2016 Crozes Hermitage Thalabert
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Tasting notes
Deep vivid ruby. Vibrant, highly perfumed black and blue fruit, floral and incense aromas pick up exotic spice and mineral flourishes with aeration. Pure, focused and energetic in the mouth, offering appealingly sweet boysenberry, cassis and violet pastille flavors that show no rough edges. Deepens steadily on the very long, lively finish, which features resonating florality and well-knit tannins.
Critic scores
Average Score
Joe Czerwinski, Wine Advocate
Richard Hemming MW, jancisrobinson.com
More reviews and scores
The 2016 Crozes Hermitage Domaine De Thalabert offers a rocking (and classic) bouquet of ripe black fruits intermixed with notions of new saddle leather, pepper, garrigue, and hints of bacon fat. This ripe, medium to full-bodied, silky wine has remarkable purity, is already complex, and finishes with serious length. Drink it over the coming 10-15 years. The big news at this benchmark estate is the loss of winemaker Jacques Desvernois to Domaine Guigal. At the time of my tasting with Caroline Frey, there was no replacement, so it will be interesting to see who comes on board. They will certainly have big shoes to fill. Nevertheless, the estate has been on an incredible roll, with their sensational 2015s last year, and now two strong vintages with their 2016s and 2017s.
The classically styled 2016 Crozes Hermitage Domaine de Thalabert boasts savory scents of black olive and leather. Medium to full-bodied, it's plummy and rich, creamy and ripe but savory and earthy, not jammy at all, with a lingering, velvety-textured finish. It drinks well now, but it should continue to evolve and drink well through 2035.
This shows pretty dark fruit along with cloves, dark berries and hints of black pepper. Medium to full body and a juicy finish.