Château Le Tertre Rôteboeuf, St Emilion Grand Cru, 2017
As one would expect from Francois Mitjavile's flagship wine, this is an idiosyncratic, exotic style of St Emilion. Tasted straight from barrel, the sample is heavily influenced by oak, but even so, one detects notions of mushrooms, Kirsch, caramel, sweet earth, cacao, mocha and degraded fruit. Velvety, dark, rich and sumptuous. The overall balance is good, and in time this should reveal lots of charm as those ripe, earthy notes emerge. There is simply nothing else like it in Bordeaux…..
critic reviews
Beautifully fragrant, this is a great example of limestone terroir encouraging floral aromatics, particularly in lighter vintages such as 2017 (I am thoroughly enjoying the 2017 vintage right now by the way, and just a few days ago had a delicious example of the neighbouring wine, Larcis Ducasse). Expect a swirl of gunsmoke, plenty of rich and juicy blueberry and blackberry fruits, violets, peonies, cloves and cumin. Traditionally the southen slopes of St Emilion were called the most Burgundian of the region, and there is a touch of Musigny about this. 100% new oak for ageing. Easily one of the wines of the vintage, tasting even better with six years under its belt, brilliant stuff from François Mitjavile.
The 2017 Tertre-Rôteboeuf has Saint-Émilion blood pumping through its veins, although this 2017 has tones of Left Bank, subtle cigar box and smoke aromas infusing the tightly knit red fruit, a faint marine influence in the background. The palate is silky smooth on the entry with a fine line of acidity, quite savory in character with cracked black pepper and a touch of spice on the persistent finish. There is a nice "bite" to this Tertre-Rôteboeuf and it should give over 20 years of drinking pleasure.