« Goody Goody Yum Yum | Main | Life-Changing Stuff … DRC 2006 »
Clos v Clos - our lucky winner reports back
By Peter | November 18, 2008
So many of you were keen to win my ticket to the Fine Wine Experience’s Clos de Tart versus Clos de Lambray tasting last month ! Only one could go, but here is the eighteenth next best thing - a full report. Many thanks to our competition winner, Paul, for writing up these notes, and allowing us to publish them here.
Anthony Hanson introduced the tasting by talking about the site of the two vineyards, next door to each other in Morey but with Clos des Lambrays slightly higher (about 1/3 of it above the most advantageously situated mid-slope) and with a slightly less favourable, more northward aspect.
Lambrays has seen significant replanting since 1977, and the average vine age is now about 40 yrs with the vineyard covering around 8.5ha. Winemaking involves careful sorting and rigorous selection for the Grand Cru, especially over the last 5 years [ed: with deselected grapes used in the 1er cru “Les Loups”], with whole bunch fermentation (i.e. including stalks) leading to a lighter colour. Elevage is in about 50% new oak. Thierry Brouin has managed the domaine since 1980.
Clos de Tart consists of 7.5ha and has been managed by Sylvain Pitiot since 1996. Pitiot has drastically reduced yields, to the point where each vine only gives 5-6 bunches of fruit. 10% of the stems are retained, the fermentation/maceration are both more intense and longer and the wine is aged in 100% new oak.
2005 Clos des Lambrays
Medium ruby. Ripe, slightly oaky, some toast, lovely pure fruit. Lovely purity and decent depth on the palate with ripe, rounded tannins, well judged oak and very good length. Fresh, youthful but elegant. Excellent ***(*1/2).
2005 Clos de Tart
Deep ruby, narrow pale purple rim. Nose shows ripe, darker purple fruit, vanilla. Very intense, slightly smoky with just a hint of sauvage complexity about it already. Fuller, riper and richer than the Lambrays on the palate, a fair amount of oak but there is plenty of fruit here as well as mouth-coating, dense tannins, but it all seems in balance with electric acidity carrying a mouth-coating, exceptionally long, smooth finish. Lovely, and certainly one for the long term. WOTN ***(**).
2003 Clos des Lambrays
Medium ruby, with an already quite wide garnet rim. Slightly more developed nose - showing some spice. Only medium intense, with slightly spicy red fruits, some perfume. Quite restrained, ripe but in no way over-ripe or overdone, indeed nice and fresh if slightly tannic on the medium length finish. Tannins may resolve given time, but does seem to lack a little focus and purity if overall a decent effort for the vintage. ***
2003 Clos de Tart
Deep/opaque ruby/purple, very narrow rim. Very ripe, jammy nose lots of brash vanilla oak which dominates. Very sweet. On the palate, very ripe, intense black fruits, more oak, rich and mouth-coating soft tannins, fresh, slightly jarring acidity, some heat on the long oak dominated finish. Mmm. Someone said more Barossa Shiraz than Burgundy and it’s hard to disagree. Great now if you like shiraz, if burgundy’s more your thing lock it away for 20 years and hope for the best, as it may come round. *(?).
2002 Clos des Lambrays
Surprisingly developed appearance, mahogany core, wide rim. Ripe, quite understated strawberry fruit nose, some spicey, caramelly complexity. More fresh and youthful on the palate with elegant, perfumed red fruit, fresh acidity, integrated tannins and quite a long seamless finish. Not sure that this bottle is typical in terms of its development, but this is drinking well now. ***1/2.
2001 Clos des Lambrays
Pale, evolved garnet core, wide rim. Light/moderately intense nose, indeed noticeably less intense than the 2002 but with some interesting complexity with slightly caramelly notes. Again elegant and seamless with fresh acidity on the medium/good length finish. Drinking well and pelasant enough but not sure if its really showing GC quality. **1/2
2001 Clos de Tart
Medium garnet/ruby core, medium pale ruby rim. Fresh, intense nose with pure red fruits, some vanilla oak, but well integrated and some attractive floral perfume. Good depth and lovely purity on the palate with lovely texture, rich but with attractive contrasting acidity, great mid-palate length and complexity and an extremely long, well balanced finish with some attractive savouriness just beginning to emerge. Outstanding. ****(*).
