ROMANEE CONTI Grands Echezeaux 2010

Rich and fruity, displaying some reticence, this opens up in the glass with air. Features plenty of strawberry, raspberry and cherry, along with spice and mineral, converging on the long, refined finish.—Non-blind 2010 DRC tasting (March 2013). Best from 2017 through 2036.

Good bright red. More deeply pitched on the nose than the Echezeaux, conveying wilder scents of red berries, coffee, soy sauce and smoke. Broader and less showy today, displaying a more obvious soil component initially, With aeration, notes of raspberry and strawberry emerged. Today this comes across as more pliant and less taut than the Echezeaux, and it's not clear that it has more density or length. De Villaine notes that the average age of vines here is lower at 35 years and that the final blend includes some fruit from 12-year-old vines.

This is the second time that I have tasted the 2010 Grands Echézeaux Grand Cru from bottle from Domaine de la Romanée-Conti, and it was a wine that prompted a table of mature Pinot aficionadoes to remark upon the joys of infanticide. This is just a fantastic wine from the domaine. The nose is heavenly with its exquisite delineation, the fruit maybe a touch darker and earthier than a couple of years ago -- yet still with subtle woodland/sous-bois aromas and a hint of morels. The palate is wonderfully defined, so fresh and precise with filigree tannin. Yet there is great backbone to this wine, a framework that imparts a sense of symmetry that is totally disarming. Of course, readers should afford this magnificent wine a decade in the cellar...unless by complete accident a corkscrew falls into the cork and twists around until the cork pops out. Then you will have to drink it.