2018 Corton Grand Cru

As usual, I will not dwell too much on my visit to Domaine de la Romanée-Conti as I place more emphasis on the in-bottle tasting that is contemporaneous with the wines being offered for sale. However, it is useful to include my barrel notes to lot their evolution from barrel and to place them within the context of other domaines. The main points gleaned from my tasting with Bertrand de Villaine is that they felt that the vines resisted the heat much better in 2018 compared to 2003 thanks to accumulated water reserves. They began the harvest on 31 August in Corton where their three vineyards in Clos du Roi, Bressandes and Renardes continue to be blended together, although the 2018 does include young vines re-planted after they took over the running of these parcels. Then from 3 September, they picked in Richebourg, Romanée-Saint-Vivant, Romanée-Conti, Grands Echézeaux and La Tâche in that order, finishing on 12 September. Yields were 32hl/ha in Grands-Echézeaux, 35hl/ha in Corton but lower in Romanée-Conti at 18hl/ha. Just returning to the order of picking, I was not aware of that information during my tasting from barrel. It was only when back at home and reading the domaine's report summary, that I realised that the two last picked vineyards, Grands Echézeaux and La Tâche, were the two that I found most difficult to read from barrel, especially the former. I am intrigued to revisit this pair once in bottle.