2010 Bonnes Mares, Grand Cru Patrice Rion

Much more backward than the Amoureuses. This has an intense purple colour, very dense if currently unyielding fruit on the nose, and an impressively powerful palate, concentrated, tightly knit and backward. A great wine in the making.
Jasper Morris MW, Burgundy Director

We have decided to combine here the wines that fall under the domaine label and those produced officially as négociant wines and labelled as Patrice Rion. Most of these cuvées are from vines managed by Patrice who has one contract to farm the vineyards and another to buy the grapes. The exceptions are the village Chambolle-Musigny and Nuits-St Georges Vieilles Vignes where Patrice is not involved in the farming.

Patrice and son Maxime are tweaking their techniques a little by reducing new oak and slightly increasing extraction in the pre-fermentation stage. These are impressive results – the Nuits-St Georges continues the consistently fine streak of recent years while this is certainly the finest range of Chambolle-Musigny that they have ever produced. 2010 reminds Patrice a little of 1978 and 1991, two vintages with small yields, full ripeness and notable concentration.

Sweet Spot Wines from the 2010 Vintage
(from a small parcel that makes on average one barrel annually; 100% new wood). A brooding and restrained nose of notably cool red currant, earth and ferrous-earth aromas are in keeping with the equally serious and tightly wound flavors that possess a sleek muscularity on the dense and superbly long finish. The supporting tannins are firm but clearly phenolically mature and this should repay 12 to 15 years of aging. 2021+
(Allen Meadows - burghound.com - January 2012)