The 2005 Hermitage Les Miaux is austere and tight, but much in keeping with the style of the vintage. High tannins and a foreboding personality, but a deep ruby/purple color and plenty of cassis fruit all make for an impressive but backward, high-brow style of Hermitage worth cellaring for 5-6 years and drinking over the following two decades. As I said last year, Michel Chapoutier is expending considerable amounts of money and energy to upgrade the wines of Ferraton. He still controls the biodynamic farming of many of their vineyards, and is totally responsible for the negociant blends that are put together. His emphasis is on terroir, purity of fruit, and earlier bottling to preserve the wine’s character. I thought the 2006s were perhaps his strongest overall vintage since he has been running this enterprise. In approaching the Ferraton wines, one has to realize the lower end is the negociant range, which include their generic Cotes du Rhones, the Crozes-Hermitage La Matiniere, the St.-Joseph, and the Hermitage Les Miaux, and then of course, the single-vineyard wines such as the St.-Joseph Les Oliviers, Ermitage Les Dionnieres, Ermitage Le Meal, and Crozes-Hermitage Le Grand Courtil. Importer: A French Paradox, Peoria, IL; tel. (309) 682-8994