The 2014 Rouget is a wonderfully complete wine that melds together super-ripe, racy fruit and structure. Succulent red cherry, rose petal, mint and white pepper give the wine its distinctive aromatic and flavor profile. Even with all of its flamboyance, the 2014 has plenty of structural underpinning. A few years in bottle should help the wine soften a bit. Even so, this is a decidedly opulent Pomerol. The 2014 was quite impressive both times I tasted it.

The 2014 Rouget was memorable, extremely rich and opulent when I originally tasted it from barrel. Now in bottle, it has retained that brash and ostentatious persona with intense oyster-shell tinged red fruit that really pack a punch compared to some of its more demure brethren. The palate is medium-bodied with impressive density, a muscular Rouget at first but give it time in the glass and you start to see more of its nuances and elegance. Hopefully time will temper the aromatics and if so, this will be a very worthy Pomerol. My only caveat is that the wood tannins are still conspicuous on the finish and they do need to be subsumed.