Delas Hermitage Les Bessards 2005
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Wine Spectator
Supertaut now, but loaded with racy black currant, fig and suave mocha notes, all pushed by racy tannins. This offers loads of briary grip, but it's sweet and ripe, with a minerality that blazes through on the finish. Should cruise in the cellar. Best from 2010 through 2030.
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Robert Parker's Wine Advocate
A wine that needs to be left alone for another 4-5 years is the 2005 Hermitage Les Bessards. As with the Cote Rotie La Landonne, I tasted this earlier in the year and it showed similar this go around as well. Massive, tannic, concentrated and backwards, with tons of graphite, crushed rock and smoked meats, it has full-bodied richness, massive tannin and a big finish. I worry a smidge about the overall tannin level/balance here, but I’m still convinced that this wine’s best days lie ahead.
Rating: 95(+) -
Wine Enthusiast
Delas's cuvée parcellaire is a rich wine that's almost syrupy in its concentration and tannic strength. But this definitely has plenty of fruit for balance, mixing cassis with black olive, espresso, cinnamon and clove. Not quite as rich as the '03, but still a classic, with great persistence on the finish. Best after 2015.
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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.”
One of the smallest and most important Syrah regions of northern Rhone, Hermitage is practically one single south-facing slope of crushed granite, thinly covered with varied, yet well-charted soil types. Many climats (well identified parcels) exist within Hermitage and while some smaller producers make single climat Syrahs, some larger ones blend to make one balanced expression of the appellation.
Though the AC regulations allow the addition of up to 15% white grapes to a red Hermitage, in practice it is usually made from Syrah alone. Winemaking is pretty traditional—or you might say historic—with hot fermentations and aging in older barrels of various sizes. The best wines, characterized by deep, dense and sexy flavors of black fruit, cocoa, licorice and tobacco, have massive textures and a solid 10-20 years aging potential.
The region of Hermitage is totally enclosed; the only place it could go really is to literally fall down its own hill into the city of Tain or the Rhone River. Soil erosion is a problem and terraces exist alongside the hill in order to keep the earth in place. Crozes-Hermitage encloses the region entirely to its north and south.
While Hermitage seems synonymous with some of the best Syrah on the planet, actually about one third of the wine produced here comes from white grapes. The full, lush and robust Marsanne or the less common, but almost more charming, Roussanne create wonderful whites in which the best have great potential for aging, like the reds.