Lyle Fass

Founder Fass Selections

9.6

One of my favorite wines ever. Tressalier and Chardonnay blend. Nose is rich and buttery like and old school Meursault but has so much sea air mineral expression it’s unreal. Gorgeous. Palate is stunning if a bit young. This needs air but the bones are there. Juicy, clean, pure, rich, like a Meursault but super fresh and textured. So elegant and dense. What a wine. Let’s see what air does. Getting nutty as well. 9.4 to 9.5 overnight. Stunning today. Fresh, textured and energetic. Icing on cake texture and so pure. Almost a 9.6. — 9 months ago

Lyle Fass

Founder Fass Selections

9.8

Glory is this wine. Just one of the best wines in Burgundy now. After the 22 I had large expectations and this surpassed them. Nose is just bananas. Not literal bananas. The other type of bananas. The most complex cherry diaspora. Sour, mid season, late season and black. Spice galore and florals up the wazoo. Earth, limestone, dead leaves, living leaves and wet leaves. The nose is a 9.8 on the pop and pour. Just insane. Wild mint. What stands out the most is the layering and the clarity. Also the breadth. Wow that inner mouth perfume and endless, boundless energy that has the same fruit energy as La Tache. What I mean by that is this wine, yes can be about minerals as CDC is rocky, but man the fruit in 22 and now 23 is just in another register. Sappy, poised and clear as the sky is blue on a cloudless day. Yes the tannins are firm but you know with air they will melt into the fruit. The nobility of this site never fails to blow me away. Unreal concentration and density and just insane length. The tannins are velvety, sweet and intense but so so high class. Nose has so much florality, spice and red cherry fruit one cannot believe it. This is just insane. It’s almost a perfect wine. The balance is just beyond and the structure is incredible. This is a 50 year CDC. What a finish. Let’s see where this goes. After an hour the nose is remarkable. So deep, so nuanced, so spicy, so floral. Provocative. Palate is silky, sweet and so dense. Pumps the fruit out like an old set of Wilson Puppies. Unreal balance and purity. But this is built like a brick house. Let’s see where this goes. Will unfurl more but it’s a slow one! The concentration and tiny berry fruit intensity is off the charts. Now after 17 hours open its nose is full blown complex and flat out stunning. The cherry trifecta of sour/mid season and black. Mint and bramble plus wonderful and gorgeous sous bois. Stoney as well. All velvety bramble and such elegant and ripe tannin. A wave. Stunning inner mouth aromas, tiny berry fruit intensity and stunning purity. This seems like it’s more classic than the 22. Even on day 3 this is stunning. Lost nothing. — a year ago

Lyle Fass

Founder Fass Selections

9.6

Nose has the classic porphyry aromas and are just wonderful. It’s so expressive. Such mineral precision. Insane clarity of wet stone aromas. Nose is a bit quiet as well as it’s too cold. Palate is hauntingly elegant with unreal rockiness and sappy minerality. Not much fruit right now but the underlying architecture is perfect. Stunning purity. This is a rock star. Literally. What intense minerality on the finish but so so elegant. Just stunning. Some apricot now on the nose. Crystalline purity and just so well made and everything in its place. A stunner. — 4 years ago

Lyle Fass

Founder Fass Selections

9.9

OMFG. This nose is insane. Insane. Just the most pure black cherry ever. God’s Jelly Donut filling. Earthy, graphite? Tiny berry fruit intensity. Wild flower that is crazy. Smells like a scene in nature. Wow, the sweetness is BONKERS. Unreal purity. So balanced and pure. Texture is seamless. Huge amplitude and minerals. Tingly saline mineral note. Minerality and more mineral than the whites. The finish has tiny berry fruit intensity and echoes of flowers. What a finish. How is this better than the Cras?

Now the nose gets herbal. Complexity is off the charts. Raspberry spice cake on the nose now. This is some of the most beautiful fruit I’ve ever had in my life. But the finish is glorious minerals intermingled with fruit. — 5 years ago

Lyle Fass

Founder Fass Selections

9.5

Classic Hühnerberg with slate, spice, gorgeous spice, citrus up the wazoo. Tangerine, tangelo, kumquat, swimming pool, urinal cake, hint of rubber, lavender, flowers so so sick and so so complex. Fruit cocktail. But also a hint of savory. Palate is elegant, concentrated, sleek, mineral, straight as an arrow with unreal complexity, finish seems peppery, juicy, mineral explosion and citrus pithy explosion as well and ripeness that hints at sweetness but is still bone dry. Watermelon fruit. Finished salty, mineral and apricot pith. So so complex. So so long. Stunning. As usual. — 6 years ago

