Winemaker Notes
The 2015 Domaine Des Quatre Vents is a bright garnet color. Fresh aromas of black fruits, cherry stone, mild spices permeate the nose, while the same fruits and spices are ripe and fresh on the palate, with silky tannins. This wine pairs well with tarragon chicken, oven-roasted salmon, lamb or beef, spicy dishes and aged cheeses.
Professional Ratings
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James Suckling
Impressively aromatic with crushed berries, dried flowers, nutmeg and other spices. Full-bodied, round and flavorful with a light vanilla and chocolate aftertaste. About 20% new barrels.
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Robert Parker's Wine Advocate
The 2015 Fleurie Clos des Quatre Vents was surprisingly reticent on the nose, possibly due to a touch of reduction, although there appears to be plenty of fruit underneath. The palate is sweet and ripe on the entry, dark cherry and raspberry fruit, hints of blueberry, fine tannins with good weight and persistence on the finish. This is a charming Fleurie with the structure to suggest that it will give 7-8 years of drinking pleasure.
Delightfully playful, but also capable of impressive gravitas, Gamay is responsible for juicy, berry-packed wines. From Beaujolais, Gamay generally has three classes: Beaujolais Nouveau, a decidedly young, fruit-driven wine, Beaujolais Villages and Cru Beaujolais. The Villages and Crus are highly ranked grape growing communes whose wines are capable of improving with age whereas Nouveau, released two months after harvest, is intended for immediate consumption. Somm Secret—The ten different Crus have their own distinct personalities—Fleurie is delicate and floral, Côte de Brouilly is concentrated and elegant and Morgon is structured and age-worthy.
The bucolic region often identified as the southern part of Burgundy, Beaujolais actually doesn’t have a whole lot in common with the rest of the region in terms of climate, soil types and grape varieties. Beaujolais achieves its own identity with variations on style of one grape, Gamay.
Gamay was actually grown throughout all of Burgundy until 1395 when the Duke of Burgundy banished it south, making room for Pinot Noir to inhabit all of the “superior” hillsides of Burgundy proper. This was good news for Gamay as it produces a much better wine in the granitic soils of Beaujolais, compared with the limestone escarpments of the Côte d’Or.
Four styles of Beaujolais wines exist. The simplest, and one that has regrettably given the region a subpar reputation, is Beaujolais Nouveau. This is the Beaujolais wine that is made using carbonic maceration (a quick fermentation that results in sweet aromas) and is released on the third Thursday of November in the same year as harvest. It's meant to drink young and is flirty, fruity and fun. The rest of Beaujolais is where the serious wines are found. Aside from the wines simply labelled, Beaujolais, there are the Beaujolais-Villages wines, which must come from the hilly northern part of the region, and offer reasonable values with some gems among them. The superior sections are the cru vineyards coming from ten distinct communes: St-Amour, Juliénas, Chénas, Moulin-à-Vent, Fleurie, Chiroubles, Morgon, Regnié, Brouilly, and Côte de Brouilly. Any cru Beajolais will have its commune name prominent on the label.