L’Aventure Cote a Cote Red Blend 2020 – 750ml Terroir

98pts Robert Parker’s Wine Advocate

The 2020 Côte a Côte is a beautiful blend of 45% Grenache, 30% Syrah and 25% Mourvèdre and one of the most successful wines I tasted from the challenging 2020 vintage. Deep ruby-purple, it offers pure aromas of blackcurrant, boysenberry, tar and pipe tobacco, continually unfolding with each return to the glass. The full-bodied palate offers wave after wave of perfumed fruit and tremendous spicy accents. It’s powerful yet harmoniously structured with powdery tannins and seamless acidity, and it offers a very long, detailed finish.

97pts James Suckling

I love the depth and the mineral quality of this. Dark cherries, black licorice, iodine, graphite, oyster shells and hot stones. Quite vertical yet broad, with super fine but present tannins. Long, seductive yet quite focused, too. A stunner from L’Aventure.

97pts Jeb Dunnuck

The 2020 Cote a Cotes checks in as 45% Grenache, 30% Syrah, and 22% Mourvèdre, with the balance Graciano and Viognier, that was brought up in equal parts barrel, concrete, and amphora. It’s a full-bodied, ripe, sexy wine offering fabulous dark fruits as well as subtle violet and orange blossom aromatics. The balance is spot on, it has terrific purity, and it’s another brilliant wine in the making.

94pts Decanter

Floral and lifted on the nose, dark chocolate, violets and rose petals with sweet strawberries and pomegranates. This has a sticky side, balsamic touches but with herbal edges too. Thrilling with a lovely texture, you get the grip and pull from the fine but tense tannins, this has a purity an energy to it with excellent acidity. I like the direction and the push from start to finish. You get the California heat and the stewed strawberry fruit but there is also an elegance and energy to this where it doesn’t feel overworked and still has freshness and a juicy appeal. Ageing 14 months in French oak (33% new, 36% one year old, 17% concrete and 15% amphora).

Winemaker Notes 

L’Aventure was founded in 1998 by a French winemaker, Stephan Asseo. After Stephan graduated enology school in Burgundy, the Asseo family bought their first estate, Domaine de Courteillac, in the Bordeaux area in 1982. Later, the family purchased additional properties: Chateau Robin and Chateau Fleur-Cardinale in Saint-Emilion. Stephan raised these properties to a level of great quality, while managing some other well-established domaines such as Chateau Guillot-Clauzel in Pomerol and Chateau Corbin in St Emilion.

Stephan saw in the New World a unique opportunity to expand his experience, while gaining more freedom in viticulture and vinification. He began by looking all over California for land, including Napa/Sonoma and Santa Barbara counties, but it was the terroir and climate of Paso Robles that impressed him the most.

Blend: 34% Grenache, 34% Syrah, 32% Mourvèdre