2014 E Guigal Cote-Rotie La Turque, Northern Rhone

Now that it's in bottle, the 2014 Cote Rotie La Turque has exceeded all of my earlier expectations. It's got those classic Côte Rôtie elements on the nose of smoked bacon, olives and violets, seamlessly entwined with supple tannins and raspberry fruit. Medium to full-bodied, it's silky and fine, showing tremendous length and complexity on the finish. On this occasion, La Turque came to the head of the class as the most approachable, exciting and elegant of the three La Las.

98 points Joe Czerwinski robertparker.com

As my visit to Guigal came smack in the middle of harvest, I was only able to do an abbreviated tasting of about 30 wines. Tasting with the father-and-son team of Marcel and Philippe Guigal and joined by recent addition Jacques Desvernois (formerly at Jaboulet), we worked our way through all of the current releases in between sporadic loads of Côte Rôtie grapes arriving at the reception. On one occasion, while Philippe was dealing with a delivery, Marcel grabbed a pipette and we went to take an "unofficial" look at the 2015 La Las. As we only tasted from one barrel of each, I'm not updating my formal reviews from last year but will simply say that each of the barrels we tasted from were potentially perfect. When someone of Marcel's experience says 2015 is the best vintage he's ever seen in the Northern Rhône, would you expect anything different? Of the now-bottled 2014 La Las, Marcel said, "It's not a great year, but it needs time." While not up to the level of the 2015s, they're still impressive, and while they could all use a few years in the cellar, the La Mouline and La Turque are fairly approachable. Guigal's policy of giving their red wines extended élevage means they're often not yet on the market when new-vintage hype strikes. On the other hand, now that many 2015s from the Northern Rhône have already sold through, Guigal is a last chance for consumers to grab hold of some great examples at reasonable prices from Crozes-Hermitage and Saint-Joseph, and the Côte-Rôtie Brune et Blonde. Even the 2015 Côtes du Rhône release is a beauty. As Marcel pointed out, "For us, it's a grand vin, not a simple, fruity wine." New from the 2017 vintage is a white Châteauneuf-du-Pape, while notably missing from the lineup is a Hermitage Ex Voto from 2014, as it wasn't deemed worthy and was blended into the regular Hermitage.