2014 Chambertin Vieilles Vignes

Healthy full red. Much darker and cooler on the nose and palate than the Clos de Bèze, offering slightly stunted aromas of black cherry, chocolate, menthol, pepper, licorice and minerals. The biggest, most powerful and most brooding of these 2014s by far but still with a remarkably smooth texture and noble tannins that spread out to saturate the mouth. Not showing the fireworks--or the delicacy--of the Clos de Bèze right now, as its menthol and mineral elements dominate and there's little easy sweetness in the early going. This extremely long wine will need extended aging. The crop level was just 25 hectoliters per hectare, the same yield produced in 2014 by the 90-year-old Chapelle-Chambertin vines. (The Clos de Bèze yielded 30 hectoliters per hectare.)

Bright, dark red. Totally different on the nose from the Clos de Bèze: higher-pitched, offering aromas of wild berries, spices and menthol. Utterly silky and smooth on entry, then conveys an exhilarating cooler character in the middle palate, with the intense berry flavors buttressed by smoky saline minerality. Ultimately more intense and sharply delineated than the Clos de Bèze, with an almost painfully penetrating finish that electrifies the taste buds. A long-distance runner.