Wine Store

Maker's Notes -

Appearance: garnet red colour

Nose: complex and fine with notes of black fruit (blackberry / blackcurrant)

Palate: fruity with lovely notes of liquorice. Silky tannins. Creating a precise and elegant wine with lovely freshness

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Maker's Notes -

Appearance: Deep, dark garnet, nearly black.

Nose: Intense and fiery with ripe fruit notes (blackcurrants/ raspberries).

Palate: Full and powerful. The ripe fruit notes are found again on the palate along with sweet spices. Pronounced silky, delicate tannins.

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Maker's Notes - Appearance: bright, dark garnet. Nose: powerful red berry aromas (cherry, raspberry) accompanied by cocoa and sweet spice fragrances.

Nose: powerful red berry aromas (cherry, raspberry) accompanied by cocoa and sweet spice fragrances.

Palate: delicious and juicy on entry, a profusion of red fruit, full on the palate with silky, velvety tannin. The perfect example of a Grenache noir

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Wine Advocate 88 - The flamingo-hued 2019 Mathilda Chapoutier Grenache Rose features scents of crushed stone and alpine strawberries. It manages to avoid being confected while being fresh and fruity—not always an easy thing in Grenache-based rosés. Medium-bodied, it finishes with a slightly silky-textural flourish.

Vinous 88 - Light, bright orange. Smoke-tinged redcurrant, strawberry and orange zest on the nose and palate. Supple and dry, with a gripping finish that features a subtle herbal nuance.

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Vinous 91 - Glistening orange-pink. Incisive red berry and citrus fruit scents are complemented by building floral and mineral nuances. Silky, dry and precise, showing good heft to the strawberry and blood orange flavors, which are braced by an undercurrent of juicy acidity. Smoothly blends depth and energy and finishes very long and focused, with lingering florality and a suggestion of chalky minerals.

Wine Spectator 88 - This lively rosé has a glossy texture sporting cherry, tea and blood orange notes that are fresh and inviting. Accents of herb and stony mineral fine-tune the finish. Grenache, Syrah, Cinsault and Rolle.

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CRU/JRM - An Aussie shiraz with a French accent.  Dark ruby and full of black fruits and pepper aromas.  Silky smooth and elegant.

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CRU/JRM - Superbly made, elegant, long, balanced and delicious. Top shelf CDR. Super value.  Grenache and Syrah.

Maker's Notes - Beautiful garnet-red robe. The nose offers a superb aromatic bouquet with notes of red and black fruit such as cherries and blackcurrants mixed with floral notes, spices and "garrigue". With elegance, the mouth develops into fine and silky tannins with aromas of small red fruit and a beautiful aromatic and racy finish with subtle notes of tobacco.

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Maker's Notes - This wine has a very expressive nose with notes of violets and fresh strawberries. Supple, rich and complex on the palate, it reveals beautiful aromas of pepper, black fruit and thyme before a long, silky and elegant finish.

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Winemaker's Notes - The appellation of Côte de Brouilly sits on the steep slopes of the extinct volcano Mont Brouilly and is surrounded by the larger appellation of Brouilly. The soils here are volcanic with blue stones, from diorite deposits. The Stéphane Aviron Côte de Brouilly is sourced from two separate vineyards of these slopes. The first makes up about 75% of the blend and sits in the poor soils facing southwest on the hillside. Vines average 60+ years old in this parcel and these grapes account for the wine’s depth and structure. The second parcel faces due south with younger vines (45+ years) and contributes ripe juicy fruit to the final blend.

CRU/JRM - Stephane Aviron's wines are stunning value for money.  Highly respected and consistently well made.  This is silky and moreish.

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Vinous 90 - The 2019 Lucilla is deep, fleshy and superexpressive. Silky tannins wrap around a core of bright red berry fruit. Floral notes perk up the finish. Lucilla is a blend of Sangiovese, Cabernet Sauvignon and Merlot. Over time, the international varieties have become domesticated.

