2000 Côte-Rôtie Seigneur de Maugiron

As evidence of its higher quality standards today, thisx000D house declassified most of its cuvees parcellaires into its basic offerings inx000D 2000 to protect the quality of these latter wines. According to director/enologist Jacques Grange, the crop load inx000D 2000 was a bit too heavy to make serious, concentrated wines. Two thousand one, he says, produced a morex000D structured set of wines with good aging potential, thanks in part tox000D significantly lower yields. Grapex000D sugars were a full degree higher across the board (typically 12%, vs. 11% inx000D the earlier vintage), and the skins were correspondingly riper as well. In fact, there were more polyphenols inx000D 2001, Grange added, but longer, hotter fermentations were needed to extractx000D what the skins had to give, a comment I heard at several other Northern Rhonex000D addresses in November. With elevage thex000D better 2001s are revealing themselves as complete wines, Grange noted. Grange has focused his attention on thex000D house's white wines in the past couple of vintages. In 2001, he adopted what he described as "a Champagnex000D approach," gently pressing 150 kilos of grapes to get 100 kilos of juice,x000D in an attempt to fashion wines with more aromatic purity and definition. (Maisons Marques & Domaines, Oakland,x000D CA) Also recommended: 2000 Crozes-Hermitage Les Launes, 2000 Saint-Joseph Les Challeys. Other wines tasted: 2001 Cotes dux000D Ventoux, 2000 Cotes du Rhone Saint-Esprit.

Director/enologist Jacques Grange initially felt the young 2000s were fine if a bit diluted by high yields, with the tannins not quite ripe enough. "Until September of this year I thought the red wines lacked concentration and structure compared to our region's wines, but now I find that they have good balance, finesse and purity," he explained. "And when you compare them to syrah from elsewhere around the world, they're not so bad." Still, Grange added, they will need earlier bottling than the '99s or '98s: the top '98s got an elevage of 26 months and the '99s 24 months, but the 2000s will be bottled after just 15 months. Grange finds the '98s especially true to their sites, while he considers the '99s the best vintage for the Northern Rhone since 1990. The house's top 1999 cuvees parcellaires showed spectacularly in November.