Wine & Spirits - February 2021 - 45

Year's Best Northern Rhône Wines
consider the fruit in this .74-acre parcel
to be outstanding. It comes from their
highest-altitude plot, the vines 70 years
old and extremely low-producing. Their
concentration reads clearly in this 2018,
which is as meaty as a thick-cut steak. It's all
about black fruit and dark earth, chocolate
tannins and fresh black-pepper spice, the
flavors deepened and sweetened by the
caramel tones of new oak. Give it time in the
cellar for the oak to recede and the gamey
aspects of the fruit to come up; then pour
with a well-charred, dry-aged steak. § Taub
Family Selections, Boca Raton, FL
279548

92 | Delas Frères

$60

2018 Cornas Chante Perdrix ^ A big, burly
Cornas, this packs its generous blackberry
fruit in darker flavors of earth, game and
caramelized sugar. It's rich and chewy, a little
rustic in structure, wanting something gamey
to match. § Maisons Marques & Domaines,
Oakland, CA
278597

90 | Delas Frères

$62

2017 Cornas Chante Perdrix ^ This has all
the floral, gritty, gravelly flavors you'd expect
from syrah grown on the rugged, sun-soaked
slopes of Cornas. It's a brawny red, powered
by peppery spice, the alcohol bringing it up
slightly short in the end, but not so much
that you'd notice if there's a steak at hand.
(W&S 10/20) § Maisons Marques & Domaines,
Oakland, CA

CÔTE-RÔTIE
279568

95 | Jean-Michel Gerin

$240

2017 Côte-Rôtie Les Grandes Places ^
The Jean-Michel Gerin and his sons Alexis
and Michel source this wine from a 3.5acre lieu-dit on a steep, terraced southfacing slope. One-third of their vines were
planted in 1927, the rest in 1965 and 1989.
This super-concentrated wine, aged in new
barrels for two years, has a polished, oakdriven opulence. The tannins are firm but
fine-grained with no hard edges; the fruit
feels vibrant, dark and juicy, with a sultry,
smoky brown-sugar richness. Those flavors
hold for days, cycling through phases of oak
dominance and fruit forwardness, each phase
attractive in its own way. Give this a decade
in the cellar before you think of opening it;
it needs time to meld. § Taub Family Selections,
Boca Raton, FL
279595

95 | Christophe Pichon
Père et Fils

$65

2018 Côte-Rôtie Promesse ^ Bacon fat and
plums, black pepper and violets-this is

the sort of red that makes syrah lovers
swoon. The Pichons blend it from an array
of parcels, including ten percent viognier
in the mix, and age it for a little over a year
in oak barrels, 75 percent new. The wood
is barely noticeable; what comes across is a
sense of freshness, from the juiciness of the
fruit to the breeziness of the acidity, which
keeps the wine feeling light and open even
while the flavors reach deep into the earth.
Approachable now, this has the structure to
age. § DB Wine Selection, Framingham, MA
279567

94 | Jean-Michel Gerin

$120

2017 Côte-Rôtie La Viallière ^ This comes
from a parcel just below Les Grandes
Places, the source of the Gerins' top wine.
Destemmed, macerated for a month, and
aged in new 500-liter oak barrels for nearly
two years, the wine is dark, rich and suave,
with plenty of chocolatey fruit to fill out the
smoky oak. Rather than feeling modern
in its massive build, it feels Old World,
evoking mahogany-paneled libraries and
pipe tobacco in its scents, all with the feel
of crushed velvet. Give it time in the bottle
and the brambly fruit and cool mineral tones
should come forward. § Taub Family Selections,
Boca Raton, FL
278602

94 | E. Guigal

$85

2017 Côte-Rôtie Brune et Blonde ^ This is a
terrific vintage of Brune et Blonde, a blend
of both estate and purchased fruit from the
Côte Brune's schist soils and the Blonde's
granite. The concentration gained in the
warm, dry summer of 2017 is reflected in
the wine's color, as dark purple as a Kalamata
olive; the flavors are clenched in a fist of
tannins and oak smoke. But give the wine a
day to open and it turns cigar-smoky, with a
cool blueberry-skin feel to the fruit, silky and
refined-and it remains that way for days on
end. (W&S 10/20) § Vintus, NY
279550

93 | Delas Frères

$112

2018 Côte-Rôtie Seigneur de Maugiron
Rouge ^ Sourced mainly from parcels in the
Côte Brune, this is a lean, tough Côte-Rôtie
in its youth. Fermented in open-top concrete
vats and aged for 14 months in new and used
oak casks, the wine feels ferrous, taut and
red, with gritty tannins that keep everything
under wraps. What's hidden feels exciting,
the sense of energy and earthy complexity
that flits around the edges. Give this five
to ten years in the cellar or a long decant
before serving with a roast cooked rare,
or an eggplant tian. § Maisons Marques &
Domaines, Oakland, CA
279585

92 | Stéphane Ogier

$82

2018 Côte-Rôtie Mon Village ^ A blend of
fruit from young vines in côtes Brune and
Blonde, this is lush and youthful, brimming
with floral purple fruit. There's a touch of
oak spice but the focus is on fruit, juicy and
dark, with a sense of breezy freshness. It's
not profound, but it's elegant and delicious. §
Vineyard Brands, Birmingham, AL
279547

91 | Delas Frères

$300

2018 Côte-Rôtie La Landonne ^ From an
old-vine parcel in this famed lieu-dit of the
Côte Brune, this is dense and monolithic in
its youth. Work it in the glass and you'll find
glimmers of fresh plum, lilacs, pepper and
stone, but the main impression is blackness,
the wine's details hidden behind formidable
tannins and oak frame. Give this years in the
cellar before serving with roast beef. § Maisons
Marques & Domaines, Oakland, CA
279566

91 | Jean-Michel Gerin

$95

2017 Côte-Rôtie Champin Le Seigneur ^
This is the wine to drink while waiting for
the Gerins' other Côte-Rôties to come
around. A blend of fruit from 11 parcels,
some co-planted with viognier, it's plush and
spicy right from the start. Offering plump,
ripe fruit and caramel tones of oak, the wine
remains savory, lasting with a firmness that
would carry it through a T-bone steak. § Taub
Family Selections, Boca Raton, FL

C R O Z E S - H E R M I TA G E
279553

95 | Delas Frères

$63

94 | Christelle Betton

$35

2018 Crozes-Hermitage Le Clos ^ From a
vineyard in Les Châssis, this is an extravagant
Crozes-Hermitage, lush and spicy with
plenty of peppery plum flavor. It gets
meatier with air, the tannins asserting their
presence in its weave, while notes of coffee,
game and chocolate add complexity. It's a
regal Crozes, built for the cellar and a blackpepper-crusted steak. § Maisons Marques &
Domaines, Oakland, CA

2018 Crozes-Hermitage Espiègle ^ Christelle
Betton's young-vine Crozes could pass for an
WINE & SPIRITS

FEBRUARY 2021

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Wine & Spirits - February 2021

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of Wine & Spirits - February 2021
