With the addition of another parcel of Chambertin that arrived with the 2009 vintage (sufficient to provide another five piéces to the estate’s production), Domaine Rousseau now owns fully 2.55 hectares of vines in this magical grand cru, and I cannot think of better hands to have this much Chambertin in! The 2011 is utterly brilliant, soaring from the glass in a stunning blend of red plums, cherries, blood orange, cocoa powder, grilled meats, a gloriously complex base of soil and a suave framing of vanillin oak. On the palate the wine is deep, full-bodied, very pure and sappy at the core, with stunning transparency, great structural elegance, very suave tannins and superb length and grip on the focused and still very young finish. This is really not far off the magical quality of the 2010!

This is completely different from the Bèze aromatically speaking as here the nose is brooding and recalcitrant and only aggressive swirling liberates fresh scents of spice, wet stone, game and dark berry fruits. There is outstanding richness to the powerful and impressively scaled flavors that possess an abundance of dry extract that imparts a velvety quality to the mid-palate while also buffering the tightly wound core of firm tannins on the driving mineral-inflected and hugely persistent finish. This is a stunner of a wine and one of the great wines of the 2011 vintage.

Tasted blind at the Burgundy 2011 horizontal tasting in Beaune, you have to get past a little reduction on the nose of Rousseau’s Chambertin 2011 that is animally and feral, developing a strong estuarine influence - mudflats, kelp and sea salt. The palate is medium-bodied with crisp, slightly chalky tannins and fine precision. Grippy in the mouth and more masculine with a precise, mineral finish. This is very fine but it needs 3-4 years to show its true nature. - Neal Martin