2009 Fleurie Clos de la Grand'Cour

Dutraive’s 2009 Fleurie Clos de la Grand’ Cour – representing the estate’s largest cuvee, and vinified half in foudre, half in old barriques – is loaded with elderberry and red raspberry shadowed by distilled berry essences and tinged with brown spices. Interestingly marked by nuttiness and resin from its oak and oxygen exposure, this displays a slight but not annoying tick of tannic roughness in its otherwise satisfyingly long finish. Based on the evolution of several older exemplars I tasted, I would plan to drink it within two years. Jean-Louis Dutraive’s Domaine du Grand’ Cour occupies a spacious complex of ancient buildings that testify to its long-standing communal importance. Utilization of older barrels and minimal sulfur compromised the purity of fruit and engendered considerable oxidation in several of the cuvees I tasted here (all of which are vinified by extended carbonic maceration), especially among Dutraive’s 2007s, suggesting also that these wines need to be drunk young. No known U.S. importer.