The 2018 Chablis Les Vaillons Vieilles Vignes 1er Cru offers green apples, lime, sea spray and light grilled almond notes on a nose that takes a few swirls of the glass to get going. The palate is well balanced, with a faint tang of dried quince and bitter lemon on the entry. I admire the salinity and savory finish of this Vaillons, though I suspect it will show best in its youth. Maybe I’ll be proved wrong!

The 2018 Chablis Les Vaudevey 1er Cru offers attractive honeysuckle and orange pith scents on a nose that gradually achieves greater delineation with aeration. The palate is well balanced with a lively opening: lemon zest, dried orange peel, and a touch of ginger coming through with aeration. Quite long on the finish, this is a fine, easygoing Vaudevey that I suspect will be best broached in the flush of youth.

The 2018 Chablis Les Blanchots Grand Cru did not quite engage the senses on the nose. Following on from the delightful Côte de Léchet, it is just missing a bit of lift and vigor. The palate is much better, featuring lemon zest, lime and light orange peel notes on the entry, a fine bead of acidity, and a concentrated, quite penetrating finish that leaves a saline aftertaste. I will be prudent with my score for now, hoping that the aromatics will get their act together.

Intense, offering lavender, honeysuckle, apricot, lemon and saline flavors, packed into a creamy texture. Vibrant, converging on the long aftertaste, where lemon and stone elements collide. Drink now through 2025. 330 cases made, 50 cases imported.

Ripened in the ample sun of Les Clos, with its direct southern exposure, this is packed with flavor intensity, straight through to its bright, sunny finish. Laroche owns 2.77 acres of the vineyard, the vines 30 to 50 years old; its 2017 feels vibrant and youthfully grand, with Meyer lemon richness wrapped in smoky, briny soil notes. This has the substance to develop for a decade or more.

Covering a knoll below Vaillons, this 17-acre parcel sustains 70-year-old vines on Kimmeridgian limestone. Aged in French oak foudre, its fruit delivers a bright wine with the immediate richness of a briny shellfish stock, layering langoustine, oyster and scallop freshness into notes of green apple and honeycomb. The wine’s clean power races through sun and shadows with a wow factor that’s unusual for a village Chablis. Delicious.

The 2017 Chablis Les Blanchots Grand Cru is airy in the glass, with a real feeling of translucent energy that distinguishes it in this range. White flowers, citrus, orchard fruit and light tropical accents all grace this understated, nuanced 1er Cru. This is such a pretty wine.

The 2018 Chablis Grand Cru Blanchots La Réserve de l'Obédience is showing well, offering up aromas of crisp yellow apple, citrus oil, toasted almonds and warm bread, framed by a patina of oak that integrates nicely with a little time in the glass. Medium to full-bodied, muscular and structured, it's firm and mineral, built around an appreciable presence of dry extract. Youthful and introverted, it will be fascinating to revisit with a few years in bottle.

The 2017 Chablis Les Bouguerots Grand Cru is a bright, inward, tightly coiled wine that is going to need at least a few years in bottle to unwind. White flowers, citrus peel, white pepper, mint and chalky notes abound. The Bouguerots is marked by its taut, nervy feel, but there is plenty of substance waiting to emerge as well. It is one of the highlights in the range.

The 2016 Chablis Les Bouguerots Grand Cru is reduced to only one demi-muid this year (although this is still more than there will be in 2017!) The bouquet needs a little more definition, touches of yellow plum and oyster shell, are quite feisty in style rather than elegant. The palate is well balanced with a spicy, stem ginger-tinged opening, fine depth although personally I seek more precision and mineral-tension to come through on the finish.

The 2017 Chablis Les Montmains 1er Cru is bright, lifted and finely cut, with tons of energy that give the wine its sense of focus. White flowers, citrus, orchard fruit, mint and pineapple all develop in the glass, but it is the wine's taut feel that stands out most. This is another compelling wine from Laroche.

A cool, pure and very pretty nose features notes of mineral reduction, green apple, iodine and tidal pool. There is an attractive texture to the delicious, intense and well-detailed middle weight flavors that aren't super-dense but they do offer fine depth and persistence on the youthfully persistent lemon-tinged finish. This is worth checking out.

Revisiting the 2016 Chablis 1er Cru Montmains, I found it drinking well, offering up the same aromas of white peach, mandarin oil and Meyer lemon that it showed a year ago, today complemented by suggestions of dried white flowers and lanolin. On the palate, the wine is medium-bodied, bright and incisive, with a fleshy core of fruit, tangy acids and an attractively pure, precise finish. While I suspect that this will develop more exotic overtones with further bottle age, it's an undeniable success in this challenging vintage.

The 2016 Chablis Les Montmains 1er Cru comes entirely from the titular vineyard and is matured 60% in oak. It has an attractive richness on the nose, more so than the Les Vaillons Vieilles Vignes, scents of white peach, melted candlewax and praline. The palate is well balanced with a slightly earthy entry, the acidity well judged and displaying impressive weight towards the finish that is laced with nutmeg and a pinch of fennel. This is quite a complex Les Montmains that will deserve a year or two in bottle. What a great Montmains from Laroche.

The 2017 Chablis 1er Cru Les Fourchaumes Vieilles Vignes is a dramatic, powerful wine that offers up aromas of yellow orchard fruit, honeycomb, white flowers, nectarines and oyster shells. On the palate, it's full-bodied, ample and fleshy, with a generous, impactful attack, though it falls a little short on the finish.

The 2017 Chablis Les Fourchaumes Vieilles Vignes 1er Cru captures all of the signatures that make the Laroche wines so compelling. Rich, complex and multi-dimensional, the 2017 opens up beautifully in the glass. Lemon confit, dried flowers, mint, apricot and light tropical notes infuse the 2017 with striking character as well as nuance. There is so much going on here.

A notably ripe nose exhibits a whiff of exotic fruit while displaying enough Chablis typicity to be persuasive. The sleek, intense and appealingly textured medium-bodied flavors are not as dense as what I'm used to seeing, all wrapped in a delicious if not especially complex finale. This is prettier than it is deep though I do like the clean, dry and focused finale.

The 2016 Chablis 1er Cru Les Fourchaumes Vieilles Vignes is one of the more expressive wines in what's a youthfully reticent range, exhibiting pretty aromas of white peaches and flowers. On the palate, it's medium-bodied, glossy and textural, with a broad attack, succulent acids and a tense, stony finish. Understated but nicely balanced, it's a persuasive Fourchaumes.

The 2016 Chablis Les Fourchaumes Vieilles Vignes 1er Cru, which comes mainly from L’Homme Mort, is aged 60% in oak and 40% in stainless steel. It has a comparatively rich bouquet with scents of orange blossom and peach skin complementing the citrus peel notes, although, personally, I would have preferred more mineralité here. The palate shows fine tension from the start, quite concentrated but with satisfying energy towards the finish that offers just a hint of stem ginger. There is plenty of energy here and it probably deserves a couple of years in bottle.

The 2018 Chablis Les Vaudevey 1er Cru is a gorgeous, complex wine. Dried flowers, slate and earthy tones give the 2018 tons of aromatic nuance to match its mid-weight personality. The Vaudevey is an especially somber Chablis marked by strong mineral/soil inflections. It is also tightly wound today and in need of time to be at its best.