2015 Domaine Auguste Clape Cornas

Other Reviews....
The grand vin of the estate is the 2015 Cornas, and it's even more inky colored than the Renaissance, with a saturated purple/bluish color. It offers a truly profound bouquet of black cherries, melted asphalt, ground pepper, exotic flowers and graphite, as well as the classic iodine/bloodiness I always find in this cuvée. Full-bodied, beautifully concentrated, and seamless, with sweet tannin and a stacked mid-palate, it has an almost Hermitage-like liquid rock character, shocking elegance and purity, and a huge finish. This is Cornas at its finest – hats off to the Clape family! It's relatively accessible now, yet I suspect it will close down with a few years of bottle age, so try one (or two) now and save the rest for after 2025.
100 points
Jeb Dunnuck

Opaque ruby. Heady, smoke- and spice-tinged aromas of dark berry preserves, candied licorice and olive; an intense mineral quality adds urgency. Chewy, broad and focused on the palate, offering appealingly sweet boysenberry and cassis flavors and powerful spicecake and floral pastille flourishes. In a lush, decadent but lively style and not at all outsized. Finishes smooth, smoky and extremely long, displaying repeating spiciness and velvety tannins.
93-95 points
Josh Raynolds - Vinous

Clape’s flagship 2015 Cornas is enormously complex and compelling. Almond skin, cherries, blood and herbal notes all combine on the nose, while on the palate this medium to full-bodied wine is firmly tannic but ripe and balanced, with a rich, velvety and nearly endless finish.
97 points
Joe Czerwinski - Wine Advocate #234 (Dec 2017)