The 2018 Cote Rotie les Grandes Places (assembled from several barrels) boasts aromas of tar, blackberries and blueberries. It's medium to full-bodied, open-knit and a bit tannic, but it's ripe, flavorful and long on the finish.

Gerin's 2017 Cote Rotie les Grandes Places is medium to full-bodied, ripe and concentrated. It practically oozes blackberries and blueberries, then picks up hints of licorice on the long, velvety finish.

The inky-colored 2014 C?te R?tie les Grandes Places (100% Syrah) is a beauty! Concentrated, structured and tannic, with tons of minerality, smoked meats and ripe black fruits, it hits the palate with full-bodied richness, solid mid-palate depth and a great finish. It shows this vineyard's character perfectly and will have two decades of longevity.

Inky purple/black in color, the masculine, mineral-laced 2013 C?te R?tie les Grandes Places has the classic signature of this vineyard with its smoked dark fruits, coffee bean, and earthy aromas and flavors. Like the other C?te R?ties, it has a modern slant and is more medium to full-bodied than full-bodied, yet it has terrific purity of fruit, solid underlying structure, good mid-palate depth and a great finish. Give it a few years in the cellar and enjoy bottles over the following decade.

Another knockout effort by this producer, the 2011 Cote Rotie Les Grandes Places is a long, rich and medium to full-bodied effort that possesses fantastic notes of smoked bacon, raspberry, kirsch, licorice and assorted spiced meat-like qualities on the nose. It too has some sweet oak to integrate, so hide it in the cellar for a handful of years. It will have two decades or more of longevity. Other than a lackluster, slightly odd Condrieu, this was a brilliant lineup of wines by proprietor Jean-Michel Gerin. Farming 17 acres (organically) in Cote Rotie (mostly in the northern part of the appellation) and Condrieu, Gerin-s first vintage was in 1987. The winemaking style here is quite modern, with lots of destemming and plenty of small barrels, some of which are new. The wines show fantastic purity and also age gracefully Importer: Esprit Du Vin, Port Washington, NY; Tel. (516) 802-4758