2015 Domaine Coursodon St. Joseph La Sensonne

Community Tasting Notes (11) Median Score: 92 points

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  12/7/2022 - forceberry wrote: 81 Points

  Made with Syrah sourced from several parcels in St. Joseph. The fully destemmed grapes are cold-soaked for a long time before spontaneous fermentation in open-top fermentors. The wine is fermented and macerated with the skins for 18 days, after which the wine is pressed into oak barrels (100% new). Aged for 15 months in oak, then bottled. 14,5% alcohol. Tasted half-blind in a tasting of eleven 2015 Saint Joseph wines.
  
  Somewhat translucent black cherry color with a somewhat evolved maroon hue. The nose feels somewhat evolved and vaguely Bordeaux-like with sunny aromas of wizened blackberres, some tobacco, light woody notes of cedar and pencil shavings, a little bit of old leather, a hint of sweet raisiny fruit, an autumnal touch of damp leaves and a whiff of cassis. The wine feels juicy, broad and relatively fat on the palate with a rather full body and surprisingly sweet-toned flavors of strawberries and soft dark plums, some pruney dark fruits, a little bit of extracted woody bitterness, light blueberry tones, a hint of sweet, toasty oak and a touch of tobacco. The medium acidity doesn't lend much freshness to the wine, so the structure relies mostly on the moderately grippy medium-plus tannins. The finish is juicy, long and moderately grippy with a bold, sweet-toned aftertaste of strawberries, some wizened dark berries, a little bit of pruney dark fruit, light woody notes of savory oak spice, a hint of extracted woody bitterness and a sweet, chocolatey touch of mocha oak.
  
  Ugh, a noticeably ripe, jammy and quite clumsy effort for a Saint Joseph. Several people in the tasting found the wine impressively big with great "Bordeaux-like complexity", but for me the wine was just excessively ripe with rather obfuscating oak tones and too low in acidity. I guess the people who liked big wines confused that "Bordeaux-like complexity" with premature development, since this wine seemed surprisingly evolved and tertiary for its age; virtually all the other wines were still very youthful and brimming with youthful fruit, whereas this wine seemed pretty tired, awkward and raisiny to me. Oh well, different strokes for different folks - apparently some people like this kind of jammy, heavily oaked wine made in a very "Shiraz" style, but I didn't feel this had anything to do with Saint-Joseph. I doubt this wine was more balanced in its youth and I have a hunch it won't get any better from here with further aging, seeing how aged and tertiary it is starting to feel already now, at just 7 years of age. At 81€ this wine felt ridiculously overpriced for its quality. In our tasting the wine received three points from the ten participants, making it finish on shared fourth place.

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  12/6/2022 - spinnin_and_sippin Likes this wine: 93 Points

  Second bottle. This time for some reason I’m a lot more focused on the oak presence. It’s a stylistic choice and it’s well done but I agree with recents posts it’s hides the syrah a bit.

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  8/17/2021 - mryev wrote: flawed

  corked

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  8/16/2021 - spinnin_and_sippin Likes this wine: 95 Points

  Blood/iron followed by herbal bitter finish on a backdrop of dark fruit. Well balanced and concentrated.

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  7/2/2021 - Musigny1955 Likes this wine: 91 Points

  {Purchased on release, first bottle, perfect fill and sound cork; PopNPour with dinner, consumed over 3 hours} Ripe, jammy, eventually Syrah notes peek out from the finish; aromatics reflected the very fine Syrah fruit - but hard to tell this was from a specific place or region. Well made, not really my style ... I love Syrah with more vineyard/soil presence ... but well made wine with well-judged balance.

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