5/13/2024 - Benoit Hardy Likes this wine:

great length which synthesizes richness and acidity, floral flavors. Stunning!

5/13/2024 - Benoit Hardy Likes this wine:

passion fruit, mango, beautiful minerality, the richest of all Auslese while having laser acidity. Drank with #87 and #89

5/13/2024 - Benoit Hardy wrote:

Big concentration which immediately impacts the mouth. A little sullen, with a more perceptible woodiness than on the other vintages but the wine definitely has all the qualities to digest it. Big finish, sensation of an "up & down" wine which has also been decanted

5/13/2024 - Benoit Hardy Likes this wine:

mineral and dense, offering beautiful fruit and delicate acidity. Tracing and seductive.

5/13/2024 - Benoit Hardy Likes this wine:

Exuberant and creamy, with herbaceous flavors, honey and spicy finish. Beautiful density and complexity. Finally a Herrenberg that I like.

5/13/2024 - Benoit Hardy Likes this wine:

minty nose, palate of peach and grapefruit, great freshness with an acidity that makes the wine going up, loose juice and mineral finish.

5/12/2024 - Benoit Hardy Likes this wine:

Nose with floral and buttery aromas with baked apple.

The mouth has a very nice creamy feel. The wine seems to have been picked at maturity where complexity blossoms, while retaining a touch of youth. The juice is ample, with floral, brioche, saline and citrus flavors. There is a side that is both suave and juicy. The texture is velvety with a formidable flavor. Great buttery and salty finish with a great vibrant finish.

Excellent champagne.

5/9/2024 - Benoit Hardy Likes this wine:

The nose reveals itself in successive touches but never in its total complexity despite aeration: it is wholesome and massive, gamey, bright black fruit, a little coffee, leather and liquorice.

The palate remains like the nose: it is too early for this wine which nevertheless suggests extremely promising potential. The juice is full-bodied but nevertheless refines with good oxygenation. Here too, several layers are expressed successively but not yet in concert, so that the score is certainly changing but always monotonous: intense black fruit, blood, licorice, garrigue and a zest of spice are expressed to finish on a finale gamey and almost metallic. Very nice length.

A very good Chateauneuf today but which will reward patience to express its full potential.

5/7/2024 - Benoit Hardy Likes this wine:

Very pretty nose, fragrant, rose, cherry and medicinal herb.

On the palate, it is a very Burgundian expression of Nebbiolo. A fragrant and eminently feminine juice, it is very floral with strawberry on a background of spices. Very good balance with acidity which brings tension and freshness. This Barolo certainly does not have the depth or complexity of other more “masculine” 2004s but it plays its part on a completely different register which seems pleasant and above all coherent to me. Beautiful, finely woody and spicy finish which extends over a good length.

Very good Barolo, I liked the style.

5/5/2024 - Benoit Hardy Likes this wine:

A decanting was necessary for the wine to express itself as best as possible.

Great aromatic intensity on the nose, crushed strawberry, orange peel and pepper.

Heady on the palate, the wine attacks strongly, but with lovely freshness. Peony aromas and a touch of balsamic that reminds me of a Barolo. It is a rich and warm wine, with good acidity allowing the wine to be constantly revived and thus avoiding a certain fatigue. Beautiful peppery finish which requires a few more years to fully loosen.

It's excellent.

5/5/2024 - Benoit Hardy wrote:

Nose of pear and apple.

“Direct” palate with very natural aromas of pear and apple. It remains embellished, beautiful acidity, tracing in the absence of depth. Short length while being salivating and balanced.

Good white wine, quite curious in its expression, you have the impression of drinking more fruit juice than wine.

5/5/2024 - Benoit Hardy Likes this wine:

Very nice nose of cherry, strawberry, pepper and a hint of complexity with licorice and a little natural side which dissipates very quickly to give way to a beautiful purity. Very slight volatility which dissipates quickly.

Beautiful mouthfeel, all purity with formidable sapidity. The strawberry is very present, it mixes deliciously with the pepper on a textured juice that slides on its own. It’s incredibly fun. Richness combines with flexibility. Beautiful acidity with a very nice balance. A slightly “natural” finish with tangy red fruit and good length.

Excellent!

5/3/2024 - Benoit Hardy Likes this wine:

100% Pinot Meunier. Dgt 10/2017.

Nose of grapefruit and kiwi.

