E. Guigal, Cote Rotie, La Turque 2022

A particularly dark, black-fruited La Turque this year, showing liquorice and smoke. Full-bodied, ripe but fresh, the oak is well integrated. Plenty of blackberry skin tannins and some oak tannin as well, it's solid and really quite dense and spicy on the palate. Powerful but fresh, for long ageing, this comes from vines on the Côte Brune, planted by Marcel Guigal in 1980 after having been abandoned since 1935 – La Turque is a central part of Côte Brune, comprising less than 1ha. This will be aged for 40 months in new French oak barriques.

Darker and more inward, cassis, graphite, crushed stone, and liquid violets define the 2022 Côte Rôtie La Turque, and it picks up more gamey, smoky, black olive notes with air. Made from 93% Syrah and 7% Viognier and aged 42 months in new oak, it shows a more structured, focused profile than La Mouline, with full-bodied richness, impressive concentration, and a great finish.

The magnificent 2022 Côte-Rôtie La Turque wafts up with espresso, blackcurrant, black cherry, pencil shavings, crushed violets and wood smoke. Dark and brooding, this is a remarkably charming La Turque, much more so than the muscular 2019 or 2020. Nonetheless, the 2022 La Turque is framed by an intricate tannic web and marked by elevated flavor concentration, ending with ample persistence on the complex finish.

Crafted from a one-hectare parcel on iron oxide and clay soils, the 2022 Cote Rotie La Turque presents a reserved yet characteristically somber profile, revealing aromas of spices, licorice, pencil lead, oak and spices mingled with gingerbread. Full-bodied, concentrated and muscular, it's structured with a layered, dense, almost compact core of fruit and concludes with a brooding, firm and long finish, though the oak notes are somewhat prominent. Given its sunny terroir and extended barrel maturation process, La Turque typically requires over a decade or two of aging to develop its full potential.