TERTRE ROTEBOEUF 2020

Another absolutely perfect wine in this incredible vintage, the 2020 Château Tertre Roteboeuf comes from a tiny hillside vineyard (5.6 hectares) and is 80% Merlot and 20% Cabernet Franc raised all in new Radoux barrels. This show-stopping wine has everything and reveals a dense purple hue, incredible aromatics of cassis, vanilla bean, burning embers, graphite, and smoke tobacco, full-bodied richness, flawless integration of its tannins and acidity, and a massive finish. The finest wine I've ever tasted from this address, it's not going to hit maturity for another 7-8 years and will be a 30+-year wine. Hats off to the team of François Mitjavile for another singular, sexy, absolutely off-the-charts wine.

The 2020 Tertre-Rôteboeuf has exquisite purity on the nose, to the point where I could not decide whether the aromatics resembled a fine Romanée-Saint-Vivant or a Saint-Émilion. Maybe a mixture of the two? There are plush black cherries, cassis and vanilla, and creamy new oak but wonderfully integrated. The palate is medium-bodied with fine-grained tannins. This particular sample, from a half-bottle, did demonstrate quite a bit of wood tannin, especially on the finish, but that will be subsumed by the oak, and as my glass warmed up, it did become more enmeshed. I suspect this Tertre-Rôteboeuf will require more bottle aging than previous vintages.

The 2020 Le Tertre Roteboeuf will delight admirers of Mitjaville's singular style. Unfurling in the glass with aromas of rich dark berries and plums mingled with black truffles, exotic spices, espresso roast, cedar, vine smoke and toasty new oak, it's full-bodied, layered and velvety, with an ample core of ripe, heady fruit framed by sweet, powdery tannins, concluding with a long, sapid finish.