Vougeot “Le Clos du Prieuré” Rouge Monopole Reviews

The 2012 Clos du Prieuré Blanc presents an attractive mix of apricot, mint and spice notes. Here the style is soft, round and caressing, with a touch less minerality than some of the other whites but more texture, resonance and breadth. There is a sense o

There is just over one hectare (2.47 acres) of pinot noir in this walled vineyard, where some of the vines date back to 1901, the youngest palnted in 1983. Farmed under biodynamics since 2001, it produced a mood-altering wine in this vintage, sparkling with freshness, the brightness of the color itself showing the life in the wine. It surges with energy across the mid-palate, a revelation in fraise de bois flavor. The wine has not issues, just layer upon layer of delicate red fruit and Vougeot earth.

This lean, sinewy red is marked by a tannic edge and a cedar note. There’s intensity to the cherry and berry fruit, finishing sweet, with a spicy accent.

Medium red. Slightly reduced aromas of candied raspberry, coffee and menthol accented by peppery herbs and spices. Leanish, slightly raw wine with juicy red berry and spice flavors framed by sound balancing acidity. Offers modest complexity and depth. Peppery herbs dust the finish, which displays subtle fruit and good energy. Not bad.

This lean, sinewy red is marked by a tannic edge and a cedar note. There’s intensity to the cherry and berry fruit, finishing sweet, with a spicy accent.

Outstanding. A really lovely and intensely floral nose offers up notes of lilac, violet and rose petal along with pretty red pinot fruit and subtle earth scents. There is good body and mid-palate density to the rich, round and utterly delicious flavors that possess excellent complexity on the mildly rustic and persistent finish where a touch of wood surfaces. This is a very fine villages and worth a look.

The freshness of this wine is almost explosive, crackling with floral scents, bees­wax and the funky corn notes of huitlacoche. It’s fresh cream underneath, smooth­ing all that tension and suggesting that you decant a bottle for roast grouper.

The 2010 Vougeot Le Clos du Priure boasts an exotic nose redolent of spices, tar, anise, sweet dark cherries and tobacco, all of which resonate beautifully on the palate. This is a gorgeous, layered wine graced with notable depth despite its mid-weight personality. A striking, caressing finish rounds things out in style. Anticipated maturity: 2015-2025. This is stunning set of wines from Pierre Vincent and Domaine de la Vougeraie. It is impossible to miss the attention to detail at this impeccably run domaine. No expense is spared. It takes 80 people to work the vineyards during harvest and another 20 in the cellar to take it from there. Production in 2010 was of course down significantly as it was everywhere else. Yields came in at 24 hectoliters per hectare for the Pinot and 29 for the Chardonnay. Vincent used between 30-80% whole bunches, depending on the wine. Readers who want to learn more might want to check out my video interview with Pierre Vincent on www.erobertparker.com. I will report on the domaine’s 2009s in the April issue. For now let me just say the 2009 Musigny is one of the wines of the vintage.

A distinctly earthy, brooding and very serious nose features mostly dark berry fruit and sauvage hints. There is very good volume and mid-palate fat to the solidly rich flavors where the supporting tannins are clearly ripe before terminating in a balanced and attractively persistent finish. This delivers fine quality for its level and while it's not a wine of refinement, there is ample character.

The 2009 Vougeot Le Clos du Prieure is another of the more delicate, restrained wines in this lineup. Sweet, silky tannins and floral notes round out the finish. Anticipated maturity: 2015-2022. Biodynamic farming and non-interventionalist winemaking are at the heart of the approach at Domaine de la Vougeraie. The 2009s saw roughly a 25 days of maceration (including a week of cold soak) with one punch down a day. Once in barrel racking was kept to a bare minimum. A number of wines were bottled in late 2010 and early 2011. I tasted these wines with winemaker Pierre Vincent in March 2011.

(a monople of the domaine) An intensely earthy nose features a pretty mix of red currant and dark pinot fruit aromas where the earth component transfers over to the rich, intense and mildly rustic middle weight flavors that possess fine volume and a round mouth feel as there is ample sap on the solidly persistent finish. 2015+