2013 Domaine Château de la Tour Clos de Vougeot Vieilles Vignes Grand Cru***

Good dark red with ruby highlights. Deep, brooding aromas of black fruits, minerals and dark chocolate. Lush, sweet and layered, conveying a strong impression of sucrosité , but a rose petal quality gives the wine an unexpected light touch (and it's also bone-dry at under one gram per liter residual sugar, according to François Labet). The wine's richness is nicely leavened by a note of wild herbs and sound acidity. Finishes with plush, broad tannins and lovely lift and length. When I asked Labet when he would drink this wine, he responded: "Tonight." But he added that it will probably close up in bottle.

Tasted blind at Fine & Rare Wines' Clos Vougeot tasting, the 2013 Clos Vougeot Vieilles Vignes Grand Cru from Château de la Tour has a rather dour, uninviting, broody nose with a hint of wet tobacco infusing the slightly smudged red fruit. The palate is medium-bodied and much more vigorous: crisp, quite tensile tannin, some nicely judged, vanillary oak that is neatly interwoven with the red and black fruit, gaining intensity towards the lightly spiced finish; here, the cooperage is a little more evident. The palate is far more engaging than the nose, although bottle age should address that. Perversely I preferred the regular bottling to the Vieilles Vignes, but one supposes that will be addressed with bottle age. Won't it?

Tasted blind. Bright blackish ruby. Heady, gamey nose with quite a bit of development. Real attention-grabber on the palate – more advanced than many. But with admirable concentration of fruit. Lots going on here. (JR)