2005 Richebourg
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Tasting notes
There is the first whiff of secondary character to the gorgeously complex red, black and violet-infused aromas that are trimmed with a dazzling array of spice and sandalwood hints. The round, intense and overtly muscular broad-shouldered flavors possess real power and superb intensity that slowly builds from the mid-palate to the explosively persistent and robust finish. I really like the purity of expression here on the linear and stony backend that has a dusty quality from all of the dry extract that coats the palate and buffers the still notably firm tannic spine. This is a big wine but it remains impeccably well-balanced and it should live for decades, indeed it is still very much in need of more cellar time.
Critic scores
Average Score
Allen Meadows, Burghound
The Wine Advocate
More reviews and scores
Deep red-ruby. The nose offers a pure, pungent expression of Richebourg soil: black raspberry, blueberry pastille, musky minerality, smoke, cocoa powder. Like a black hole of dark fruits on the palate: thick but weightless, with incredible concentration and depth. This is quite closed, like the Beaux-Monts, with the slow-mounting finish displaying great length and thrust. A fabulously ripe but youthfully imploded wine that will need 12 to 15 years in the cellar to fully express itself.
The 2005 Richebourg displays a fascinating and alluring bouquet of black raspberry, nutmeg, ginger, sandalwood, and marrow. It offers an incredibly spicy, intensely black-fruited, old vines impression in the mouth, coating the palate with silken folds of fruit yet gliding elegantly into a finish of dark berries, spice, raw meat, wet stone, and mineral salts. Like spading fertile earth, one turns up new, dark secrets with each sip. For all of its textural richness and ripeness of fruit, this superb Pinot preserves a certain “cool” restraint, with no superficial sweetness. It would be a shame to cellar this for fewer than 10-12 years. Etienne Grivot aimed this year for gentle extraction (essentially without pigeage), then watchful preservation of the freshness, subtleties and refinement inherent in near-perfect raw material. He performed some very light chaptalization to extend the fermentations. Given the health and natural concentration of his vinous raw material, he felt no need to sulfur or rack the wines until shortly prior to bottling (without filtration), which was the stage at which I tasted. Importer: Diageo Chateau and Estate Wines Company, New York, NY; tel. (212) 419-1400.
Good medium red-ruby. Reticent nose hints at black raspberry, chocolate and minerals. Then wonderfully broad and horizontal in the mouth, with great palate-staining sweetness of fruit. Fabulously mouthfilling wine without any heaviness. Perhaps most impressive today on the palate-staining finish, which offers extraordinary length. Grivot advises cellaring this for 15 years but notes that it may never really shut down in its youth.
About the producer
A benchmark name in Vosne-Romanée, Domaine Jean Grivot is one of Burgundy’s most respected estates. They have an impressive array of vineyards, including plots in Grand Cru Clos de Vougeot, Echezeaux and Richebourg.