Wine Advisor
Henri Magnien, Ruchottes Chambertin Grand Cru 2019
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Description
Tasting notes
Reviewed by: Neal Martin
The 2019 Ruchottes-Chambertin Grand Cru, 25% whole bunch matured in two-thirds new oak (including a new cooperage, Lagrange), was surly and backward on the nose. Crushed stone infuses the dusky black fruit, along with hints of tobacco. This demands a lot of coaxing. The palate is well balanced with tarry blackberry and bilberry. It is initially quite austere but mellows with time, white pepper and truffle infusing the black fruit. Lively and quite persistent on the finish. This deserves five years in bottle to really meld together, but it has very good potential.
Reviewed by: William Kelley
The finest rendition of this cuvée to date is the 2019 Ruchottes-Chambertin Grand Cru, a lovely wine that wafts from the glass with notes of red berries, plums, blood orange, peonies and rose petals. Medium to full-bodied, layered and velvety, with an ample core of lively, perfumed fruit that almost entirely conceals the wine's rich structuring tannins, it concludes with a long and expansive finish.
About the Producer
The Henri Magnien wines are currently made by the dynamic young Charles Magnien, a winemaker pushing boundaries within this classic Domaine. "Charles Magnien took the helm at this enviable six-hectare Domaine in Gevrey-Chambertin in 2009, and his seemingly boundless ambition is already bearing dividends. Friends with the likes of Cyrielle Rousseau, Maxime Cheurlin and Guillaume Rouget, Magnien is part of the Côte de Nuits' dynamic younger generation, but there is substance here as well as style—manifested in a renovated and well-appointed winery and, he tells me, ambitious work in the vines." The Henri Magnien wines are also unique in the Pinot Noir clone they work with. Theirs is a particularly old clonal selection, lovingly referred to as 'Pinot Noir Magnien'. Unique to their Domaine, it lends itself to a particularly intense expression of Pinot with a distinctive spicy kick
