Domaine des Lambrays, Clos des Lambrays Grand Cru 2015

robert_parker95

Reviewed by: Neal Martin

The 2015 Clos de Lambrays Grand Cru contains 95% whole cluster fruit, part of the crop with thicker skins deprived of their stems according to winemaker Thierry Brouin. It is being aged in 50% new oak. It has dusky black fruit on the nose, earthier than I was expecting given the growing season, the stem addition lending a subtle undergrowth and moss-like scent. The palate is medium-bodied with grainy tannin and offers succinctly judged acidity. It is certainly harmonious in the mouth with a generous dash of black pepper on the finish, a pleasant prickle in the mouth after the wine has departed. Whilst not the purring engine that is Clos de Tart since it is more rough-hewn perhaps, this Clos des Lambrays has a charm of its own.

robert_parker95

Reviewed by: William Kelley

The 2015 Clos des Lambrays Grand Cru continues to show very well, unfurling in the glass with a rich bouquet of ripe plums, blackberries, dark chocolate and forest floor. On the palate, it's full-bodied, satiny and powerful, with an ample chassis of fine structuring tannins and a deep core of fruit, but the wine is shutting down and is more inscrutable than it was six months earlier. Readers with bottles in their cellars are sitting on a great example of Clos des Lambrays, one of the best produced since the 1970s, but a decade's patience is advised.

robert_parker95

Reviewed by: William Kelley

The 2015 Clos des Lambrays Grand Cru wafts from the glass with a youthfully reticent bouquet of mulberry, plum, cocoa nib, game bird, currant leaf and mossy soil, its framing of new oak already nicely integrated. On the palate, the wine is full-bodied, deep and multidimensional, framed by an ample chassis of savory, fine-grained tannins, and underpinned by bright acids which already seem appreciably more vibrant than they did from barrel. This has already begun to shut down after bottling, but its immense potential is impossible to miss: a controlled and beautifully balanced Clos des Lambrays.

vinous94

Reviewed by: Neal Martin

The 2015 Clos des Lambrays Grand Cru has a pure, utterly seductive bouquet of raspberry coulis, wild strawberry, crushed stone and seamlessly integrated new oak. The palate is medium-bodied with firm tannins - a serious Grand Cru that has closed up in recent months. Foursquare, distant and aloof - but maybe that is what you seek at this stage? Not enjoyable but certainly a quality-driven wine that needs a decade in bottle. Tasted blind at the annual Burgfest tasting.

vinous95

Reviewed by: Stephen Tanzer

(100% vendange entier): Healthy dark red. Pure but tight aromas of raspberry, spices, rose petal, licorice and herbs. Densely packed and vibrant--impressively so for a 2015--with notes of bitter orange rind and peppery herbs accenting its flavors of red berries, brown spices, menthol, mocha and underbrush. Very savory wine with terrific spicy depth, as well as more punch than the 2016. Finishes very firm and extremely long, with serious but refined tannins and superb lift. An outstanding vintage for this grand cru, this wine combines the best characteristics of 2005 and 2010, and that's a formula for longevity and greatness.

vinous95

Reviewed by: Stephen Tanzer

(made with 95% whole clusters; Brouin destemmed 5% of the fruit owing to the thick skins of '15): Healthy dark red. Subdued but complex, sexy scents of raspberry, mocha, brown spices and earth: a real essence of this distinctive grand cru. Sappy and wild, conveying terrific intensity and precision to its red berry and spice flavors. Tactile, savory, dense and very long, finishing with lovely energy and peppery lift and a lingering element of salty minerality. Beautifully integrated ripe tannins suggest that this will be an outstanding and long-lived vintage for Clos des Lambrays. The pH here is 3.6, which Brouin described as normal. Brouin added that potential alcohol levels following the sorting were around 12.5% in 2015, and that the finished wines will be between 13% and 13.2%.