Wine Advisor
Chateau de la Tour, Clos de Vougeot Grand Cru Vieilles Vignes 2013
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Description
Tasting notes
Reviewed by: Stephen Tanzer
(from vines picked on October 5, as in 1978; 24 h/h): Medium red with a faint amber tinge at the edge. Distinctly wilder on the nose than the 2016, and as much about soil as primary fruits, conveying perfumed scents of plum, currant, cherry, dried flowers and spices. A juicy, salty, soil-driven wine with very good density and noteworthy elegance, with its aromatic red fruit flavors complicated by mocha and spices. Still a bit youthfully inexpressive--even imploded--but nicely perfumed from start to firmly tannic, classically dry finish. Here the tannins are a bit dustier than those of the '16, which is also longer on the aftertaste. An October vintage, says Labet. I suspect this wine is passing through a sullen stage today.
Reviewed by: Stephen Tanzer
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.
Reviewed by: Stephen Tanzer
Bright, full red-ruby. A wild essence of Clos-Vougeot on the nose: black cherry, smoky herbs, pepper and mint. At once superrich and juicy, with dark cherry fruit complicated by a saline element. In a distinctly powerful style, finishing with strong tannic structure and superb persistence. The stem-influenced high notes are more apparent in this wine today than in the cuvée classique.
About the Producer
Chateau De La Tour is located in the wine-producing village of Vougeot under the Cote de Nuits appellation in Burgundy, France. It is the largest and largest vineyard in the wine-producing village. A prestigious winery. Chateau De La Tour was founded in 1890 by the Labet Family and the Dechelette Family and has a history of more than 100 years. Since the 1930s, all wines produced by Chateau De La Tour have been bottled in-house. In the 1970s and early 1980s, the wines produced by Chateau De La Tour experienced a relatively low period; by 1986, after the young Francois Labet took over the management of the winery , Chateau De La Tour winery began to carry out technical cooperation with the famous wine brewing master Guy Accad (Guy Accad), borrowing Mr. Guy's method to manage vineyards and brewing wine, and successfully produced fine wines of excellent quality, Revived the reputation of the winery. Since then, the quality of Chateau De La Tour's wines has been steadily increasing after the hiring of master winemaker Jean-Pierre Confuron as the winery's chief winemaker. Chateau De La Tour owns a total of 6 hectares of vineyards, planted only with Pinot Noir (Pinot Noir), a single grape variety. The vineyards of the winery are located on an upper slope in the village of Vaux, adjacent to the wine-producing village of Musigny. The soil is mostly brown limestone, which is very suitable for the growth of vines. In terms of vineyard management, unlike most wineries in Vauville, Chateau De La Tour adheres to an organic management method and pays great attention to the protection and appreciation of the land. It is worth mentioning that the production of the vineyards of Château De Letoux is very low, with less than 2,500 liters of grape juice per hectare of vineyard, thus guaranteeing the excellent quality of the grapes. In terms of winemaking, Chateau De La Tour has always believed that good grapes make high-quality wines, and every drop of high-quality wine is the crystallization of high-quality grapes. Therefore, the winery pays great attention to the wine-making process. When picking the grapes, the winery uses wicker baskets to collect the grapes, so that the oxidized grapes are filtered out, and the remaining grapes are carefully selected for whole bunch fermentation using natural yeast. In order to preserve the original flavor and varietal characteristics of the wine to the greatest extent, Deletou Winery has always insisted on not adopting processes such as filtration and clarification of the wine. Wines from the winery are bottled and stored in underground cellars for a decade or more before being released to the market. Therefore, most of the wines produced by Chateau De La Tour are full-bodied, powerful, rich in flavor and have great aging potential.