Extremely fruity on the palate, the grapefruit comes out strongly in this wine. It is a juicy grapefruit which gives a beautiful liveliness to this wine, and which demonstrates that yes, a Pinot Meunier from a beautiful vintage like 2008 can age harmoniously. Then comes the apple and the kiwi which give a little roundness to the whole. The acidity is perfectly integrated and provides a nice balance. This wine can be criticized for a lack of depth, sacrificed on the altar of palatability in my opinion. In this sense, he is more comfortable on his own and makes an average dining companion. Nice saline finish with good length.

Very good Pinot Meunier, but the wines the estate offers today are even better.

5/1/2024 - Benoit Hardy wrote:

It all starts well with a nose that expands with notes of pepper, kirsch and crushed strawberries. The nose will gain power then gradually die down.

The mouth is like the nose: textured juice, ample and dense. It’s refined and silky, with beautiful flavors of black fruits and spices. Very good balance which ensures that the 15° passes by itself. However, the wine gives the impression of running out of steam with aeration and ends up lacking in energy. And above all, it lacks depth, ending with a good quality finish with powdery tannins but which sorely lacks vigor.

The wine will even struggle to stand out against a matured T-bone. It's certainly very good, but not in line with the laudatory comments we read on CellarTracker. I much preferred the Mordorée 2001.

Maybe a weak bottle.

4/29/2024 - Benoit Hardy Likes this wine:

100% Sangiovese

Intense nose, vanilla, tobacco, black fruits and earthy notes.

Palate with balsamic accents, the woodiness is subtle, well integrated, with flavors of black fruits and tobacco. It’s quite rich and intense but well balanced with good acidity. Second part of the palate with undergrowth accents. The wine reminds me of a “luxurious” Chianti, it’s pleasant and savory at the same time. Correct finish, grainy and fruity at the same time with good length.

Very good Sangiovese.

4/28/2024 - Benoit Hardy Likes this wine:

Dsg 12/2018 with a dosage of 4g

Very pretty serene nose with jasmine, chalk and a touch of honey.

The palate is distinguished, from the touch the acidity comes to bring a juice with fine effervescence, saline, with a little patina. The floral side immediately emerges with a very significant jasmine. Beautiful balance with finesse, it is traceable and comfortable at the same time with a nice honeyed evolution in the glass. Beautiful finish on wet stone and chalk, saline length that we would have liked to be more intense given the level reached in the mouth.

Very beautiful Champagne, racy, lively, with depth and patina. My best André Robert to date.

4/27/2024 - Benoit Hardy wrote:

Uninviting nose at first on the burnt tire. It will evolve positively towards cooked fruit.

Mouth with a frank attack with aromas of espresso and coconut. Some tertiary notes. It’s quite a departure from the brightly fruity Beaujolais I’ve been drinking. Sensation of an “ambitious” wine but which fails to convince me with its cooked fruit side. Good cocoa finish.

Question of style... But I think this wine must have been better a few years ago.

4/27/2024 - Benoit Hardy Likes this wine:

Bottle drunk in parallel with a Pontet Canet 2009. Carafage for 4 hours.

Nose of black fruits, menthol, tobacco and leather.

Mouth full of tension, with a stony side. Mineral flavors, dead leaves, black fruits and tobacco follow one another in a harmonious and intense way. Beautiful complexity and evolution for a wine which retains a nice freshness but which already seems to be at its peak unless you prefer more tertiary aromas. Today it offers a good balance, it is suave and sapid. Beautiful finish on tobacco with an elegant length.

Excellent.

4/27/2024 - Benoit Hardy Likes this wine:

Opulent nose, black fruits, graphite, cedar, coconut and vanilla.

Structured palate with magnificent intensity. A 4-hour decanting was necessary to soften this noble beast. The juice is thick and velvety with a magnificent balance, thanks in particular to a fine acidity which stretches the wine to infinity. Second part of the palate is spicier with flavors of undergrowth. Great finish with a still notable tannic mass which will take a few more years to fully blend, good length on the graphite.

Excellent Pauillac, still very young.

4/26/2024 - Benoit Hardy Likes this wine:

Dsg 02/2023

It’s difficult to keep my hands away from this rosé de saignée which intrigues me! Even though probably (too?) young, I decided to open a bottle from the lot I have just to gauge the level. Probably based on 2019.

When opened, the bubble is abundant, the wine could have been decanted but it was aerated for a long time which was beneficial to it. The choice of a large pinot noir type glass was also profitable.

