The 2024 bottling of Clos Vernay from the Lafarge family is another classic in the making. It is a touch more structured out of the blocks than the straight Fleurie bottling, but shares the same lovely sense of sappiness in its bouquet of red and black cherries, gamebird, a touch of mustard seed, distant bonfire, a superb base of soil tones and a topnote of rose petals. On the palate the wine is deep, focused, full-bodied and nascently complex, with excellent depth of fruit, fine soil transparency and grip, ripe, buried tannins and a long, impeccably balanced and very promising finish. Just give this lovely Fleurie a few years of bottle age before having at it. 2029-2050.