Romanée-Conti

2003 Romanée-Conti Echézeaux

By on February 28, 2006 #asides

Medium-plus colour. Bright, ebullient nose: at first it’s wide and fat, becoming sleeker with time. Eventually there is a dense core of slightly indistinct fruit overlayed with a minty tone. The instant impression in the mouth is from the texture of the tannins, they’re not the most cultured – plenty of rasp – followed by ripe, sweet fruit that ends with an interesting touch of sourness. There’s a long, intruiging finish that has a little saccharin about it. I’d have no concern over drinking this today as it’s a lovely wine, but vs other recent vintages it’s just a little more simple.

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2003 Romanée-Conti Grands-Echézeaux

By on February 28, 2006 #asides

The nose is deeper and darker of aspect; dusky, fecund – quite exciting. Slowly the nose ‘brightens’ to bring higher-toned spicy elements to the fore, aniseed and red-wrapped fruit. The palate is less obviously sweet, some separation in the mouth between the impression from the fruit vs the tannin and extract that comes through on the mid-palate. The length is haunting, slowly drying out onto your teeth. This is an enigmatic wine today, almost two personalities in one glass – if they marry this will be a superb wine – it is anyway a larger step-up from the Echézeaux than in recent years.

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2003 Romanée-Conti La Tâche

By on February 28, 2006 #asides

The nose starts in a similar vein to that of the GE; exciting, deep, musky, before broading to an even wider panorama of powdery red fruit aromas. Mouthfilling and concentrated. There is an easily preceptible extra density to this wine. The marvellous finish is easily a match for the GE, and overall, this is the first wine that manages to better it. Superb.

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2003 Romanée-Conti Richebourg

By on February 28, 2006 #asides

The only wine today that reluctantly welcomes your nose – quite closed, only slowly, slowly evolving a deep, coffee edged, savoury plum aspect. Given time this perspective becomes broader and more spice inflected but never quite matching the openness of the other wines. Again this is a wine where the palate is dominated by its weight of extract, bettering the RSV and equalling the GE for length. The tannins are just a little less astringent than those from the RSV. I find the wine incredibly impressive, yet somehow not as compulsive as the GE.

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2003 Romanée-Conti Romanée Saint-Vivant

By on February 28, 2006 #asides

The nose is instantly brighter, redder and more ’round’. Softer and perhaps less precise but with an intense and persistent weight of fruit at its centre. The palate is full-wrapped velvet, though despite the fineness of these ripe tannins I’m a little concerned by their abundance. This wine is quite different to the GE, with even more extract that leads to a drying impression into the finish – full-on, rather than graceful and the flavours don’t quite etch into the palate like those of the GE. Looking to the long-term, there is a cool and concentrated quality to the fruit and the tannin will anyway lessen with time, and the glass was also emptied rather easily!

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2003 Romanée-Conti Romanée-Conti

By on February 28, 2006 #asides

Perhaps it is a little passé to describe this wine as ’rounder’, but that is certainly the impression from the aromatics; similar to La Tâche except that there is a distinctly more mineral core and the fruit has an extra edge of cream bedecked fruit. Take a sip, and there is not the same ‘hit’ that you get from La Tâche – there is much more subtlety and understatement. More sophistication than any other wine in the line-up, the tannins are as fine as those of the RSV, but with none of their astringency. Better than superb? No, just different.

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2003 Romanée-Conti Grands-Echézeaux

By on October 31, 2005 #asides

There won’t be so many press tastings for this vintage as the average harvest across the domaine was a mere 18hl/ha – I guess I was lucky to taste this. Medium-plus colour. The nose is wide and deep with fresh berries, a little time in the glass gives up an extra spicy edge and extra purity to the fruit. In the mouth it’s fat and creamy and is loaded with velvety tannin and concentrated dry extract of fruit on the finish. This is a fascinating expression of the vintage, drier and less fresh than 2004 which I prefer.

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