2006 Clos de la Roche

An intense aromatic melange of smoked meat, brown spices, herbal and framboise distillate, and ripe berries rises from the glass of Lignier 2006 Clos De La Roche. Polished and refined in tannin, this Pinot's expansively fresh-fruited palate preserves clarity to smoky, spicy, as well as saline mineral and savory meat stock shadings, and it finishes with snap and penetration as well as meat broth-like underlying richness. Here is one of those 2006s that obviously has extract and energy to spare, yet comes off as elegant and buoyant. I would plan on giving it several years' rest in bottle and following it for at least a decade thereafter. This was in a slightly reduced and certainly more backward state than the other Lignier 2006s when I last tasted it, and might well have blossomed further short-term. Hubert Lignier's estate – long one of Burgundy's most prestigious addresses, and now re-named to reflect the partnership with his son Laurent – remains caught up in a sad drama of familial acrimony. Kellen Lignier – the American widow of Hubert's tragically youthfully deceased son and heir-apparent Romain – bottles one share of this estate under "Domaine Lucie et Auguste Lignier," the names of her children by Romain. (I have not yet tasted any of those wines.) Hubert and Laurent receive a share of the wine vinified by Kellen Lignier's team and continue to themselves farm and vinify the fruit from another portion of the estate, including the acreage that informs Hubert Lignier's long iconic Morey 1er cru Vieilles Vignes and Clos de la Roche. Hubert and Laurent also began with the 2005 vintage purchasing and raising negociant wines, of which I have tasted only a few not yet especially distinguished examples. I was last able to taste their 2006 estate wines just prior to bottling, and the line-up of samples did not unfortunately include their Gevrey Combettes. These 2006s remind Hubert Lignier of his 2001s, and a direct comparison of the two top wines also demonstrates how impressively those 2001s have evolved. Importer: Rosenthal Wine Merchant, Pine Plains, NY; tel. (800) 910-1990