Wine Advisor
Clusel Roch, Cote Rotie Les Grandes Places 2016
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Description
Tasting notes
Reviewed by: Joe Czerwinski
From old vines (80 to 90 years old), the 2016 Cote Rotie les Grandes Places is maturing in 25% new oak. It offers up hints of toasted almond, cherry and espresso. It's a more muscular wine than the Vialliere, yet it still retains an inherent sense of lightness and elegance.
Reviewed by: Josh Raynolds
Bright purple. Powerful, spice-accented dark berry preserve, fruitcake, candied violet and licorice scents, along with notes of vanilla, olive and smoky Indian spices. Palate-staining blueberry and cherry liqueur flavors show superb depth braced by a spine of juicy acidity. Expands slowly with air, picking up hints of star anise and cola. At once plush and energetic, finishing with superb clarity, mounting tannins and outstanding persistence.
Reviewed by: James Suckling
This has darker fruit with more modern spices and riper, darker, cherry and boysenberry character. The palate is very powerful, very defined and beautifully cast in terms of tannins. Dark-chocolate and black-cherry-liqueur flavors at the finish. A terraced plot, high up on the slope. 30 per cent whole cluster fermentation. Pure syrah with no viognier. Try in 2024.
About the Producer
Guillaume Clusel is the man behind a uniquely elegant style of Côte-Rôtie. In an area of the Rhône valley associated with powerful red wines, his Syrah is graceful and refined. The secret is his attention to detail. Guillaume picks early and by hand and uses around 30% whole bunch fruit in many of his cuvées. He has farmed his 20 hectares of vineyards organically since 2002, and alongside his coveted Côte-Rôtie vineyards, also grows Viognier on the terraced slopes of the hills of Condrieu, plus Chardonnay and Gamay in the warm, pebbled soils of the Côteaux du Lyonnais. Guillaume took over the domaine from his parents, Gilbert Clusel and Brigitte Roch, who put the estate on the map during the 90s when they invested significantly in the vineyards and the cellar. His signature wine, Les Schistes, is a classic Côte-Rôtie blend with a dash of Viognier bringing a floral lift to the Syrah and named after the south-east facing soils of his Northern Rhône vineyards.
