Wine Advisor
Domaine Leroy, Clos de Vougeot Grand Cru 1992
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Description
Tasting notes
Reviewed by: Pierre Rovani
The bright ruby-colored 1992 Clos de Vougeot has dark pit fruit, cherry, wax, spice and juniper berry aromas. This wine is fully mature, and will harden with additional bottle age. Its character is already showing more herbal and vegetal aspects than sweetness of fruit. Softly textured on the attack, this medium-bodied wine is beginning to lose the harmony of youth. Drink up.
Reviewed by: Robert M. Parker, Jr.
The grand crus I tasted included the outstanding 1992 Clos de Vougeot. While it lacks the sheer magnificence and compelling bouquet of some of the other Domaine Leroy wines, it possesses a rich, monolithic, super-concentrated, sweet black fruit character, full body, excellent purity, and a round, generous, long finish. It should drink well for 15-20 years, but it will never reach the heights of complexity some of Bize-Leroy's other wines have achieved. I have said it so many times that it may seem redundant, but if you missed it in my 1990 tome, Burgundy, Lalou Bize-Leroy stands virtually alone at the top of Burgundy's quality hierarchy. Because she is a perfectionist, and because she has had the courage to produce wines from low yields and bottle them naturally, without fining or filtration, she has been scorned by many Burgundy negociants, and even by the proprietors of other top domaines. Not only are they jealous, they are frightened of Bize-Leroy because they fear increasing pressure for lower yields and bio-dynamic farming. Anyone who loves great Burgundy, must realize that her wines embarrass much of what is produced in Burgundy. For the fifth consecutive vintage since she launched her wines from the Domaine Leroy (formerly the Noellat estate), Lalou Bize-Leroy has made the highest percentage of Burgundy's greatest wines. Although not as phenomenally concentrated and extracted as her 1991s and 1990s, the 1992s are more closely aligned to her sumptuous 1989s. All of Domaine Leroy's 1992 Burgundies are shipped in temperature-controlled reefer containers and are distributed carefully by the American importer, Martine's Wines, San Rafael, CA; tel. (415) 485-1800.
About the Producer
Lehua is a top-level famous chateau in Burgundy. It has been able to compete with another top-level chateau in Burgundy, DRC, in just over 30 years since its establishment. Le Hua's products have always been valuable in the market. They have long been frequent buyers of Sotheby's wine auctions, and they are also the dream products of many wine collectors. The vineyards owned by Leroy are distributed in 26 legal production areas, subdivided into 46 sub-vineyards, with a total area of 22 hectares. The annual output of omaine Leroy wines of all levels is only 35,000 to 45,000 bottles.
