2018 Hermitage
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Tasting notes
Gorgeous black raspberry and cassis fruits as well as complex saddle leather, dried flower, spice, and stony minerality all emerge from the 2018 Hermitage. One of the finest wines I've tasted from Yann Chave, this beautiful wine is full-bodied and has a rounded, expansive texture, building tannins, and again, a wonderful sense of minerality. This stunning Hermitage will benefit from 4-5 years of bottle age and cruise for two decades. Bravo!
Critic scores
Average Score
Richard Hemming MW, jancisrobinson.com
Jeb Dunnuck
More reviews and scores
Youthful purple. Smoke- and mineral-accented black and blue fruit preserve, licorice and incense scents, along with a hint of exotic spices in the background. Impressively concentrated yet lively as well, offering spice-laced black currant, bitter cherry and candied violet flavors that become sweeter with air. Delivers solid punch but comes off graceful, finishing with superb, floral-driven persistence and dusty, slow-building tannins. Chave owns vines in the Peleat and Les Beaumes lieux-dits . Raised in a combination of new and used demi-muids .
100% Syrah. Cask sample. Tasted blind. Sickly-sweet, jammy fruit on the nose. Austere and bitter on the finish. Perhaps it just needs age, but this is severe and unfriendly to taste at the moment. (RH)
Inky ruby. Ripe blackcurrant and cherry liqueur aromas are complicated by suggestions of smoky minerals, exotic spices, olive paste and succulent flowers. Concentrated black/blue fruit and spicecake flavors show impressive depth and become livelier with air. Velvety tannins add discreet grip to a very long, floral-tinged finish that echoes the smoke and spice notes.