2013 Romanee St Vivant

Deep ruby-red. Wilder and deeper on the nose than the Clos Vougeot, offering scents of black raspberry and bitter cherry lifted by menthol and mint. Dense with material and extremely unevolved, showing little easy sweetness to the flavors of crushed black cherry and chocolate. Still brooding and medicinal, in fact almost brutal today, this large-scaled grand cru will get a later bottling.

The 2013 Romanée-Saint-Vivant Grand Cru sees 90% new oak and 25% whole-bunch fruit. It has an intense black plum, blackcurrant and fresh strawberry-scented bouquet with a subtle marine influence infusing the fruit. The palate is showing a lot of oak on the entry but there is plenty of fruit to absorb that, albeit with 8-10 year’s aging. Quite dense, almost opaque, this is a modern style of RSV but the persistence on the finish, that tingle on the tip of the tongue and the salinity seals the deal.

The 2013 Romanee-Saint-Vivant Grand Cru sees 90% new oak and 25% whole-bunch fruit. It has an intense black plum, blackcurrant and fresh strawberry-scented bouquet with a subtle marine influence infusing the fruit. The palate is showing a lot of oak on the entry but there is plenty of fruit to absorb that, albeit with 8-10 year’s aging. Quite dense, almost opaque, this is a modern style of RSV but the persistence on the finish, that tingle on the tip of the tongue and the salinity seals the deal. Dec 2014, www.robertparker.com