2020 Marzelle - Saint Emilion Grand Cru Classe

Ripe plums, blackberries, damp earth, and tobacco emerge from the 2020 Château La Marzelle, a medium to full-bodied, pure, balanced, elegant 2020. It shows the style of the vintage nicely with its balanced yet structured mouthfeel, and it’s going to benefit from a few years of bottle age.

The 2020 La Marzelle has a nicely composed bouquet (far better than the 2018), with macerated red cherries, kirsch and light orange zest aromas. The palate is medium-bodied with pliant tannins, fleshy and quite tart, dovetailing into a white pepper tinged, slightly herbaceous finish that just deserves more complexity. Still, it should present 10-15 years' drinking pleasure. I warmed to it more on a second tasting.

The 2020 La Marzelle is bright and effusive right out of the gate. Rose petal, cinnamon, red cherry fruit, blood orange and pomegranate are all amplified in this sumptuous yet vibrant Saint-Émilion. This is a pretty rich wine for this sector of Saint-Émilion. The extraction is high and the oak imprint is strong. Every time I taste La Marzelle my impression is of a very good wine, but I wonder if more is possible here.