2003 Chateauneuf du Pape Cuvee Marie Beurrier

Dark red. Sauvage aromas of dark berries, fresh game, truffle and underbrush. Rich, spicy and meaty, with deep, sweet flavors of blackberry and plum.

Full ruby. Complex aromas of dried red fruits and herbs, heightened by a licorice note and a hint of cracked pepper. A sweet, palate-caressing wine for Bonneau, offering sweet raspberry and cherry flavors and a supple texture. Open-knit and easy to drink now, this wine shows none of the warm, liqueur-like qualities that mark so many wines from the vintage. Finishes with very good clarity and spicy persistence. I have been overestimating this wine, it seems.

The 2003 Chateauneuf du Pape Cuvee Marie Beurrier, from a troublesome and challenging vintage for Henri Bonneau, is a lightweight, medium-bodied effort displaying attractive fig, underbrush and loamy soil notes and a moderate finish. It’s a competent but hardly inspiring wine from the inimitable Monsieur Bonneau. Henri Bonneau, who is now 70 years of age, continues to make Chateauneuf du Pape the way it was made 50-100 years ago ... long cask aging in old barrels and bottling it, as he says jokingly, “when I need money.” A visit to these cellars is always one of my most rewarding of the year. The barrels and foudres that will probably be used in the Cuvee Marie Beurrier all have the letter “G” on them and everything with Reserve des Celestins potential has the letter “P” on it. Bonneau went through a litany of the issues that confronted the 2009 vintage, particularly the drought that affected much of the Grenache planted in many of Chateauneuf du Pape’s terroirs, and he reminded me that he had predicted it would be a problem when I saw him last year. Bonneau continues to claim the 2007s are too showy and flamboyant to ever develop into a great, long-lived vintage. Importer: Alain Junguenet, Wines of France, Mountainside, NJ; tel. (908) 654-6173