Tom Ellis

9.7

No tasting notes necessary. Almost unreal flavor, textures capable of restructuring your brain cells. This wine almost ruined me by raising the bar impossibly high for everything else that followed. Now regretting I sold my double magnum of '70 in 1997. "Dark chocolate-covered berries, fresh moss, leathery clay bound in a sensory rush that lingers all evening". This is what separates the classics from so many wines; One thinks of it and can taste it for the rest of your life. — 8 years ago

Lyle Fass

Founder Fass Selections

9.6

This is a superstar wine in 22 and now 23. They also could not be more different. Stunning nose of ripe mid to late season cherry and a hit of kirsch. Stunning fruit clarity. Gorgeous stoniness and elegant herbs. Terrific tiny berry fruit intensity. Elite finesse and shows the silkiness of this brilliant site. The tannins are stoney and big but ripe and sweet. This doesn’t have the decadence of the 2022. Great freshness and has that chord progression fruit that is a signature of 2023. Unreal silkiness. Gorgeous wine but will be better with a few more hours of air. Oh it’s getting opulent like this site does and wow the energy is off the charts. Tannins melting into fruit. After 5-6 hours this is just insane. The energy of 23 and the opulence of 22. Genius!
— 9 months ago

Lyle Fass

Founder Fass Selections

9.2

Full of fruit, huge cherries, mid season, sour cherries, intense red berries, spice, lean, sweet, unreal acids, swiss clones, high acid, freshness, wow, great tanginess, citrus, wild berry, forest berry, woodland berry , woodland forest vibe, very alpine, so juicy and clean. Wonderful. Long. — 2 years ago

Lyle Fass

Founder Fass Selections

9.6

Nose is chlorophyll, mineral and sweet green. So evocative. Sea air. So layered. Some smoke. So elegant. White flowers. So pretty. Palate is so crystalline. Unreal purity. Elegant and finesse driven. Faint peach fruit and incredible acidity and depth. It glides on the palate. Really juicy. Long. Just another wonderful 21. — 2 years ago

Alex Lallos

Owner No Limit Fine Wines, Private Wine Consultant

9.8

Holy cow this evolved beautifully. Cork crumbled and I didn’t expect much but the kaleidoscope of aromas and flavors are unreal. — 3 years ago

with Lee

Lyle Fass

Founder Fass Selections

9.6

This is a specialty here and wow this is really something. Such a glorious and nuanced nose of spice, tree bark, glorious dark black cherries, spicey oak and wonderful violets. It’s super clean, nuanced and multilayered. Great. Palate is fresh, energetic and has superb purity and freshness. Tangy red cherries on the palate, a bit of oak and as always this needs mega air but it’s all there as it always is. Huge structure on this. Elegant and so bright. Awesome length. Needs 5 years.

Day 2 update : 9.4 to 9.6 overnight. Palate is so fresh and energetic. Unreal freshness and purity. Beautiful sweet, silky and cherry fruit. Long, tangy and fresh. Haunting and deep. Wow. Amazing on day 2. — 4 years ago

Lyle Fass

Founder Fass Selections

9.8

Carolin sent me cask samples of the 19 GG’s and wow. This is insane. A nose so pretty and so pure one needs new words to describe it but I will try with my mere old words. A beautiful perfume that is transcendent. In every way. An amazing caramel nougat. Airy, gorgeous, perfumed and insanely clear minerality. Just sick. Some smoke. Wood shavings. Not oak, but woodshop. Some clearly defined citrus. Wet stones and earth. It reeks and I mean reeks of terroir. The palate has a very serious and very major core. Insane citrus that is driving me crazy. So pure. So ephemeral. So clean. The nose or the palate. What is better? I can’t stop asking myself. It’s even. The core of fruit, minerals and saltiness is unreal. This has elite elegance to it. It’s backwards but beautiful. Not many wines are like that. It has PERFECT balance. I’m between 9.8 and 9.9 now. The level of complexity and texture might push it over the edge. But then the salt kicks in. And the lingering of the finish. Fuuuuuuuuuuckkkkkkkk. — 6 years ago

Lyle Fass

Founder Fass Selections

9.3

Unreal wine. Gorgeous nose. Honey, tangelo, confectionery aromas, perfumed and elegant, palate is elegant, mineral and honeyed, sappy and elegant. Complex. Really fine. Intensely flavored but also so fine. Long finish. — 7 years ago

with Nicolas

Lyle Fass

Founder Fass Selections

9.5

Just a brilliant brilliant wine. I cannot believe the value here. Nose is just sick. Deep berry, raspberry, cherry, sour cherry, blueberry, woodshop shavings, violets and other florals and so much more. This has so much stuffing it’s crazy. Extraordinary palate that is at once dense and at once nimble. Unreal sweet fruit and unreal, albeit youthful fruit and astonishing length. Crazy intense and brilliant inner mouth aromas and such complexity. Structure to burn and let’s see where we are in a few hours. Wow. — 9 months ago