Wine Advocate 89 - The Castello di Farnetella 2019 Lucilla offers a medium-dark ruby color and nice, easy concentration. The wine is amply perfumed with cherry, fresh plum and summer lavender flower. Other recognizable aromas include baked clay and light spice. Let Lucilla join you on your next take-home pizza night.

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Maker's Notes - Our 14 hectare vineyard in Cairanne is located south west of the old village. The soils are stony, made of clay and sand. The wine is fleshy and develops beautiful aromas of blackcurrant, Garrigue and liquorice. Beautiful deep and intense purple colour. The fruity and expressive nose is an explosion of red fruit with spicy notes of pepper and juniper. Round and silky on the palate, it is a well-balanced wine between ripe fruit and slightly chalky tannins which bring elegance and structure.

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CRU/JRM - From vines of between 55 and 90 years of age located on the steep slopes of the famed La Madone vineyard in Beaujolais, this has deep colour and a fine, perfumed bouquet. The texture is silky, with a pure, fresh finish.  Fantastic value for money.

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Maker's Notes - The Nobile is the most representative of our terroir. Here the main star is the Sangiovese which in Italian means “Jupiter’s Blood”. A wine for the Gods. Spontaneously fermented, the Blood of Jupiter naturally deserves our greatest attention, which is why we age the grapes from every single plot separately for 18 months in oak barrels and large casks. Luscious and majestic, Nobile enchants you with its fragrant mulberry notes and delicate cinnamon hints, making you feel like an Olympian.

Jeremy's Notes - This wine has a special smoothness and elegance that evokes simple luxury.  It is not bold or super-concentrated but rather palate-caressing and silky. This pairs well with most food but is an outstanding no-food sipper and we all need those.

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Wine Spectator 89 - Cherry and plum paste notes are wrapped in a light-handed mix of singed alder and warmed licorice. Grenache, Syrah and Mourvèdre.

Wine Advocate 87 - The tank-matured 2018 Vacqueyras Domaine des Genets—a blend of Grenache, Syrah and Mourvèdre—is a solid representation of the vintage. A bit lighter in weight than expected and slightly herbal, it's a silky-textured, easy-drinking wine redolent of cherries and garrigue. Drink it over the next few years.

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Wine Spectator 93 - A refined, powerful white, with enveloping flavors of almond, white peach and spiced apple infused with wool, baking spice and vivid mineral elements. Dried flowers, heather, matchstick and honey notes mesh together on the long, lingering finish. Grenache Blanc, Grenache Gris and Vermentino. Drink now through 2024.

Wine Advocate 89 - The 2017 Côtes du Roussillon Occultum Lapidem Blanc is a 60-40 blend of Grenache Blanc and Grenache Gris, half fermented and aged in steel, the other half in demi-muids. It's plump and medium-bodied, with notes of lime zest and melon, a silky mouthfeel and hints of peach on the fresh, vibrant finish.

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CRU/JRM - A perennial favourite and serious value for money.  Medium-bodied, cherries and raspberries at the front and a silky textured finish.

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Wine Spectator 93 - Fresh, ripe and well-defined, with raspberry, bitter cherry and plum puree notes that race through, carried by a fine minerally spine while savory and sanguine details infuse the finish. Drink now through 2030.

Vinous 92 - Vivid ruby. Displays ripe, smoke-accented cherry and dark berry

scents that are complemented by hints of licorice, game and cracked pepper. Juicy and broad in the mouth, offering appealingly jammy red and blue fruit liqueur and baking spice flavors and a

salty touch of olive. Finishes long and

smooth, with well-knit tannins and repeating pepper and cherry notes.

Wine Advocate 91 - An exceptional vintage for this wine, the 2019 Crozes Hermitage les Meysonniers showcases violets, cassis and crushed stone aromas on its complex, nuanced nose. Medium to full-bodied on the palate, it's silky and seductive, with a long, exquisitely balanced finish.

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Maker's Notes - Bright gold. It offers a nose of tropical fruit, minerality and baking spices. On the palate it is round, smooth with silky texture and spicy and mineral finish.

CRU/JRM - This is luscious, moreish and very delicious. Silky smooth and palate caressing.  Hard to resist.