1999 Clos des Lambrays
Medium/deep garnet core, narrow pale garnet rim. Slightly closed on the nose, some slight mustiness, underlying spicy, earthy red fruit. Again subdued fruit on the palate and a stripped, tannic finish - seems this is lightly corked. On going back to this an hour or so later it showed more fruit on the palate but the finish was still a little disjointed, tannic and short. NR (flawed)
1999 Clos de Tart
Medium garnet. Slightly caramelled, sweet, red fruited nose, some nice perfume but quite evolved and seems to lack some precision. Nicely balanced on the palate though but again the fruit seems to lack a bit of focus and the finish is a little short and dry. **
1995 Clos des Lambrays
Pale mahogany, wide tawny rim. Sweet, slightly toffeed, but also nicely perfumed nose. Complex and interesting with a note of Christmas cake. Harmonious, developed, savoury mid-palate, with mature slightly caramelly fruit, fresh acidity. Elegant and complex, although there are still some tannins showing on the finish at the moment, suggesting that it still may improve with a few more years. ***(*).
1995 Clos de Tart
Medium mahogany - developed appearance. Slightly more intense than the Lambrays, but similar on the nose if a little more youthful with some underlying sweet strawberry fruit. More fruity still on the palate, slightly denser and richer than the Lambrays, with greater fruit concentration, but similar flavour profile. Some drying tannins on the finish which, although others felt were slightly green, I thought just a little firm and thus would balance out with time. ***(*).
1985 Clos des Lambrays
Pale/medium tawny, pale tawny rim. Vegetal, slightly cabbagey nose, but with some nice mellow fruit too and some attractive bovrilly notes. Actually I quite like this, and although lacking a little charm it has interest and length across the palate too. Does trail away a bit on the finish. Interesting and characterful, but drink up! ***
1985 Clos de Tart
Medium tawny/garnet. Fresher than the Lambrays, if with a slightly “stinkier” nose. Some fresh, spearminty fruit here too though. Decent length and balance on the palate, and a sweet lingering, harmonious finish. Mature and very drinkable. ****
1982 Clos des Lambrays
Very pale tawny. Complex, slightly nutty, caramel nose. Still some freshness here too - actually I think it rather charning! On the palate it has decent depth and length too and a lingering sweet fruited finish. Decently complex, mature and very drinkable. Although others weren’t so keen I really liked this, but does need drinking up.. ****
1966 Clos de Tart
Dark, muddy brown, completey oxidised. Shame. NR (flawed)
This was a really interesting, well put together tasting where the different styles of the two domaines really came through, especially in the later vintages.
Clos des Lambrays: all restraint and elegance, with pure red fruit, a dash of oak seasoning, balanced and eminently drinkable, even at a relatively young age.
Clos de Tart: more extracted, concentrated, riper, richer, denser, certainly oakier. At it’s best - at least for me - a better, more satisfying and potentially longer lived wine. At it’s worst (as in the 2003) a caricature, even - I have to say - something of an abomination. And certainly more expensive, especially of late.
Is this the terroir talking or the wine-making style? Well, that’s obviously difficult to say - but one suspects that whilst the slightly more favoured aspect/position of Clos de Tart does at least play a supporting role, ultimately the lower-yielding, later picking and more extractive approach probably has the greater say.
Topics: Tasting Notes |
March 4th, 2010 at 5:25 pm
[…] tasting at Clos de Tart have a started to emerge, it looked at vintages spanning an amazing …Clos v Clos - our lucky winner reports back |So many of you were keen to win my ticket to the Fine Wine Experience’s Clos de Tart versus Clos de […]