Winemaker Notes
Professional Ratings
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Wine & Spirits
This wine combines remarkable freshness with elegant richness, so that even after it's been open for several days, the flavors are still evolving, the fruit still brisk as an autumn breeze. It needs that time for the blunt chalkiness of the structure to mellow, for the cool apple and pear flavors to develop and lengthen. Built to age, this is an exceptional vintage of L'Ermitage.
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Wine Enthusiast
Compared to Roederer's current nonvintage bubblies, this one’s tight and not as likeable. It has an almost rustic scoury feeling. But it’s very rich in cherries, raspberries, white peaches and yeasty, leesy influences, and probably needs time in the bottle.
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Wine Spectator
Sleek and complex, with lovely aromas of green apple, loam and warm cinnamon rolls. The flavors show pinpoint focus, yet are nicely layered, with baked apple, lime and toasty spice flavors that linger.
Representing the topmost expression of a Champagne house, a vintage Champagne is one made from the produce of a single, superior harvest year. Vintage Champagnes account for a mere 5% of total Champagne production and are produced about three times in a decade. Champagne is typically made as a blend of multiple years in order to preserve the house style; these will have non-vintage, or simply, NV on the label. The term, "vintage," as it applies to all wine, simply means a single harvest year.
Reaching up California's coastline and into its valleys north of San Francisco, the North Coast AVA includes six counties: Marin, Solano, Napa, Sonoma, Mendocino and Lake. While Napa and Sonoma enjoy most of the glory, the rest produce no shortage of quality wines in an intriguing and diverse range of styles.
Climbing up the state's rugged coastline, the chilly Marin County, just above the City and most of Sonoma County, as well as Mendocino County on the far north end of the North Coast successfully grow cool-climate varieties like Pinot Noir, Chardonnay and in some spots, Riesling. Inland Lake County, on the other hand, is considerably warmer, and Cabernet Sauvignon, Zinfandel and Sauvignon Blanc produce some impressive wines with affordable price tags.