Deal or No Deal? 2001 VCC

I lucked my way into a bottle of 2001 Vieux Château Certan this week. I paid $119 which according to my internet sleuthing seems pretty good.

The question:

Stash it in the back of my cellar and forget about it for a decade.
Or
Drink up, life is too short and it isn’t a vintage-of-the-century vintage.


To add some more context, this is definitely the nicest Bdx I have ever purchased but is on par, price wise with many of the other birthday, holiday, etc… bottles in my cellar.

I haven’t had this wine, but 2001s I’ve drunk have been very good though young. I think you could give it a good decant and drink it. It may well inspire you to pursue VCC or other great Bordeaux.

The Cellartracker notes sound great.

I haven’t had the VCC, but the 2001s have been delicious pretty much from the get-go and are drinking great right now. If I had the right occasion I would not hesitate to open it now but there is no rush. Jealous at the price; it’s basically half the going rate

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Major causal factor in Offsite Storage Syndrome.

nice price -indeed astonishing.

Excellent price. I’d drink it the next chance I got. (perhaps some lamb is in the forecast this week?)

OMG, back the truck up. Not a great vintage overall, but a very nice one for Pomerol. And VCC made a great wine that year. Decanter gave it 100 points, if you can believe it. Here is their tasting note:

“2001 was a vintage that very much suited Pomerol, and the Merlot here takes precedence over the Cabernet Franc, expanding sideways, juicy and smiling. This is a show stopper of a wine, from the very first moment that you pour it. Concentrated and powerful, it gathers pace through the palate with flavours of truffle, cinnamon, toasted almonds, rich plum and damson. The texture is of cashmere and silk, the fruit palate varied and balanced. You can open it now, but there’s no rush, even at close to 18 years on.”

Why not drink 1 immediately to see if you like it… and if you do, buy more asap?

I wish I could buy more! Unfortunately, it was the last bottle in the bin, so I don’t know if I will get the opportunity to get more if I tried. The store did have some other interesting bottles from the late 90’s / early 00’s so another trip back is on the docket.

TW

I’m thinking this wasn’t a state store…

I’m not at will to say… I wouldn’t want someone coming into this thread and explaining how transporting alcohol across state lines might be cause for me to lose my professional license and force me into a life of rigorous manual labor. newhere

Where is Golodetz!?

I had my first/only VCC (2006) a few weeks ago and it was amazing. I felt it was a bit too young, but still very much enjoyed it. I am on the look out for future bottles to procure at good prices…

One of my favorite wines. Killer price. I’d not blink, pop it. Great stuff. If 2000, I’d say hold.

If it’s a bin end, I’d pop it sooner than later. Congrats on the find

I couldn’t disagree more. :slight_smile:

Very good deal- about half the current full retail rate and 40% less than auction. I am a huge fan of VCC, but I will also say that while I admire the current vintages it remains to be seen if the wines will ever develop the astonishingly complex and delicate aromatics of the great old vintages. 1990 is kind of that cutoff point for me- and the concern is more about the general blend shift than the winemaking itself. There is nothing remotely spoofy about the VCCs of today.

Whether to drink the 2001 right now is a tough call if you have only one bottle. It is drinking beautifully, but having had a number of older vintages back to 1945, I think a good deal more is possible. If this is something you would consider buying more of in future at current prices, then I say drink this bottle to see what you think. If not, I would lock it up for a decade. I make the distinction because over the past year a number of wines like this- meaning top chateaux from superb drinking vintages that are not volume driven- have become relatively rare in the marketplace. They just do not come along all that often unless you want to pay the really high price asked by the handful of WS vendors who have a bottle or two in stock. And so as I backfill a number of vintages like 01 and 08 when good deals come along at auction, I find I am being a bit more careful about opening them because replacing them is not as easy as it used to be. I like 2001 VCC very much, but I would personally not be a buyer at the $250ish current price tag. At $119, I would happily take a case if I found it at that price.

Here is my TN from CT if it helps. This TN was made at a bustling pre-auction tasting, so please forgive its brevity,


10/12/2018 - I like this wine: (Edit)

good purple color just starting to show signs of age, plums, cedar and cherries on the nose, racy herbal notes, on the palate a punchy tone ala 2006, lovely mid-weight wine, fine length, deceptively approachable- but a good long life ahead, it remains to be seen if vintages such as this will eventually deliver the intricate and digital terroir definition of vintages of old- but this is a very attractive and nicely balanced wine at the very least and should be quite wonderful in just a few years’ time. (), 2025-2040+.

Well you’re certainly a quick learner, so you got that going for ya.

PS: Did this wine really get 100 points from Decanter? Or was that a joke?

With the proviso that I know nothing whatsoever about the topic at hand, if I were sipping on a 17yo wine with the pedigree of VCC, and if it were still showing purple synesthesia at that age, then I’d hide the rest of the bottles deep in the back of the cellar, to be revisited at the 34/51/68/85-year-marks.

Good deal. Drinks well now; but no rush if you want to hold it for a special occasion.