10/2/2021 - forceberry wrote: 94 points

Allemand's young-vine cuvée mainly from lieu-dit Chaillot, but including young-vine fruit from Le Bois, Les Saveaux, Pigonnier, Reynard and Thézier lieux-dits. The fruit is nearly or completely in whole clusters and fermented spontaneously with indigenous yeasts in stainless steel and open-top fermentors. Punch-downs by foot. Aged unracked for 18-24 months in old oak barrels and foudres with minimal SO2 additions. Bottled unfined and unfiltered with minimal SO2 additions or without any sulfites. 13,5% alcohol.

Dark yet beautifully luminous and moderately translucent cherry red color. Beautifully fragrant bouquet with layered aromas of ripe black raspberries and fresh red plums, some heady exotic spices, light floral notes of violets, a little bit of lifted sauvage character that lends a fragrant, subtly spicy note of phenolic character, a hint of ripe red cherry a a faint sweet volatile touch of nail polish, lifting the sweeter red-fruited notes a little bit. The wine is dry, clean and quite crunchy on the palate with beautifully silky textures, a medium body and bright flavors of brambly black raspberries and juicy blackcurrants, some gravelly mineral tones, a little bit of meaty umami, light ferrous notes of blood, a hint of fragrant herbs and a faint sauvage touch of lifted volatile character. The wine certainly has a subtly wild side to it, but the wine is nevertheless all about finesse; there are no rough edges, yet the wine never comes across as polished or glossy. The high acidity and quite ample yet ripe and gentle tannins lend wonderful firmness and sense of structure to the wine. The finish is long, dry and somewhat grippy with fine-tuned and enjoyably savory flavors of brambly black raspberries and fresh red plums, some peppery spice, a little bit of meaty umami, light ferrous notes of blood, a perfumed hint of violets and a touch of Mediterranean herbs.

From a cooler and rainier vintage, it does show - although Allemand's personal, minimal-interventionist style does so, too. After a lineup of more muscular and darker-toned Northern Rhône Syrah wines, this Allemand bottling came across as strikingly delicate, fine-tuned and - simply put - more Burgundian than the other wines. Especially compared to the Cornas wines of Clape, this wine showed more red-toned fruit compared to the more darker-toned expression of Clape, and even though the Clape wines weren't lacking in acidity, the Allemand had definitely more emphasis on freshness, focus and acidity. This is not a brooding and tightly-knit Cornas all about olives and charred gamey tones, but instead a relatively delicate and supple - yet still very serious - expression of Cornas that feels like a missing link between Northern Rhône and Côte de Nuits. Drinking wonderfully right now and neither the fruit nor the structure call for any additional cellaring, but seeing how youthful the wine still is, it doesn't take much imagination to see how much there is upside to aging this wine. Considering how 2008 wasn't a memorable vintage in Northern Rhône, this wine was just absolutely gorgeous.