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An attractive, aromatic nose just beginning to show some development, the red and black cherry fruit is joined with a hint of undergrowth. Good body and silky smooth tannins make for an elegant finish.

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Wine Advocate 92 - Bottled just a week before my visit, the 2018 Saint-Péray Lieu-dit Hongrie was already showing off its stuff, bursting with notes of grilled pineapple and citrus. It's medium to full-bodied but crisp and firmly built, with a silky feel on the palate and a lingering, nicely focused finish.

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Wine Spectator 92 - Expressive, with welcoming black cherry and plum pâte de fruit aromas and flavors, gilded with violet and anise notes. Reveals a graphite edge on the finish. Tasty.

Wine Advocate 89-91 - The medium to full-bodied 2020 Crozes Hermitage Domaine des Grands Chemins features gently floral aromas and a backdrop of cherry fruit. It's silky and fine, with a hint of mocha on the lingering finish.

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Wine Advocate 91-93 - Comprising old vines not from la Crau or le Pied Long (two years ago, the Bruniers purchased eight hectares of 60-year-old Grenache, specifically for this cuvée) and young vines from those lieux-dits, the 2020 Chateauneuf du Pape Telegramme delivers pretty notions of strawberries and raspberries, plus just a hint of chocolate. Full-bodied but silky, fine and elegant, this looks like the finest wine I've tasted under this label—a solid wine of its own.

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Vinous 92 - The 2011 Brunello di Montalcino is one of the more successful wines of the vintage. Sage, lavender, iron, smoke and dark red cherry notes flesh out in a supple, inviting Brunello. A kick of Mediterranean warmth gives the 2011 its generous texture, with all of the elements very much in the right place. I would prefer to drink the 2011 over the next handful of years or so. This is a strong showing from Piancornello.

WA 91 -  Here's a pretty, ruby-colored Sangiovese from the heart of southern Tuscany. The 2011 Brunello di Montalcino shows a lot of purity and red fruit intensity with wild berry and dried cherries in pole position. The wine offers a good sense of depth and balance thanks to those warmer notes of light tobacco and spice that add complexity in a subtle and lasting way. This Brunello is also distinguished by the mouthfeel that is tonic and bright without feeling too ripe or thick. This is a silky and elegant wine with a medium finish.

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Wine Advocate 94 - The Begali Lorenzo 2017 Amarone della Valpolicella Classico is a beautiful wine that shows ample ripeness, with balance. It shows elegant restraint, but it is also exuberant and fully loaded. Its opulent character is very much in line with the hot vintage and the basic promise of Amarone that always prioritizes big intensity and lots of brooding fruit. This estate opts for more Rondinella in the blend, clocking in at about 35%, with 60% Corvina and 5% other complementary grapes. Rondinella adds much of the darkness and the extra concentration you see here. It is aged in French tonneaux and botte for three years. The Lorenzo Begali house style offers oak contours and renderings with extra softness and textural density.

Vinous 93 - Dark, rich and deeply seductive, the 2017 Amarone della Valpolicella Classico lifts up with notes of crushed blackberries, balsamic spice, smoke and lifting hints of mentholated herbs. It’s silky, coating the palate in glycerol-like textures contrasted by saturating black fruits, salty minerals and bitter cocoa. A fine layer of tannin clamps down hard, leaving only purple-tinged inner florals and hints of black licorice to resonate throughout. The 2017 does a wonderful job of straddling both the savory and sweet side of Amarone, but it will require a good amount of cellaring to fully flesh out.

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Wine Advocate 96 - The 2016 Chianti Classico Riserva Rancia knocks it out of the park. Like the other new releases from Fèlsina, this pure expression of Sangiovese needs more time to evolve and improve with bottle age. But even at this young stage, you are made fully aware of the beautiful intensity and complexity of the quality fruit at its core. There is so much energy and tension here, further reinforced by the fresh acidity of the vintage. There are vibrant tones of wild cherry, raspberry and spice, followed up by white truffle and tilled earth.

