Chapoutier Le Meal Ermitage Blanc 2005

"The warmest terroir for the white Ermitage cuvees is Le Meal, an upper mid-slope terroir with a great exposition.The most flamboyant of these wines, the 2005 Ermitage Le Meal blanc, exhibits notes of buttered citrus, copious tropical fruit, crushed rocks, white currants, and an amazing amount of honeysuckle allied with good acidity and enormous body."
-Robert Parker, Wine Advocate

"Yellow-gold. Ripe pit fruit and musky lees on the nose, with a smoky mineral quality adding further depth and complexity. Deeply concentrated, chewy apricot and fig flavors are sweetened by floral honey and energized by zesty minerality, but this is ultimately an extremely rich bruiser of a wine. Few late-harvest wines have this sort of richness, but this is emphatically dry. Really amazing, but what do you do with something like this? Maybe serve it with a half-pound slab of foie gras terrine."
-International Wine Cellar

"Superdense, with lots of bass showing now--anise, fennel seed, cardamom, glazed pear and fig--but there's still plenty of minerality behind it all, with a long, salted butter finish that just won't quit. Best from 2010 through 2025."
-Wine Spectator