After tasting the 2016 Le Combard i have been hooked on finding more/backfilling on Barge’s wines.
But as that is the only Côte-Rôtie i have tasted from Barge, can someone enlighten me on the quality differences between the different Côte-Rôtie’s Barge is making.
Would be very helpful before i start going deep on these 
Quality and profile is pretty consistent across the line. Very classically styled wines, as you know. The price hierarchy is roughly:
I find Le Combard to be the best bang for the buck, but the base Cote Rotie is also very good for the price. YMMV
At the low end Julien Barge Cotes du Rhone Les Coteaux de Legendes was a fantastic $15 bottle of Syrah. Classic, open, fruit and rocks. Good enough I sought out more (and I’ve purchased all the Cote Roties in a couple of vintages as well).
Côte Brune is a very nice, muscular and ageworthy expression of Côte-Rôtie (just bought the 2016). Overall I like this producer - not showy but good quality wines that are not overpriced.
Per John Gilman, the domaine lost its lease on a good chunk of what used to go into the Brune bottling, so starting with the 2018 vintage, what’s left of that fruit is being combined with what used to go into the Blonde and the Combard bottlings to make a new bottling called “Les Côtes,” alongside the Plessy.
Thanks all. I found some 2016 Cote Brune for 69 euro. But I can also get more Le Combard for 50 (and with free delivery). So not sure if I should just go for Le Combard.
I love these wines. You have to like old school type of Cote Rotie. A little wild. Beautiful quality. I love the Cuvee du Plessy and Cote Brune and also the Cote Blonde.
Yea from tasting Le Combard this is just my style. Also been backfilling on Levet, Gallet and Xavier Gerard who all make rather traditional Cote Roties.
All Barge cuvées are excellent and any ranking is subjective; I wouldn’t place any one cuvée over the others. The Brune is 100% Syrah and the most muscular and long-lived. Library releases of the Brune have been spectacular. The du Plessy has a little Viognier and is wonderfully finessed; a recent 1999 was absolutely superb. The Combard is sort of in between, a fair amount it comes from younger vines. I have not tried the Coeur de Combard but I have a couple 2013s of it sleeping. The Blonde is from older vines and is also very fine. Really, it’s hard to go wrong with this estate, one of my very favorites. (I have more Barge than any other producer.)
Thanks for this post, I really need to dive into all the cuvees not just be selective.
It’s analogous to Levet, although with more cuvées to choose from.
Thanks for the note Zachary. Found some '99 du Plessy so looking forward to trying them. Being a huge fan of Levet, going to have to try and hunt some more down, but seems pretty scarce in the US.
That is so helpful!! Thanks. Guess i will buy a little of everything.
You’re welcome. To be clear, though, the analogy I was trying to make with Levet is that, IMO, there is no strict hierarchy among the various cuvées of each producer. Robert has pointed this out many times regarding Levet. The two producers’ styles are appreciably different, of course; there really isn’t anyone quite like Levet, is there?
I found a good price on the 2016’s as a package deal. Each package had 1x Plessy 1xBrune and 1xBlonde. Bought two packages 
.
As I already have a few of the Le Combard’s in 2016, it is going to be a fun tasting at some point!
Finally got around to try a '99 du Plessy and it was sublime. You were right on about the Viognier. It was so good. ![[cheers.gif]](/uploads/db3686/original/2X/0/0ff9bfcdb0964982cd3240b6159868fbdf215b1a.gif "cheers"){kind=small}
Awesome! Just a great vintage for Cote-Rotie, and for Barge.
I need to find some en Europe!!!
Had the 1999 Gilles Barge Cote-Rotie Cuvee du Plessy again the other night and it was exceptional. Probably better than the first one I had last month.
Nose was herbal, meaty, and savory with good dark-red fruit. Could smell it all night long. Palate wise, tons of smoke, meat, brine, but not overpowering the subtle fruit juiciness you get. Very long finish. Going to need to find me some more older Barge CRs!
… and if you can dig one up, the '83 is dope.