Winemaker Notes
Deep purple in color. The nose offers a full and intense fruit expression accompanied by floral, spicy and roasted notes: violet, cherry and plum, berry, and mocha.
Professional Ratings
-
Decanter
Lovely lavender and dried herbs on the nose and palate. Shot through with saturated fine tannin and juicy blackberry acidity. Plenty of detail, personality, power, freshness and great balance, this is a really satisfying glass of Crozes-Hermitage.
-
Jeb Dunnuck
Already bottled, the 2020 Crozes-Hermitage shows the vintage beautifully, with a pure, medium-bodied, elegant style as well as the classic floral, pretty, exotic character this cuvée always shows. I love its overall balance, it has nicely integrated acidity as well as impressive purity in its cassis and dark berry fruits, and it’s going to drink nicely right out of the gate yet also evolve for over a decade. This is an estate readers need to seek out.
-
Robert Parker's Wine Advocate
The 2020 Crozes Hermitage immediately conjures visions of a wild blackberry thicket—slightly green, prickly, yet brimming with sweet fruit. That said, it's much more polished in the mouth, where this medium to full-bodied wine delivers ripe fruit, smooth, supple tannins and a lingering, softly tannic finish. Nicely done.
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.”
Crozes-Hermitage is Northern Rhone’s largest appellation, surrounding the steep granite faces of Hermitage to its north and south. Here the rolling vineyards are less extreme and its soils, rich in clay-limestone and alluvial matter, produce Syrahs that range from fruity and charming to lush and seductive. The Syrahs of Crozes-Hermitage have more mass than those from St. Joseph but are less intense than those from Hermitage. While many are intended for early consumption, some of the best Syrahs from Crozes-Hermitage will age beautifully for 5-10 years.
Up to 15% of white grapes may theoretically be added to red Crozes at the time of fermentation but whether this is done or not depends on the decision of the winemaker. The best Crozes-Hermitage Syrahs will be fleshy with black fruit (currant, blackberry and black cherry) and bay leaf qualities, notes of tar and stone, and a well-concentrated finish of smooth tannins.
About a tenth of the wine produced in Crozes-Hermitage is white, primarily composed of Marsanne supplemented by smaller amounts of Roussanne.