2015 Chateauneuf du Pape Grenache de Pierre

From three parcels of sandy soils (one in Pignan and two in the La Crau lieu-dit), the 2015 Châteauneuf-du-Pape Grenaches de Pierre is a more finesse-driven wine that offers beautiful notes of blackberries, leafy herbs, blueberries, and pepper. Burgundian and incredibly elegant on the palate, with fine tannin, it’s another gorgeous wine from Marie Giraud that needs forgotten for 4-5 years and enjoyed over the following two decades. This estate has been run flawlessly by Marie Giraud for more than a decade now and the estate is consistently in the top handful of domaines in each vintage. She’s excelled in the more difficult 2015 vintage, and has produced some of the wines of the vintage in 2016. If you don’t know about Domaine Giraud, you’re missing out.

Youthful violet. Deep-pitched aromas of ripe red fruits, incense and Indian spices, lifted by a smoky mineral element. Juicy and expansive on the palate, offering impressively concentrated bitter cherry and black raspberry flavors that flesh out and become sweeter as the wine opens up. Supple, harmonious tannins give shape to an extremely long, mineral-accented finish that emphatically echoes the red fruit and spice notes.