2017 L'Ame Soeur Seyssuel

Deeply colored, the 2017 Chateau Haut-Mongeat L'Âme Soeur offers lots of ripe black cherry and currant fruit as well as notes of scorched earth, graphite, and roasted herbs. It's a rich, medium-bodied, mouthfilling, chewy wine that packs plenty of fruit and texture. Drink it over the coming 7-8 years.

Coming from the northern part of Seyssuel, which is more Gneiss soils, the 2017 IGP Collines Rhodaniennes L'Ame Soeur offers a perfumed, floral, violet, blackberry, and mineral-laced profile as well as a fresh, focused, balanced style on the palate. With good acidity, fine tannins, and considerable elegance, it's going to benefit from a year or two and keep for a decade. Unquestionably, one of the most exciting domaines in the world of wine today is that of superstar winemaker Stephane Ogier, who continues to purchase and plant new vineyards throughout Côte Rôtie and the Northern Rhône. I was blown away by his 2017s, and his Côte Rôtie Côte Blonde is unquestionably one of the wines of the vintage, as well as one of the greatest Côte Rôties I’ve had the opportunity to taste. While it’s still in barrel, the Côte Rôtie Belle Helene is another wine with perfection written all over it. In general, his 2017s shows ripe, expressive aromatics and tons of fruit, yet they have a firm, structured vibe on the palate and need bottle age. The 2018s, which are from a vintage compared to 1991 by Stéphane, show a slightly more rounded, seamless profile with silkier tannins. These wines shine for their purity of fruit as well as balance. While the expensive releases get all the attention, don’t miss the La Rosine, L’Ame Soeur, Saint Joseph, or Côte Rôtie Mon Village from this estate. These are terrific wines that offer loads of character and represent smoking values for the true wine lovers and wine drinkers out there.

The 2017 L'Ame Soeur Syrah de Seyssuel has shed much of the dark, brooding character it showed last year, revealing charming notes of red raspberries and black tea. It's medium to full-bodied but pretty and lacy in its tannic structure, with a long, silky-textured finish.