Community Tasting Notes (40) Avg Score: 90.6 points

  • Surprisingly vibrant, pleasant and lively for its age. Secondary notes of tobacco, (barbecue)meat, bacon, mint and menthol as well as ripe figs in the nose. Well balanced on the palate. Medium bodied, still good length. Drink with next 3-5 years.

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  • Mature color. At 15% alcohol, definitely a super full-bodied wine that reminded one of my guests of a mature Amarone. Smooth mouthfeel, sweet cherries, red berries and soft tannins but a bit flabby compared to other vintages I had of this wine, i.e. 1995 and 1998.

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  • Bright dusty plum on nose, palate on ripe side. Fruit still good but tannins awkward on palate, off-putting on the finish. The new oak treatment shows versus "traditional" wines from the area. From a cool cellar, may give the remaining bottle a couple more years to see what happens with the tannins.

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  • Tired, pruny, baked; a hot vinyard in a less than convincing year.

    #CoraVined

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  • Last bottle. Garnet with broad orange rim. Garrigue, sweet cherries, blackberries and sometimes even hints of cassis and blueberries. The large amounts of tannin have melted away to a large extend, but the rest is still quite present. Nearly viscous mouthfeel. This has aged gracefully, but is in (slow) decline for sure. Tasted without decantation (decantation of a small amount led to a wine with oxidative sherry scents within less than an hour.). 5/12/17/6 . If cellared under textbook conditions since release, this may hold through another one or two years. From my cellar it has to be consumed now.

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  • At 15% alcohol you can expect a sundried taste and flavour. Still ok but need to finish my last bottle soon. I don't see this getting better.

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  • Ruby leaning towards orange in the color. Very attractive nose with full ripe berries and prunes, cacao and truffle. Then also stewed meat and smoked bacon. On the palate similar tones of jammy red fruits and earth in this highly attractive attractive "Hautes Garrigues" - style. Tannins in the finish bit drying. Best to finish your last bottles within the coming years I would think.

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  • Browning; iron filings, meaty, baked fruit. Tiring.

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  • Hardly budged since previous bottle two years ago. Plenty of grunt. One for the long haul.

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  • Ruby with orange reflexes, tight, reduced nose first, developing over 6+ hours in the bottle. The part that was decanted seemed to lose much of his intensity of flavors. Black berries, cassis, flowers, game, much body, dense, very concentrated with high levels of tannin. This is on the young side, 10 years or more to come. If old bordeaux is a dancer on toes, this is hulk. I liked this cuveé when it becomes fully mature and more open developing in a little more elegant style. The 1995 (not much future) and 1998 are providing more pleasure today.

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  • this needed time to decant. maybe 5-7 hours wouldve helped. as poured it was too tight and primary and almost dull. but the structure is there. feeling sorry i didnt give it the chance to shine.

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  • Pale garnet; warm brick, worn leather, shows bottle age/maturity but also vitality; mellow, yet retains peppery punch, full bodied; finishes powerfully with typical heft. This deepened & added weighty over several hours. Plenty of time in hand, as long as fruit holds.

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  • Rich, silky smooth wine with great dense fruit concentration. Old world wine with a bit of new world flavor. I liked it a lot more than my wife.

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  • Nice, big, dark full bodied for Gigondas. Very modern style, Not my first preference but still very good with a lot of life.

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  • Very nice bottle. This was probably a big wine when it was young. It's fairly mellow now, still some nice dark fruit, plum and cassis. There's a little herbal quality as well. The tannins are very smooth now. Very enjoyable and easy to drink now.

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  • This isn't my prefered style of Rhone wine, too Parkerized. That said, for what it is, this is indeed in a very good place right now. As others have noted, lots of depth and fruit and the tannins are smooth but still present. Still, to my taste, nuance has been sacrificed for the sake of extraction and power.

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  • Continues to provide alot of pleasure. Great depth and nice smooth tannins. Just a great wine in a really good spot right now.

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  • Bottle open. Tastes dumb, or dead.

    Decanted 1hour. Tastes dead.

    Decanted two hours. A little life. Zombie, or real?

    Decanted three hours. Decent fruit and acid have emerged, and they are balanced.

    Decanted four hours. Tannins and structure emerging. A little chalky, but still.

    Okay -- clearly this was just a recalcitrant bottle. Things keep emerging. Non-zombie things.

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  • Just outstanding . Drinking beautifully now . Great plum flavored with a spicy finish. This makes $35 investment in this wine look very good .

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  • On the first day I had given it a mid 80 based on my rejection of so high (15,5) alcohol levels and the conviction, that Grenache can never be a really great wine, regardless how often Parker and others give 100 points to Ch9duPapes and the kinds from the south. But on day two I gave it the proper handling. First : Do not decant, it does not need it. Second : Serve it cool, more at 13 to 14 degrees, than the alcohol and the Grenache do not dominate and you see the structure laid out by Mourvedre. Take only small portions and fill up your glass more often, let it open in your glass.

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  • Quite good. Still a relatively dark ruby, with a strong core of fruit and classic Rhone bitter herb and soil notes. Tannins are soft now, but works well at the table.

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  • At almost 11 years old, this wine still has a powerful, dark red colour with no bricking around the edges. Nose of Provençal herbs and black fruit. The full taste still shows a healthy dose of somewhat drying tannins. Could age further, but I doubt if that will give additional interest.

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  • Excellent Gigondas. Dark fruit profile. Nice concentration and texture.

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  • After a litany of disappointments with 1998 and 1999 ChdP and Gigondas, this was a great surprise. None of the barnyard nose, sweet yet lots of garrigue and the color-just a hint of brick. In the mouth a fabulous combination of rich fruit, yet the hint of typtical southern-Rhone earch/animal/whatever. But not the least bit overpowering or off. Really a treat, much more fruit and sweetness than expected, but with great Rhone features.

