2016 Domaine Notre Dame des Pallières Gigondas Les Racines

Vivid ruby. Sexy, mineral- and spice-accented blueberry and black raspberry aromas show excellent clarity and pick up an exotic five-spice powder flourish as the wine opens up. Juicy and focused on the palate, offering appealingly sweet dark berry and spicecake flavors that show a suave blend of depth and energy. Finishes very long and silky, with slow-building tannins adding shape and gentle grip.

The old vines cuvee is the 2016 Gigondas Les Racines and comes from the oldest vines of the estate located around the domaine. The soils here lie around 200-300 feet in elevation and are a mix of broken limestone and clay, and the resulting wine is always blacker fruited, dense, and concentrated. Blackcurrants, black olives, exotic spices, and crushed rock notes all flow to a powerful, concentrated, tannic Gigondas that has remarkable purity and elegance. It shows the balance and freshness, as well as richness, that makes this vintage so compelling, and while it needs 2-3 years of bottle age, it's a profound, sensationally complex, layered wine readers shouldn't miss!

The 2016 Gigondas Les Racines was in its foudres at the time of my visit, but I still think it is the equal of the Brunier family's Châteauneufs. Full-bodied and rich but silky and almost lacy in texture, it marries raspberries and apricots with lovely herbal nuances and a lingering finish. It's a tremendous Gigondas, made from 75-year-old vines (80% Grenache).