Once the foam of the effervescence has dissipated, the juice offers an impactful attack, all in freshness, then on an intense red fruit coulis. It is a flavorful and very pleasant champagne. Good structure even if I would have liked to have a more vinous and longer finish.

Very good champagne, still reasonably priced which is becoming rare for Rosé de Saignée.

4/25/2024 - Benoit Hardy Likes this wine:

Nose of great freshness, both floral and peachy.

Mouth of mirabelle plum, all elegance and structure. Still a little austere but with magnificent length. The juice is distinguished, still too young of course, but we can see all the potential it can have within 5 years. Its vigor made me think of a beautiful Chablis. Nice finish on green tea.

4/25/2024 - Benoit Hardy Likes this wine:

When the chardonnays of Oiry, Avize and Chouilly meet the Pinot Noirs of Aÿ.

In terms of style, the mouth leans more towards an Egly, but finer. Flavors of biscuits, peach, butter, burnt wood and a little nut… This wine is definitely the most complex and accomplished of the range. And even so, it's too young for my taste although it's release later than the others cuvée. But the potential is undeniable.

4/25/2024 - Benoit Hardy Likes this wine:

Dgt 10/2023. 100% Pinot Noir

Magnificent portrait of Aÿ, very restrained, with vinosity and black fruits. It is imperative to age, as it is so structured and viscous. Great potential, it's like a book that turns page by page, it made me think of Krug.

4/25/2024 - Benoit Hardy Likes this wine:

DSG 10/2023. 75% Pinot Noir and 25% Chardonnay.

As the name suggests, these are the favorite plots of the master of the estate. And we quickly understand why this vintage is such a favorite for me. It’s a mini Clos des Goisses for €30 estate price. It is vinous and precise, deep, powerful but at the same time delicate. A very good champagne.

4/25/2024 - Benoit Hardy Likes this wine:

DSG 10/2023. 55% Chardonnay and 45% Pinot Noir.

This rosé is an ode to the art of Champagne blending. Constituting 25% of the estate's sales, this vintage requires every attention. Elegant rosé, very gentle, on raspberry, with great length and freshness due to its majority of chardonnay. Delicate and fresh.

4/25/2024 - Benoit Hardy Likes this wine:

DSG 10/2023. 70% Pinot Noir from Bisseuil and 30% Chardonnay

Concentrated and precise champagne, full of spices, just right to give comfort. Tangerine and peach flavors. Chardonnay gives this extra depth and length which makes it a fresh and digestible champagne.

4/25/2024 - Benoit Hardy Likes this wine:

DSG 10/2023. Grapes from Mareuil, Oiry and Chouilly mainly.

Tasty champagne, lemon zest and wet stone. Tracing but not boring, surprisingly supple for a recent disgorgement, it’s a nice introduction.

4/25/2024 - Benoit Hardy Likes this wine:

Owned as a monopoly by the Breuer family, these 12 hectares located to the east of the Rheingau appellation face south on a terroir. This terroir has a reputation for producing wines that are both powerful and dry.

Still pale yellow color.

The nose is exuberant and surprisingly very young with fresh lemon and jasmine in particular. The wine, with its floral aromas, is definitely not 20 years old.

Mouth in total harmony with the nose. The attack is warm and even creamy, revealing a warm vintage with flavors of peach and acacia honey. Then the acidity takes over to balance a beautiful juice and bring tension. The transition is harmonious towards more spicy and herbaceous flavors, it is airy and rich at the same time, still very young. The wine ends with a great chalky and limestone finish at the same time, dry but elegant. Great saline length.

Excellent Riesling!

4/23/2024 - Benoit Hardy Likes this wine:

Nose of honeysuckle and sea spray. The whole thing remains restrained.

Tight mouth, with mineral and saline acidity. The wine is linear, concentrated. The juice is not yet released, it is still timid, laser cut. Flavors of lemon meringue sprinkled with sea salt. Good finale where the honeysuckle comes to the fore.

Very good Chassagne but which does not fully deliver.

4/23/2024 - Benoit Hardy Likes this wine:

DSG 2022

Winey and mature nose, pear and some oxidative notes but much less than with Père Anselme.

Very spicy palate, dominant apple and pear with strong vinosity in the background. Very nice balance with a tension which carries this juice of very good quality. The difference in style is there, the oxidative notes are more delicate. It is especially the spicy side which brings a nice complexity. Great finale, ethereal but vibrant.

I've tasted it better than a year ago on an older disgorgement.

4/22/2024 - Benoit Hardy Likes this wine:

Earthy and granny apple nose.

