La Tâche, Domaine de la Romanée Conti 2011

As it was from cask this is more restrained than usual and it requires aggressive swirling to coax the pure and spicy essence of red berry fruit aromas to emerge from the glass where there is a slight hint of herbal tea present. There is a similar reserve to the distinctly focused and linear flavors that enjoy a seemingly unlimited reserve of dry extract that renders the fine-grained and silky tannins almost invisible at present though I suspect that they will become much more apparent once the baby fat melts away. There is superb complexity and fantastic length and this mineral-driven effort should be capable of drinking well after only 12 years or so of bottle age but require a solid 20 before it's completely mature. While La Tâche is almost by definition a superbly elegant wine there is also always an inner core of muscle. In 2011 it seems to have more of the former and a bit less of the latter, indeed this may the first vintage in quite a while where it is ready before the Richebourg.