Lyle Fass

Founder Fass Selections

9.8

Wow. This is one hell of a Taillepieds. Nose is deep, dark black cherry fruit with twizzler, mid season cherry with pitch perfect clarity. Taillepieds always brings the drama and this goes to 11. Dark roses, Dried and fresh. So complex and so darn dramatic, Gorgeous roundness to the nose. Just insane. 9.8 nose. Some wood spice, but more like shavings from 7th grade woodshop. Wow. That palate is just insane. It’s got the cherry fruit, sour, dark, mid season, dark red all on a chord progression and all at the same time. Cherry fruit, everything, everywhere, all at once. Unreal internal aromatic and it has a decadence but outlined by this tart cherry fruit that circles opulent black cherry fruit. Just stunning. More open than the Clos des Chenes. A genius wine. Equal to CDC in 2023. Wow this nose goes hard as air gets into it. My god this is hedonistic but also fresh and energetic like 2008 or 1996 but with the fruit of 2019. This is absolutely a showstopper. Gorgeous tannins. So well crafted. The purity is the star here as is the transparency. The nose goes hard after an hour. It’s hard to describe as it’s got a lot of “non wine” aroma. 9.8 nose. Heavenly. Super sweet and silky now. Gorgeous fruit and opulence. What a finish. Unreal blackberry and black cherry inner mouth aromas an hour in. So structured and young but just incredible. After a day this is just stunning. Deep, dramatic and juicy. Wonderful structure and sexy black cherry fruit. Silky as silky can be. — a year ago

Lyle Fass

Founder Fass Selections

9.6

Ridiculous Rhini! What a nose. Red cherries and berries galore. You can smell the density. Gorgeous soil and limestone tones. Unreal expansiveness and so so aromatic. Just a crazy nose that has so much breadth. The clarity, purity and pinosity are off the charts. Palate is tangy and tense and as usual at chez Ziereisen it needs mega air but the structural architecture is there. A very red fruited expression of Pinot which seems to be the new direction this estate’s Pinots are going in which I am here for. Lovely bitter herbals on the nose now. Great freshness and acidity but needs to fill out. It will. I’ll be back. Fruit getting sweeter with air that classic hidden Rhini structure. Now with air the nose is super spicy and complex . Herbal and spicey. Fruit is so much sweeter and is like a squeegee on the palate and clings to the palate. So clean on the backend. Huge quality change on day 2. Nose is denser and cleaner with rich cherry fruits, pine resin, black forest vibes and spice. Wow. A 9.7 nose today. Palate is elegant and dense with that unreal Rhini elegant yet substantial structure and crazy complexity. Big but very very fine tannins. 9.5 to 9.6 overnight. — 2 years ago

Lyle Fass

Founder Fass Selections

9.6

Huge ebullient nose of black and red cherries. Gorgeous spice, blackberry and licorice. Lovely Stoney minerality. So Volnay. Stunningly sweet fruit. Unreal purity and freshness and so so young. Sappy and dense but also light on its feet. Raspberry cake, raspberry coulis. Good extract, purity and freshness but as this is a barrel sample it’s maybe lost a little bit. Nose is showing huge minerality and earthiness. Palate is more engaging with air. It’s more precise and juicy. Very gamey. Nose is super sick now with air. Cherry liquor. Very fresh. Palate is elegant and fresh. This is a wine for laying down. So much potential. — 5 years ago

Lyle Fass

Founder Fass Selections

9.6

Huge spice, huge citrus, sweet grapefult, tangelo, ripe, perfumed, bigger, chewy, texturally stunning, so juicy, long. Pure. Zippy. Dry and energy, very pure, very intense. Young but so pure.

After 8 hours this is crazy. Unreal spice, super pure apricot, so airy and perfumed. Unreal clarity. Palate is so fine and elegant with tangy citrus fruit, clarity like nothing else and a long finish. Stunning. — 6 years ago

Lyle Fass

Founder Fass Selections

9.6

Wow. Most expansive nose yet on the Weltner 18’s. Cucumber, vegetables, herbal, apricot, huge minerals, lanolin, bouillon, lime zest, soupy, unreal clarity, transporting, what density and chewiness, complex and so so mineral, again no fruit, spicey, it’s so dry and that is sucks all the saliva out of your mouth. Not punishing. So so long. It’s complex, concentrated and ultra dry. So long. — 6 years ago

Pinotman /// Andreas

9.8

Their second vintage. Big and young. Needs 5 hours to open up. I would recommend to cellar this for at least 5 - 10 more years. Mandarin zest - cedar - quite spicy - unreal complexity - Tulsi. It has a real bite despite just 12.5%. Without doubt one of the top 5 Pinot’s made in Germany that year another one made by the same guys is the Muschelkalk. If you pop a bottle open in the morning drink pm. — 7 years ago