Community Tasting Note

Cailles wrote:

Wednesday, November 23, 2022 - Double blind taste-off between Chapoutier‘s 2012 L‘Ermite (96pts) and the Le Pavillon (94pts). The L‘Ermite took it home thanks to an unbelievable complexity. Every sip and sniff revealed a new, highly precise aroma. All embedded in a weightless structure. True world class here, although not my favorite style of Northern Rhone Syrah: the wines are a bit riper than their peers and are less structured and too polished. Certainly made for earlier consumption. Still great, intellectually and hedonistically appealing wines.

TN: Wonderful expressive nose, herbal, bretty, dark fruits, quite ripe but not too ripe. On the palate, lots of dark berries blueberries, spices, especially but not exclusively black pepper, various dried and fresh herbs, animalic notes, with time beautiful nutty notes… just a never ending stream of highly precise aromas from the attack to the long finish. Superb. The wine is very polished with already fully melted tannins, medium+ acidity keeping the wine fresh, no weight but lots of intensity, a satin-like texture - feels somehow a touch too polished, not with a structure that makes you believe that this can age gracefully for 4 decades. We had this after 11 wines (and it was clearly the most layered one) and my palate was a bit tired already, hence my 96/97 pts ratings might be too low and clouded by a palate and ripeness fatigue.

Decanting: Decanted for roughly 2-3 hours which seemed perfect.

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