Domaine de la Charbonnière Châteauneuf du Pape Cuvée Vieilles Vignes 2019

The 2019 Châteauneuf Du Pape Cuvée Vieilles Vignes (90% Grenache and 10% Mourvèdre) comes all from the stony, pebbly soils of La Crau and was brought up in tank and demi-muids. Ripe black cherry fruits, iodine, ground pepper, and bloody, meaty nuances all emerge on the nose, and it's full-bodied, with a seamless, multi-dimensional texture, ultra-fine tannins, and a rock star of a finish. It's just a brilliant, elegant, pure, lengthy wine that does everything right. Drink this classic, traditional, structured wine over the coming two decades.

The yin to the yang of the estate's Mourre des Perdrix bottling, the 2019 Chateauneuf du Pape Cuvee Vieilles Vignes is almost all Grenache (10% Mourvèdre) from stony, galets roulés sites in Coudoulet, la Crau (sud) and Cristia. It's all black cherries and mocha on the nose, then full-bodied and rich but rather coarse and open-knit on the palate. It's long on the finish and shows remarkable intensity, but it doesn't have the same degree of elegance as the other offerings from Charbonniere; perhaps that will emerge with further cellaring. A second sample (tasted nonblind) revealed more of that elegance, with an almost airy, ethereal feel on the palate that belied the wine's enormous concentration and power.