Wine Spectator 94 - This features ripe, juicy black cherry and black currant fruit, with licorice, earth and tobacco flavors. Firm tannins frame the elements, imparting structure and complexity for the long haul. Terrific texture. Best from 2022 through 2042.

Vinous 94-97 - The 2016 Chianti Classico Riserva Rancia is yet another magnificent wine in this range from Fèlsina. Silky, gracious and inviting, the 2016 starts off gradually and then builds, gaining volume and explosiveness with air. A wine of breadth, textural intensity and pure power, the 2016 Rancia is shaping up to be epic. That's pretty much all there is to it.

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Vinous 95 - The 2014 Barbaresco Pajoré is broad, ample and super-expressive. Dark cherry, spice, lavender, licorice and leather flesh out in a multi-dimensional, complex Barbaresco endowed with myriad shades of nuance. Here, too, the tannins are fully ripe, which allows all the purity of the fruit to come through loud and clear.

Wine Advocate 94 - The 2014 Barbaresco Pajorè is a lovely wine with a firm and convincing sense of inner intensity and elegance. Red cherries and cassis rise from the bouquet, which is delivered with almost musical pulses of brightness that keep time and tempo. The wine's concentration is dark ruby and luminous. Dried mint, anise and licorice appears on the silky finish. The 1.5-hectare Pajorè vineyard is located in Treiso. Vines are up to 70 years old.

Wine Spectator 92 - Fresh thyme, cherry, tobacco and mineral flavors are the hallmarks of this firm, linear red, which is shy aromatically, but there is a core of sweet fruit. Fine length and freshness. Best from 2020 through 2032.

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WA 94 - Slighter richer is the 2015 Gigondas Clos des Tourelles. It shows similar floral notes but fills the mouth with ripe stone fruit and cherries, fine tannins and an incredibly silky finish. All of the Perrin Gigondas show the elegant side of the appellation.

Vinous 92-94 - Vivid ruby. Expressive aromas of blackberry, cherry compote and candied flowers are sharpened by a smoky mineral topnote. Gently sweet and focused on the palate, offering intense red and blue fruit flavors that deepen and spread out slowly with aeration. Shows hints of candied licorice and allspice on a very long, sappy finish that features smooth tannins and an exotic twist of blood orange.

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Wine Advocate 93 - Elio Altare gives me a bit of his winemaker's wisdom: "Wine is like a marriage—it needs to be consummated early." With that in mind, the 2015 Barolo is engineered for near- and medium-term drinking with lots of plump fruit that jumps right out. The wine is open and inviting. Dark fruit is followed by warm tones of tilled earth and cured tobacco. Grapes are harvested from different parcels in four vineyard passes. In 2015, the team had the time to wait for each parcel to mature properly because the harvest was relaxed and spread over more comfortable timing. This Barolo would match up nicely with a mild liver dish.

Wine Spectator 92 - A ripe style, boasting plum, black cherry and sun-kissed hay flavors, with a hint of vanilla. The lush fruit and texture is offset by dense tannins. All the components converge on the long finish. Best from 2021 through 2038.

Vinous 92 - The 2015 Barolo is an absolutely glorious wine. Sensual, silky and polished, the 2015 has so much to offer. Bright red berry fruit is nicely complemented by an array of floral and spiced notes that add nuance. Polished tannins add to the wine's considerable near-term appeal, but the straight Barolo also has a track record h ere of aging exceptionally well.Vineyard sites include Pernanno, Sarmassa, Rochettevino and Cerretta. Don't miss it.

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Vinous 90-93 - Deep red. Superripe yet vibrant on the nose, with a sappy lift to the raspberry and spice aromas. Lush, silky and sweet, with underlying minerality giving energy to the raspberry and cocoa powder flavors. This dense but vibrant wine really saturates the palate with flavor. Seems a bit richer in alcohol than most of these 2007s, which is not at all a bad thing.

