Northern Rhone Dinner at Marc's

DC/Silver Spring MD
Tasted Saturday, April 27, 2019 by ericindc with 150 views

Introduction

The 8 of us got together at Marc's for a Northern Rhone dinner. Always a great time.

Flight 1 - Hermitage Blancs (2 Notes)

Probably my favorite flight. Both bottles showed well, but the Guigal was just more refreshing. Served with breads, brillat saverin, and a soft goat cheese.

  • 1984 E. Guigal Hermitage Blanc 95 Points

    France, Rhône, Northern Rhône, Hermitage

    Younger, sweet yellow fruited nose. Really young seeming for such an old wine, color was still pretty pale yellow. Sharp acid, great complex fruit, a hint of mature notes, some ever so light herbal quality. Really refreshing. Stunning wine.

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  • 1984 Domaine Jean-Louis Chave Hermitage Blanc 92 Points

    France, Rhône, Northern Rhône, Hermitage

    Slightly bretty stink on the nose with apricot and sherry notes. Darker color (kinda apple juice colored). Some earth tones, browned fruits, fuller body. Good acid. Almost a tannin-like grip. A bit tiring to drink after a while though. Held up pretty well over 5 hrs.

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Flight 2 - Young Hermitage (2 Notes)

This was a hard flight for me. Stylistically, just not my bag. Served with ratatouille pie.

Flight 3 - Aged Hermitage (4 Notes)

This was a great flight of wines. Served with Beef stew and manchego cheese. Chave was my fav, but wow it took a long time for the brett to start to blow off. It was pretty undrinkable when opened.

  • 1990 E. Guigal Hermitage 92 Points

    France, Rhône, Northern Rhône, Hermitage

    Sweet black fruit on the nose. Black fruit, some light earth notes, olive, blood. Sharp acid with modest tannins that still have structure. Still pretty young, long life ahead of this.

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  • 1991 M. Chapoutier Hermitage La Sizeranne 90 Points

    France, Rhône, Northern Rhône, Hermitage

    Muted nose, but just some heat. Rather normal black fruit profile. Not super complex and sorta mundane. Mostly primary. Still has good grippy tannins. Maybe some more time open would have helped.

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  • 1983 Domaine Jean-Louis Chave Hermitage 93 Points

    France, Rhône, Northern Rhône, Hermitage

    Just horribly horribly stinky when opened. It gradually faded over a couple hours, but holy brett bomb. Browing rim. Once it started to blow off, the mature notes took over. Super complex, light/medium body, solid acidity, and light tannic structure. Without all the brett, this would have been much higher rated.

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  • 1989 Domaine Belle Hermitage 92 Points

    France, Rhône, Northern Rhône, Hermitage

    Strong eucalyptus on nose. Lighter, body low tannins, with balanced acidity. mostly red, but some black fruits, less intense, but quite complex. Nice wine. No hurry to drink this one.

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Flight 4 - Dessert (1 Note)

Served with a raspberry cake and an assortment of chocolates. Didnt pair great with the wine, but it was all good. I didnt pay as much attention to this wine as I should have as it was at about this time the Chave from the previous flight started to show better.

Closing

Marc provided most of the wines and we appreciate his generosity. Also, his beef main dish he made for the dinner was fantastic!

Generally I am not a fan of young syrah, so I generally preferred the aged wines. My favorites of the night was the 1. Guigal blanc, 2. Chave Rouge, and 3. Belle Hermitage. Wonderful night.

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