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  • This is a really great bottle of wine and tasting very nicely right now.

    Dark in colour with only a little bricking. Nose is deep and intense, with lots of blackberry and cherry fruit, and deep dark tar, garrigue and anise note that is complex and interesting. Palate is equally concentrated, but without being sweet, dry yet plush cherry and blackberry fruit, more anise and garrigue hints on the finish with a licourice, tar taste. Very complex and really good.

    Drank with some lamb shanks that were cooked in wine, port and dried mushrooms - never had lamb with mushrooms but it worked well and the wine was a fabulous match (served with white beans and a shitake mushroom relish).

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  • I really like Gigondas. It is a bit more rustic than a CdP but at its best rivals those in its price range. This is certainly one of the better ones. A very good if not great vintage and, at least for this bottle, seems to be mature an near or at peak. It has a beautiful color ruby on the outside and dark at the core. A noce of black raspberries and musty spice with a bit of liqueur. Showing a nice complexity, this provided a nice warming after standing out in the rain watching the kids soccer. Slightly bitter along with cherries and sour cherries, in a good way on the palate. No hurry to open these, but absolutely worth thinking about. Having wines like this in the cellar, is a great reason to cellar wines besides first growths and other cherries.

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  • Dark purple; Not giving too much on the nose, some dark fruit and earth. After a few hours kirsch also comes out; Rich mouthfeel with earth, spice, pepper, some herbs, and dark fruit; Medium finish with fine grain tannins, this wine has at least 5-10 more years on it, but it didn't really open up any more over several hours; 15% so by no means a lightweight, but very well balanced and not at all hot; Overall quite nice but not as good as I have expected. The wife really didn't like it at all... No 2007 Gigondas I suppose!

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  • Decanted 1 hour. Lovely wine. Classic Gigondas with pepper, blackberries, garrigue, cassis, hints of tobacco, sour milk (the syrah), leather and minerals. A fruit-driven, cool and powerful style with impressive concentration, but also acidity assuring a fine balance. No rush to drink, but why wait... It is at a peak right now.

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  • Black pepper dominates the nose. Blackberry, cherry, raspberry kirsch, liquorice, black pepper, Herbs de Provence and barnyard. Impressive concentration and structure for a Gigondas with firm tannins. A bit rustic in style. Rich, complex finish with plenty of acidity to keep things fresh.

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  • WIML90?,PURPLE89,WA94,WS79

    Tasted June 3, 2007 at home. Opened and decanted about 30 minutes before serving in a Spiegelau Authentis Magnum glass. Dark garnet, clear hue throughout. Nose of dark stewed fruits, camphor, tobacco, leather and an underlying minerality. PURPLE picked up on some herbs. Flavors of black cherries, cassis and bitters on the finish. Medium acidity, drying tannins, medium body. Drink now with an extended decant or hold. No rush here. NOTE: nose is great, basic underlying fruit and acidity are there on the palate but WHOA those tannins are firm for a typical Gigondas. This one will be interesting to follow over the next 10+ years.

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  • Very good. Classic herby, blackberry, raspberry notes. Plenty of black pepper, a little leather. Grippy and a little bit stemmy/dirty tasting, still needs a good 4-5 years to resolve.

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  • Closed at first; began showing little fruit, but lots of meaty flavors and herbs. After an hour or so, revealed wonderful spice and dark fruit to complement the roasted and grilled meatiness. Tannins well integrated, and a balanced finish. Always has been one of my favorite Rhones, and in my opinion all the wines of Santa Duc are wonderful.

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  • At a tasting: A wonderful Gigondas, as almost always with the Hautes Garrigues. Classic nose, plenty of herbal components. Drinking quite well...has plenty of tme and not yet mature, but very drinkable now. As per Parker, the tannins are very evident but not so rough. Lots of fruit, for me a little more tart than his description of blueberries, etc. It is the best of the gigondas in our experience.

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  • A little thin at the beginning. Did not decant, but opened up nicely after about an hour of air.

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  • 2004: Had at an informal group of regulars. Was simply fantastic. Classic Rhone nose with dark fruit and herbs, pepper. Very intense fruit, pepper, solid tannins, but not harsh. While it will improve, it was a gem, and a fabulous bargain.

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  • Good

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  • ($45) Dinner at Lola's Tasting Room: 15% alcohol. Decanted for about 45 minutes while we sampled the first 6 courses at Lola's Tasting Room. Large-scaled, muscular wine. Slightly hard minerality with black fruit, a wild animal streak, cedary new oak, and a cinnamon bark component. Somewhat open on the palate and showing a hint of sweet black fruit and more slate-like minerality. I took the last quarter of the bottle home and the next day the wine had grown even tighter and unyielding. No longer very pleasurable to drink. Hold on to these if you have them.

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  • Good concentration of color and very little signs of evolution and a nose of smoke, some red fruit (cherries), rubber and strawberries. In the mouth it has a gripping attack and a mid palate with elements of pepper, earth and a strong dose of tannins covered by a layer of jammy fruit. Strong, long and well made. the 15% of alcohol are very well integrated. Very good.

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  • 2000 Santa Duc Prestige des Hautes Garrigues

    1/11/04 at home. Very dark. Nose is dense, packed, very ripe. Big wine on the palate, rich, ripe, and very fine. This is easily the best Gigondas I have ever tasted. 5-12-17-8-92/100

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  • Blind Southern Rhone at Campisi's-no CDP: #17 - Red liqueur. White pepper, dusty. Sweet fruit. Interesting wine.

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