Extremely intense mouthfeel, viscous juice, precise and deep. The flavors are a concentration of undergrowth salinity and earthy flavors. Little reduction despite youth. The wine is impressive and already expresses itself perfectly, a blossoming in the real glass. It is of course a wine built over time but which is already very expansive. Intense finish with a nice richness, with an acidity that stretches the wine in length from start to finish.

Impressive.

4/22/2024 - Benoit Hardy Likes this wine:

DSG 01/2023

How lucky to have drunk it alongside the rosé de saignée at the table! it was the perfect complement as they are on a different register.

Delicate nose, with tangy fruit and jasmine

The palate can seem obviously discreet compared to the exuberance of rosé de saignée. But here we are on an airy, elegant rosé, all lace with very beautiful length. It's a ballerina, full of finesse, with delicious aromas of tangy candy and jasmine which trace through the mouth to explode on a beautiful chalky finish, saline and sweet at the same time.

Excellent rosé.

4/22/2024 - Benoit Hardy wrote:

Dsg 04/2022

This time, I tasted it much better than at the domaine. Floral and wet stone nose.

The palate is very fine, very delicate with a fine and elegant bubble. Very nice juice that slides on the tongue with winey and spicy flavors. Very nice blend where the coldness of Verzenay Pinot Noir dominates. Beautiful chalky finish.

Very good champagne.

4/21/2024 - Benoit Hardy wrote:

Nose on wet stone and coarse salt.

The mouth is massive, but loose and structured. The saline flavors dominate everything, it is extremely mineral and still young. The acidity remains high and propels this juice with great dynamism. Beautiful impactful finish on wet stone.

Very nice interpretation of the Mesnil sur Oger terroir even if I think that Elise Bougy's wines arrive on the market too early and deserve additional aging.

4/21/2024 - Benoit Hardy wrote:

Chalky and buttery nose which takes us more to Champagne than to Burgundy.

The juice coats the mouth with fat, it's buttery almost too much since I find it has a slight deficit of acidity to give length to the whole. A little heavy viscous finish.

Well, nothing more, a matter of style. But the prices are crazy!

4/21/2024 - Benoit Hardy Likes this wine:

Vaporous nose, it is floral and tangy with crunchy fruit.

Equally vaporous on the palate, a real wine for friends, floral and crunchy at the same time, balanced, slender, simple but effective structure, straight to the point!

Very nice generic Burgundy.

4/21/2024 - Benoit Hardy Likes this wine:

Floral and spicy nose with a touch of vanilla.

On the palate, it is a precise and pleasant wine with masterfully integrated woodiness. The juice has very pleasant floral flavors. Beautiful wine, very well balanced which leads us to a spicy finish.

Beautiful Chambolle village even if I think the Cathiard style can divide on this appellation. The wood is perfectly managed, of course, but it is a style that suits Vosne more in my opinion.

4/21/2024 - Benoit Hardy Likes this wine:

My second Ledru.

Powerful and vinous nose, black fruits and chalk.

Quite brutal mouth. The juice will loosen with aeration but the wine will keep this rough profile, very vinous and structured, with a trace of smoke. Beautiful acidic structure which manages to carry this powerful whole to a beautiful chalky and intense finish.

It’s objectively a very good champagne but not at all the style I like. Especially since prices are skyrocketing…

4/20/2024 - Benoit Hardy Likes this wine:

Vintage 2020. 573 bottles.

Dgt 01/2023

Nose of raspberry coulis sprinkled with a few spices.

At first the wine was closed. I had this same feeling 2 years ago during my first Brochet, a compact wine, sullen although the quality was perceptible. After an hour, the wine finally blossomed like a flower, with magnificent flavors of raspberry and sweet spices. The wine ends up becoming floral, delicate, with a very nice length on the palate where a lot of rosé de saignée crashes into an impactful and flattering juice. Very nice acidity which stretches this strawberry coulis with floral accents to a finish where freshness and spices dominate.

A delight.

4/19/2024 - Benoit Hardy Likes this wine:

This is not a wine that I come across often because I had never considered it to be to my taste.

Nose of crushed olive, smoke, licorice and spices.

The palate retains its vigor, but very soft with an ample attack due to the concentration of the juice. This unfolds all its vigor with aromas of leather, stewed red fruits and pepper. Once the first sensation of intensity has passed, the wine becomes more serene in the second half of the palate. It is always grained, which adds to the pleasure of complexity. The wine then becomes silky and textured on the palate. The balance is excellent with a nice acidity which carries the juice without any feeling of heaviness despite the intensity felt. Large peppery finish, with a seductive length reminiscent of leather aromas.

