Domaine de la Romanée Conti, La Tache Grand Cru 2016

robert_parker98

Reviewed by: Neal Martin

The 2016 La Tâche Grand Cru was picked on 24 and 25 September at 31 hectoliters per hectare, the highest yields in this vintage. It has a profound and complex bouquet: blackberry and raspberry fruit intermingling with loam, iris and a strong estuarine influence, beautifully defined and mercurial as it always is in barrel. The palate is very refined on the entry: precise red and black fruit dissected by a killer line of acidity. This is a typically multifaceted and labyrinthine La Tâche with stunning delineation on the finish. I am absolutely fascinated to see how this turns out in bottle and hope/dream that I can find out many times over.

robert_parker98

Reviewed by: William Kelley

More reserved than the Richebourg and Romanée-St-Vivant, the 2016 La Tâche Grand Cru unwinds in the glass with aromas of wild berries, licorice, rose petal, smoked duck and love, framed by a touch of cedary new oak. On the palate, the wine is full-bodied, rich and velvety, with a deep, concentrated but tight-knit core, its firm chassis of fine-grained, structuring tannins cloaked in succulent fruit, underpinned by juicy acids. The finish is long and reverberative. This is a stunning La Tâche in the making, but it is also one of the more reticent wines in the range and will demand some bottle age.

vinous98

Reviewed by: Neal Martin

The 2016 La Tâche Grand Cru was picked on September 24–25 at 31hL/ha (the highest of the five crus). It has an utterly sublime bouquet of blackberry, briar, crushed limestone, a dash of cracked black pepper and a little oregano. This is extremely complex and displays exquisite focus, to the extent that you could just sit and nose it all day. The palate is beautifully balanced, the spicy red fruit framed by filigreed tannin that belies its backbone. There is a gentle crescendo from start to finish, though being La Tâche it retains complete control. The precision and detail in the final third are deeply impressive. Less fruit-forward than the 2015, and lightly spiced, with an insistent grip. There is a captivating sense of completeness that will ensure longevity through three or four decades. 1,814 cases produced. Tasted at Corney & Barrow’s annual in-bottle tasting in London.

vinous98

Reviewed by: Stephen Tanzer

Saturated bright, dark red-ruby. Very dark, reserved scents of blackberry, violet, licorice and spices; rather brooding and cool for an infant La Tâche. Boasts extraordinary concentration but this is very tightly wound today and showing less early flesh than the Richebourg. Like an essence of a wine, but distinctly vertical in the early going. The wine's quality and class are most easily appreciated today on the extremely long, floral, rising finish.