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1926 Ropiteau Freres Volnay 1er Cru Clos des Chênes - France, Burgundy, Côte de Beaune, Volnay 1er Cru (8/16/2014)
From a bottle that was low to mid shoulder I went to ‘Audouze’ 6 hours before serving. The cork was fragile and unfortunately I pushed it straight into the bottle whilst trying to extract with a Durand. I quickly poured the wine off into a decanter and hoped for the best. It was quite brilliant when we served it. There were true tertiary characters of curry leaf, milk chocolate, salt, freshly tilled black earth and pine needle sap. Wines of this era tend to have a slippery texture like an oyster and this is no different (perhaps its from vines on their own rootstock?). It is a wine that has vinous sweetness and umami/savoury nuance. It is full, complex, ethereal and complete with freshness carried by minerally acidity. What a a treat.
Posted from CellarTracker
you are killing me. I would have loved that wine. Very interesting note.
Interesting that we (I very much include myself here) see very old wines as likely to be very delicate, often falling apart inside 30 mins of pouring, yet this one survived and prospered after a full decant and then 6 hours in said decanter. Maybe our assumption isn’t quite as robust as we believed it to be?
There is much we really still don’t understand about wine and how it ages.
Perhaps more than we do know!
Jeremy, do you have to go through many older wines before posting on one, or do you find most are post-worthy?
A very high proportion are post-worthy Craig. If you took out tca affected wines I reckon less than 5% get tipped down the drain.
Northern Rhone Syrah vines on their own rootstock?
Truer words were never spoken. I am constantly amazed at the advice that is dispensed about wines with respect to how to age them & how to treat them, when the reality is just as you put it. Thanks for sharing a great note about a treat of a wine Jeremy!