Has anyone ever seen tokaji or other sweet wine turn black in color? This bottle isn’t very old and IIRC it wasn’t like this before and was stored in temperature and humidity controlled storage.
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I’ve seen old Sauternes darken pretty deeply.
Yup… not at all uncommon.
That seems fairly dark for a '96, but not out of the ordinary I would guess.
Heavily botrytised wine can/often get very dark in color, the color of a PX wine n fact.
Not so much in German TBAs, but very much so in California TBAs. I thing partly it’s because of the lower level of SO2 In Calif TBAs and higher level in German ones.
Tom
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It’s just weird because i think it was like a whisky color when I put it in the locker around 4 years ago.
This is why I love this board, never knew. Have a few things Tokaji that I have not looked in on for years… no such luck if it is luck. But super interesting that its a thing. Will keep that in mind to not freak out.
This.
Rarely other wines seem to turn as dark as Tokaji, though. I’ve seen some wines get quite dark with age, but I’m not sure if I’ve seen wines turn as dark as old Tokaji.
I’ve had a few wines that were almost black, that’s how deep syrupy brown they were. Yet they were completely fine with no obvious signs of wine being past its peak in any way.
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. . . the Stout of sweet wines
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I have had some older Pedro Ximenez that was that dark. 1996 is on the younger side for that much change in color but not far out of the ordinary.
It looks delicious if you ask me and it also looks like others on CT are mentioning the color being similar too in recent years if that is the wine I think it is.
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Well it was in a large lot getting sent to winebid so definitely bid! I just thought it was interesting.
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The difference here is that PX is supposed to be that dark right from the start when the wine is bottled. Tokaji is golden yellow in its youth. You can’t compare PX to Tokaji because the wines are so wildly different.
What is striking in Tokaji that it can turn from luminous golden yellow to dark, PX-like, almost opaque brown in a remarkably short span of time - and that is not a sign of the wine going bad.
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fair point.
From my limited experience with Picolit, I have found a similarly quick rate of change in color with age. Do you have any experience with that? I am curious if my observation was more a 1 off or actually a norm.
I actually have a couple of these and mine are just as dark.
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Here’s my experience:
The lower-level Tokajis (lower=less puttonyos) tend to darken extremely fast; after 10 years and with 5 or 4 puttonyos this is very common.
Looking at Aszu-Eszencias or Eszencia this happen later.
6 puttonyos…depending on the making and producer.
Attachted a few pics…
I have a 1999 Royal Tokai, 6 puttonyos, that is exactly the same color and it is spectacular.
I had a 1993 6 puttonyos for thanksgiving last year that was similarly dark but otherwise no worse for wear.
Yes, it’s creepy!
