Winemaker Notes
Professional Ratings
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Wine Spectator
Dark and brooding, this has a deep well of black currant, fig and bitter plum fruit in reserve, shrouded for now in smoldering charcoal, bay leaf and alder notes. Tapenade and tar details hang in the background. Offers a steel beam of a finish. Tuck this away in the back corner of your cellar. Best from 2020 through 2035.
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Robert Parker's Wine Advocate
Probably the wine of the vintage is Clape’s 2013 Cornas. Coming from some of the prime terroirs in this incredible appellation, it’s always 100% Syrah (Cornas is always 100% Syrah) that saw no destemming and spent 22 months in mostly ancient foudre. This wine offers up classic Clape notes of beef blood, cold steel, liquid rock, pepper and saddle leather (there’s fruit in there as well) to go with a medium to full-bodied, beautifully concentrated, rich, textured 2013 that has an awesome mid-palate, ripe tannin and clean, lengthy finish. It won’t be as long lived as some of the more blockbuster-styled years, but it will dish out incredible pleasure over the coming 10-15 years.
Marked by an unmistakable deep purple hue and savory aromatics, Syrah makes an intense, powerful and often age-worthy red. Native to the Northern Rhône, Syrah achieves its maximum potential in the steep village of Hermitage and plays an important component in the Red Rhône Blends of the south, adding color and structure to Grenache and Mourvèdre. Syrah is the most widely planted grape of Australia and is important in California and Washington. Sommelier Secret—Such a synergy these three create together, the Grenache, Syrah, Mourvedre trio often takes on the shorthand term, “GSM.”
Distinguished as a fine Syrah producing zone since the 18th century, Cornas, like Cote Rotie, is made up of vineyards covering steep and hard-to-work, granite terraces. As a result the region’s wines fell out of favor during the mid 20th century when the global market was more focused on bulk wines and vineyards that yielded high quantities. It wasn’t until the 1980s when a group of energetic young winemakers reestablished the integrity of these precipitous terraces and also began making an ultra-modern style of Syrah. The new style didn’t need a decade before it was drinkable and could reach the consumer faster than the region’s traditional wines. Given the new quality coming out of the zone, its popularity once again soared and today a good Cornas can easily challenge many of those from Hermitage. Characteristics of Syrah from Cornas include teeth-staining flavors of blackberry jam, plum, pepper, violets, smoked game, charcoal, chalk dust and smoke.