Featured Wine Series: Domaine Vieille Julienne, Chateauneuf du Pape par excellence

Wines Online has been in business for close to 15 years. During this time, we have built up a strong following amongst wine lovers in Singapore and quietly established great partnerships with many wine businesses around the world to make their wines available here. We are always happy to help deserving producers raise the visibility of their brands in Singapore. As a result, more often than not, our contacts make exceptional, limited parcels available to us ahead of other wine merchants, the first bite of the cherry. This is a privilege we share with our mailing list on a regular basis.

Today, we received a call from our partner to make Vieille Julienne available on our website. Vieille Julienne is relaunching its brand in Singapore and we are its first port of call to reestablishing its presence here. For French fine wine lovers and especially Chateauneuf du Pape fans, Domaine Vieille Julienne is a gem of a find. The sandy and limestone soil dominated vineyards were bought by current owner Jean Paul Daumen’s ancestors back in 1905 and plantings took place until 1962. We are looking at very old vines that go up to a century old. The result are wines of unbelievably great quality and longevity.

For me, all the Vieille Julienne wines speak volumes of its history and superior winemaking, but the ones in particular that strike me as exceptional are the Vieille Julienne Chateauneuf du Pape 2004 and Vieille Julienne Chateauneuf du Pape Les Hauts Lieux 2011. They also give people new to Vieille Julienne the opportunity to see how the wines age and how micro climates play a big part in the domaine.

The Vieille Julienne Chateauneuf du Pape 2004 is made from grapes harvested from sandy soil vineyards in the northern part of the appellation. The wine shows a combination of dark fruits flavours and graphite, minerals and spice culminating in a long, precise finish. The bottle has undergone a decade’s worth of aging and it is just coming in beautifully. For me, it is the wine that sets the minimum standard for the rest of the Vieille Julienne range.

For the Vieille Julienne Chateauneuf du Pape Les Hauts Lieux 2011, it is made from grapes harvested from limestone soil vineyards sited at higher elevation and cooler climate. This terroir allows the grapes a longer hang time to develop its flavours more completely. The result is a wine that is all rounded, powerful, structured and rich, with a mix of red and black fruits flavours. The combination of firm tannins and acidity is such that the Les Hauts Lieux is a wine that you can drink now with decanting (up to an hour), or simply stash it away for cellaring for another 10 years.

Domaine Vieille Julienne is renowned to be excellent but the prices can be a little bit on the steep side. Production is rather small so the winery never had any real pressure to price its wines low in order to move volumes. Neither do we expect back vintages to be readily available in the market. We are therefore excited to showcase the 2004 and 2008 vintages together with the current releases. Hopefully this gives you the opportunity to grab some limited bottles of both current and back vintages for your cellar. Click here to view the Domaine Vieille Julienne wines that are available. Happy drinking!