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Wine Advocate 96-98 - Even better than I remember it being last year, and potentially edging out the L'Argnée this vintage, the 2017 Gigondas Clos des Tourelles is just flat-out terrific juice. From yields around 15 hectoliters per hectare, it's 80% Grenache and 10% each Mourvèdre and Syrah, all aged in foudre. Soaring floral notes of rose petals, violets and garrigue appear on the nose, followed by ripe raspberry flavors that flow almost weightlessly across the silky, full-bodied palate. So fine, so elegant, so long, it nearly left me speechless.

Vinous 95 - Opaque, bright-rimmed ruby. Intensely perfumed, mineral-accented cherry and dark berry scents are accompanied by suggestions of licorice, candied flowers and exotic spices. Fleshy and broad in the mouth, offering deeply concentrated cherry pastry and blackberry flavors that become more energetic as the wine stretches out. Shows superb energy and mineral lift on an impressively long, subtly tannic finish that leaves behind a suave floral note.

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Wine Advocate 95-97 - There are a whopping two demi-muids of the stellar 2017 Gigondas L'Argnee Vieilles Vignes in the pipeline, so readers will have to be on their toes to grab a bottle or two. Made from the same pre-Phylloxera parcel of Grenache, it's incredibly intense this vintage, boasting enough purple raspberries, black cherries and Asian spices to send me almost into sensory overload. Yet for all the flavor, this full-bodied wine is velvety-silky in feel, with a long, elegant finish.

Vinous 94 - Opaque ruby. Highly expressive aromas of mineral-tinged red berries, incense and licorice candy, along with a suave floral nuance that builds as the wine opens up. Appealingly sweet and seamless on the palate, offering penetrating raspberry, cherry, spicecake and candied lavender flavors that are braced by a spine of juicy acidity. Finishes silky, sweet and impressively long, with gentle tannins and lingering floral pastille and exotic spice notes.

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Wine Advocate 96+ - The 2019 Chateauneuf du Pape La Crau is a hugely successful vintage, marked by scents of sun-warmed stones, garrigue, black cherries and black olives. Full-bodied, rich and velvety, it finishes with tremendous length and softly dusty tannins, which should help ensure a long, positive evolution.

Wine Spectator 93 - Silky and refined, with focused cherry puree, plum reduction and raspberry coulis notes racing through, infused subtly with rose petal, warm stone and lavender hints. Features nice perfume through the finish. Grenache, Mourvèdre, Syrah and Cinsault. Drink now through 2036.

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Wine Advocate 95-97 - Another in a string of top vintages, Beaucastel's 2018 Chateauneuf du Pape was produced from Grenache yields of only eight hectoliters per hectare ("normal" is about 28 hectoliters per hectare, according to Marc Perrin). The final blend I was shown is almost candied in its fruity intensity of raspberries and cherries, yet it has a potent underpinning of more savory elements, like tapenade, grilled meat and dried spices. Full-bodied, with fine, silky tannins, this shows tremendous length, reverberating with hints of crushed stone on the finish.

Vinous 92-94 - Deep ruby-red. Ripe dark berries, cherry liqueur and hints of garrigue, smoked meat and potpourri on the mineral-accented nose. Palate-staining black currant and cherry pie flavors show excellent clarity, chewy texture and a hint of spicecake that builds as the wine opens up. The energetic, impressively long finish repeats the floral and dark fruit notes, and youthfully chewy tannins add shape and solid closing grip.

Decanter 96 - This is a towering, muscular Beaucastel this year with more depth, intensity and black fruit, pushing towards blackcurrant. It’s very dense and extremely concentrated in 2018, more than most but it has the energy and the vibrancy to thrust it front and forward ending with a saline finish. Grenache and Cinsault fermented in cement, Syrah and Mourvèdre fermented in foudre.

Jeb Dunnuck 94 - Moving to the reds, the 2018 Châteauneuf Du Pape showed nicely with a deep ruby/purple color as well as classic Beaucastel aromas and flavors of darker currents, blueberries, smoked meats, black licorice and roasted herbs. With medium to full-bodied richness, a pure, clean, elegant texture, sweet tannins, and a great finish, this seamless, elegant Beaucastel will be approachable in its youth, yet still have 20+ years of prime drinking.

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