Hello friends –
I recently had the good fortune of acquiring a 1969 Remoissenet Pere et Fils Santenay (photo, attached). I’m very excited to try it but I was hoping to purchase some more recent vintages that may have been grown in the same vineyards as the '69 (and taste them all together). I haven’t had much luck determining exactly where this bottle’s grapes would have been sourced. Some of my reading suggests Remoissenet (at that time) had a small vineyard but tended to buy a lot of grapes from other growers. Other articles suggest that pinots of this vintage may have been single vineyard. Perhaps some of the confusion is due to the recent sale of the winery.
I’m hoping that there is someone out there who is familiar with Remoissenet Santenay of this vintage (or could point me in the right direction). Aside from the grapes used for this vintage, I’m also interested in learning more about Remoissenet in Santenay at that time. And if anyone has tried a 60s/70s vintage of this wine, I’d love to hear about your experience.
Thanks for your time!
Derek
(Canada)
Or could be from Algeria.
I’d be interesting if anyone could say whether they were not topped with non-Burgundy - Bernie Repolt, GM of Remoissonet, told me they don’t really know about those older wines (not Santenay specifaclly). H
1 Like
I can’t answer the OP’s question, but I can say that I’ve shared several absolutely beautiful bottles of '69 Remoissenet Santenay ‘les Gravieres’ over the past 10 or more years. One of our wine group members was smart enough to snap up 1/2 case a number of years ago.
Jasper Morris has only a paragraph about Remoissenet in his book, lauding the founder as a larger-than-life figure, but saying nothing about the wines, which I take to be a silent commentary. Remoissenet is not mentioned in his chapter on Santenay.
There are some old threads somewhere–here, or maybe Tanzer board (doubt it was eBob)–about Remoissenet. They’ve been all over the place over the years, making some excellent wines, but also at times questions about sources and quality. Often it has been hard for outsiders to know what they were doing. At the moment, I don’t remember much in the way of specifics.
Footnote: I visited Remoissenet in the mid-80s and bought a bottle of something from the 70s – a grand cru, I believe. At the end of my trip, I packed it and six or seven other bottles acquired in France and Italy by wrapping them in clothes, cushioned with more clothes around the bottles.
When I picked up my bag at Kennedy, there was a faintly vinous aroma. “Smells like red Burgundy,” I thought to myself.
And, indeed, it was the old Remoissenet. It had a very alluring bouquet, which I could appreciate even in the aromatically rich environment of the baggage claim area.
Miraculously, the other bottles survived and none of my clothes were permanently stained. I think the bottle was old enough that the pigments had broken down.
I’ve had a number of ‘69 Remoissenets (back in the ‘70s and early ‘80s) most of which were lovely. Lots of questions on their origins, mostly because of their attractive price points and the continued release of vintages well past the rest of the field, but I never had a wine from them that I didn’t think was correct. I bought most of my Remoissenet from Max “The Hat” Zimmerman here in Chicago.
Unfortunately, I can’t help with the vineyard, but I suspect it is not a single vineyard wine, since they could have charged more for the bottle if it was one.
2 Likes
The Remoissenet wines were readily available throughout the 1980s and 90s - so I purchased quite a few as a retailer back then. I’ve always liked the wines overall, just felt the bigger wines were a touch over chaptalized. They always tasted fresh and bright at 30+ years of age (sometimes to a fault). Purchased quite a bit of a 1970 Hospice de Beaune ‘Dr Peste’ bottling over the years (they must have had hundreds of cases of it back then) and that was just stunning.
If the provenance is good, I am sure it will be quite good. Pretty sure this was purchased fruit (in a vintage like 1969, I am sure Remoissenet purchased a lot of juice from local growers figuring it could be the ‘vintage of the decade’ - which it was).
Thank you all for your insights and experiences. Very helpful. It’s an intriguing bottle. A friend told me tried a '69 not long ago. He said it was good for about 1/2 an hour after opening, and then it started to turn.
I’m excited to crack this baby this summer.
(John Morris – you haven’t lived if you haven’t smashed a bottle in your luggage, right??)
Cheers!
Sommselect has a couple of Remoissenets from the 60’s - SommSelect - Wine Shop