2011 Château de Saint Cosme Gigondas

Moving to the Gigondas cuvees, starting with the wines in bottle, the classic 2011 Gigondas is a serious effort that gets you a good bit of the class and richness found in the upper, single vineyard cuvees, yet for a lot less buck. A blend of 60% Grenache, 30% Mourvedre and 10% Syrah, it gives up toasty, spice-driven notes of blackberries, ground pepper and cured meats that flow to a medium to full-bodied, textured and layered effort that has notable freshness and sweet tannin. It will shine for over a decade and represents an excellent value. Without a doubt, the leading estate in Gigondas is Louis Barruol’s Chateau Saint-Cosme. Located just outside the village, he releases an assortment of world class Gigondas, as well as a number of value priced, negotiate-styled Cotes du Rhone efforts that always deliver high-quality (these are normally released under his Saint-Cosme label and do not say Chateau Saint-Cosme). Both 2011 and 2012 are incredibly strong here and readers should not miss these wines! The three single vineyard releases are basically 100% Grenache, from unique terroirs, that are brought up all in Burgundy barrels, 30% being new, 40% 1-year-old and the balance 2-3-year old. In addition to these wines, I review a number of Barruol’s northern Rhone releases in Issue 210 as well, and covered his Chateauneuf du Papes in Issue 209. Importer: Country Vintners, Ashland, VA; tel. (804) 752-3670

Deep ruby. Vibrant raspberry and strawberry scents are complicated by notes of dried lavender and Asian spices. Racy, pure red fruit flavors show very good depth and appealing sweetness. Finishes with fine-grained tannins and lingering spiciness. This wine should drink well soon after release thanks to its lively fruit and gentle tannins.

Very dense crimson. Thick and sweet with lots of satisfaction already. Tannins lurk. All in excellent balance. Powerful, mind you… (JR)