2013 Cornas Chaillot

Wine Details
Place of Origin

France

Cornas

Northern Rhône

Color

Red

Grape/Blend

Syrah

Reviews & Tasting Notes

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Drinking Window

2020 - 2027

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Over the last decade, the soft-spoken Franck Balthazar has emerged as one of the most consistently top-notch winemakers not just in Cornas, but in the entire Rhône Valley. Winemaking here is very traditional, utilizing whole clusters and only 10% to 15% new oak "just to maintain the usual rotation of wood, not for aroma or flavor." Balthazar's Cornas bottlings are some of the most elegant of the appellation, but their light touch can be deceiving. They have also proven to be excellent cellar candidates even though they show a highly seductive character in their youth. There's a new wine here starting with 2015, a Crozes-Hermitage that Balthazar sources from the limestone-rich soils of Mercurol, at the southern end of the appellation. This site is quite close to Cornas as the crow flies, "but on a completely different soil, which is really interesting for me to work with," Franck said.

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Yields here were pitifully low in 2013, Franck Balthazar told me, noting that his vines gave him less than 19 hectoliters per hectare because of "bad flowering" and the usual paucity of fruit that his old vines provide. He began harvesting during the first week of October, which gave him fully mature fruit "with good complexity and surprising acidity and minerality, which contribute to the wines' freshness." While he thinks that the wines are balanced to age, he also believes that it would be best to err on the side of youth "so that they can be enjoyed for their vivacity and fruit." Balthazar is quite pleased with his 2012s "because they're very perfumed and approachable but are balanced to age, if you wish." He thinks that they will outlive the 2013s fairly easily and that they possess greater depth of flavor and power and are thus "more classically Cornas" than their younger siblings, and this is in spite of what he called "a generous harvest" of around 30 hectoliters per hectare, a gift from nature that he'll happily take. Sadly, for me at least, Balthazar has moved his operation out of his tiny, ancient cellar underneath the town church and into a new and far more spacious cellar and chai on the east side of town near the railroad tracks and behind his home. It makes work a lot easier and the old space "was just becoming impractical," but he agreed that the original cellar had a distinct character that's hard to find anymore.

Importer Details
The Rare Wine Co.

Imports to: United States

Address: 280 Valley Drive, Brisbane, CA 94005

Phone: (415) 319-9000

Email: sales@rarewineco.com

Website: rarewineco.com