Winemaker Notes
Professional Ratings
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Robert Parker's Wine Advocate
The 2015 Marsannay En Ouzeloy, which sees a light 5% new oak, has an attractive nose of raspberry coulis and crushed strawberry, nicely defined with blue fruit surfacing with aeration. The palate is medium-bodied with sappy red fruit, finely tuned acidity with an almost sorbet-like freshness on the finish thanks to a tincture of blood orange.
Barrel Sample: 89-91 -
Wine Spectator
A sleek profile creates the backdrop for cherry pie, black currant and spice flavors. Firm and toasty on the lingering aftertaste. Best from 2020 through 2028.
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.”
Perched up in the northernmost position in the Côte de Nuits, Marsannay is the only appellation village of Burgundy to produce classified wines of all three colors: red, white— and rosé. The official Rosé de Marsannay earned its high reputation in the early 1900s.
Its reds, made of Pinot Noir, burst with red and black fruit and are consistently long on the palate. Chardonnays from Marsannay are charming, floral and full of citrus fruit and mineral. Top Marsannay vineyards include Clos du Roy and Les Longeroies.