2011 Domaine Camus-Bruchon & Fils, Savigny-Les-Beaune, Aux Grands Liards, Vieilles Vignes, Red Burgundy, France.
This wonderful Cote de Beaune Pinot Noir comes from the 90 plus year old Grand Liards vines in Savigny-Les-Beaune and is made by Lucien Camus, latest in a long line of generations to make wine in Burgundy, he is really coming into his own at the helm of Domaine Camus-Bruchon, and this wine reflects his growing talent and reputation. Lucien is a vineyard winegrower, he loves his vines and spends most of his time with them, he is a traditionalist in the cellar, he only uses about 15% new oak and employs long maceration and fermentations, he wants the grapes to give everything they have to offer, with no filtering or fining used to delivery purity and balance of fruit and tannin. The Camus-Bruchon have been superb in the last few vintages and remain savvy wines for the Burgundy enthusiast, they offer great terroir driven flavor and character at a great value, the 2008, 2009 and 2010’s were lovely, but this 2011 is showing great and is a steal, this is a buyers year for Burgundy if you know where to look, and this 2011 Camus-Bruchon Aux Grands Liards Savigny is a fantastic bottle of wine, it shows depth, palate density and a glorious layered mouth feel with plum, black cherry and raspberry fruits, tea spice, hints of wild game, anise, bitter herb and cedar along with mineral and chalky stones. Beautiful floral tone lead in the glass with violets, rose petal, a touch of pepper and lavender waft from the glass in this vigorous Pinot that shows refined tannin, lifting acidity and a silky rich texture in a medium weight frame. This is really worth looking for, imported by Beaune Imports, and it has a good drinking window, and is damn good now, this old vine Burgundy should be best from 2015 to 2022, this is lovely, impressive and expressive stuff made by a domaine on the rise.
($40 Est.) 93+ Points, grapelive
avail at www.sfwtc.com ($38.95)