Lucien Le Moine Nuits-St-Georges Les Vaucrains Premier Cru 2014
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Parker
Robert
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Wine Spectator
This is vibrant, boasting cherry and black currant notes, allied to a dense texture. Builds to a lingering aftertaste of dark fruit, mineral and spice. Shows terrific harmony and balance, though this needs a few years of cellaring to really sing. Best from 2021 through 2040. 20 cases imported.
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Robert Parker's Wine Advocate
The 2014 Nuits Saint Georges 1er Cru Les Vaucrains has a beautifully poised bouquet with mineral-tinged redcurrant and cranberry scents, very delineated and very nicely focused. The palate is medium-bodied with cranberry and strawberry on the entry, just a touch of greenness here, but in a positive sense. There is something a little rustic and enigmatic about this Vaucrains, so it will be fascinating to revisit once in bottle. There is sophistication already present in this wine.
Barrel Sample: 92-94
Other Vintages
2017-
Spectator
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Parker
Robert -
Spectator
Wine
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Parker
Robert
Lucien Le Moine is a small House of Grands Crus in the Beaune region of France. The winery is a two person operation established in1999. Mounir learned and worked in a Trappist Monastery where he discovered Chardonnay and Pinot Noir. He studied Viticulture and Oenology at the ENSAM Montpellier, then had 6 years experience in different wineries in Burgundy, other areas of France and California where he became fascinated by the "old way" of growing, vinificating and aging wines. One day he decided to push to the extreme everything he saw and experienced and created, with Rotem, a small cellar dedicated to the ideas of purity and typicity.
Rotem comes from a cheese making family. She learned Agriculture both at the Technion and the ENESAD in Dijon and oriented her studies toward wine. She won a national prize from the French Academy of Agriculture for a study on the Côte d'Or than she participated in many Harvests in Burgundy and California. She joined Mounir in 1999 and started Lucien Le Moine together.
Having studied, lived and worked in Burgundy for several years the duo got to know many good growers in the region. They decided to merge these relations and devotion to quality in a small selected production of Crus.
Lucien Le Moine produces only Grands and Premiers Crus from Côte d'Or.
Thin-skinned, finicky and temperamental, Pinot Noir is also one of the most rewarding grapes to grow and remains a labor of love for some of the greatest vignerons in Burgundy. Fairly adaptable but highly reflective of the environment in which it is grown, Pinot Noir prefers a cool climate and requires low yields to achieve high quality. Outside of France, outstanding examples come from in Oregon, California and throughout specific locations in wine-producing world. Somm Secret—André Tchelistcheff, California’s most influential post-Prohibition winemaker decidedly stayed away from the grape, claiming “God made Cabernet. The Devil made Pinot Noir.”
Inhabiting the bottom end of the northern half of the Côte d’Or, Nuits-St-Georges is a busy, market-driven town and home to many of Burgundy’s negociants. It is also the largest town in the Côte d’Or after Beaune and contributes "nuits" to the name of Côte de Nuits (i.e., the northern half of the Côte d’Or).
The appellation itself is divided into two parts, where in the north it directly borders Vosne-Romanée, the southerly end is the commune of Prémeaux. There are no Grands Crus in this village, though it does have a large number of Premiers Crus.
The best Nuits-St-Georges Pinot Noir are layered with cherry, plum, underbrush and sandalwood. The fruit is sweet, the wine energetic, and the finish long and lush.