2019 Domaine Durand Confidence Cornas 750 ml

There is no imposing château at Domaine Durand. No reception desk and no PR staff. In fact, we tracked down the Durand frères in the town of Châteaubourg (pop. 211) by spotting their worn shingle hanging in a narrow alleyway. We ducked our heads and stepped into the tiny subterranean tasting room, where Éric and Joël Durand themselves greeted us with baguettes and a big plate of charcuterie and cheese.

Judging by the personal welcome and the unadorned room, you could easily take Domaine Durand for a humble, provincial winemaking operation.

Until you taste the wine. 

Éric and Joël’s 2019 Domaine Durand Confidence Cornas is one of the most staggering values in collectible red wine we’ve found this year. This new vintage of a bottling Jeb Dunnuck called “one of my favorite Cornas” earned a stunning 97-point score that puts it in flat-out, world-class Northern Rhône company. 

Like Côte-Rôtie and Hermitage—the other two appellations that define European Syrah—Cornas is a big name with tiny production. Jancis Robinson once wrote “A top Cornas…offers all the intensity of and power of a great Hermitage, but at a fraction of the price of its more ‘noble’ neighbour.” Ask any sommelier: Cornas should be on the radar of any value-minded collector.

The Domaine Durand Confidence comes from 30-year-old vines on the finest plots. 2019 was the fifth excellent vintage in a row in the Northern Rhône, a warm, dry season—on par with the great 2015—that Joël said resulted in tannic, concentrated reds. That incredible season shows in every sip of this bottling, which firmly plants the Durands among the upper crust of the Northern Rhône.