Excellent!

4/18/2024 - Benoit Hardy wrote:

Nose of coffee and black fruits.

Quite ordinary on the palate, it is easy to drink but without much character or typicity specific to the appellation. It’s very international with the feeling of wanting to please as many people as possible. Correct final.

A wine that we quickly forget

4/16/2024 - Benoit Hardy Likes this wine:

At first, the nose was very vanilla, the wood coming through outrageously. After 4 hours of aeration, the whole appears to be more serene, on the leather, a more diffused and above all more integrated woody touch, tobacco and a bright black fruit.

The mouth is curiously thinner and slender than the nose. Make no mistake, the 14.5% alcohol is there but it is much finer and more elegant than the nose which remains on a warm register. The juice is silky, dense, with an attack of leather and tobacco, settling into a second half of the palate with intense black fruit. Good balance with an acidity which constantly tightens and revives the wine, giving a good sapid sensation. Good finish where cedar and vanilla dominate, always being coherent with the whole. Good vanilla length.

Very good Rioja from the little experience I have with this appellation. The ratings are very complimentary, I am a little more nuanced but it remains a well-made wine.

4/15/2024 - Benoit Hardy Likes this wine:

Nose of black fruits and spices

Mouth with a fine slender acidity which directs a fairly rich but sensual juice. Silky and fruity, it's easy to drink but with a good personality, always with this mix of black fruits and spices. Good vanilla finish with fine tannins.

Good Chianti

4/14/2024 - Benoit Hardy Likes this wine:

Nose of kirsch, leather, medicinal herbs and verbena.

Tapered mouth, with flavors of morello cherries but especially verbena and very present medicinal herbs. It’s lively, flexible, and above all very expressive. Very good balance on a tension which stretches the juice well with a beautiful maturity. Beautiful finish with integrated woodiness over a decent length.

Very good Nebbiolo which has good aging potential

4/13/2024 - Benoit Hardy Likes this wine:

Nose of black fruits, plums and pomegranate.

On the palate, the juice is intense, spicy and pure, with pleasant black fruit. Great flavor of a juice carried by a beautiful acidity. Aeration will bring a nice complexity with tobacco and leather. Good finish on cedar with a satisfying length.

Good Brunello which, given its evolution in the glass, is mature.

4/13/2024 - Benoit Hardy Does not like this wine:

Despite a decanting, the nose struggles to fully define itself, we remain a little vague on black fruits.

The mouth is of the same ilk, it lacks definition. The fruit is pretty, and the structure is there, but the whole thing fails to convince me by not offering anything coherent. It’s fruity with an acidic backbone but nothing transcendent. Still tannic finish.

Bottle problem?

4/13/2024 - Benoit Hardy wrote:

Cuvée now disappeared at least under this name.

Intense nose of salted butter caramel and candied fruit.

In the mouth, the caramelized side becomes clearer, coupled with the fat of the Pinot Gris. On the other hand, although the experience is no less interesting, the wine runs out of steam in the second part of the palate, losing precision. If the acidity is still present, the juice becomes more leaky. Nice finish with medicinal herbs.

Good but on a downward slope.

4/13/2024 - Benoit Hardy Likes this wine:

Nose of green apple and lemon.

Very crystalline on the palate, nice tension but the juice is very fine, perhaps a little too light but that is the mark of the vintage. The fact remains that the wine is pleasant, very lemony and saline at the end with a dry finish.

Good Chablis in the context of the vintage.

4/13/2024 - Benoit Hardy Likes this wine:

Intense nose with grilled aromas, a hint of reduction then once this has dissipated, lime and a herbaceous touch.

Very nicely matured palate, there is tension with menthol coming through. The aromas of toasted bread gradually give way to a very charming lime. Sensation of a ripe wine. Beautiful finish, much more elongated than the mouth.

Very good wine even if the grilled style tires me a little.

4/13/2024 - Benoit Hardy Likes this wine:

Very open nose of walnuts, hazelnuts and yellow fruits.

Textured and creamy palate which expresses itself with aromas of tea and lemongrass. Beautiful champagne which evolves properly in the glass with a beautiful acid structure which brings the whole thing to life. The vinosity dominates upon warming. Nice finish on nuts with good length.

I had never drunk this cuvée and I am convinced!