Was I sold Counterfeit Chateauneuf?

WINE TALK
1

My family was on vacation, and we stopped by CdP for an afternoon. My father, my brother and I ended up purchasing three bottles from a local vendor: 2x '92 Henri Bonneau and a 2005 Rayas.

We were in a rush, and I assumed the guy was legit because his store was literally a couple hundred feet from Henri’s cellar. Anyway, they went immediately into wineskins and into the luggage. I was unpacking them yesterday to put into my parent’s wine fridge and noticed the foils on the Henri’s looked really shady. It looked like someone tried to crimp them on by hand, and they look like your cheap generic foil with the grape cluster on top. All of the images I’ve seen on the internet indicate that the foil has a golden emblem on it and applied by machine.

Additionally, the Henri labels all have corners missing in the bottom right, as if they were lifted and re-applied. The Rayas label just fell off completely.

I don’t’ know much about these wines, so I was wondering if you guys could help me get to the bottom of this.

Rayas:





Thanks for your help.

2

Bonnea is all done by hand and usually looks like a mess with crumpled capsules, glue, etc.

I can’t speak to the Rayas.

3

Most of the images i’ve seen on the internet show the foil with a gold insignia on the foil though, which makes me a little curious.

4

He made a Celestins in 92 ?

5

FWIW, I have had several legit bottles of 1992 Bonneau Celestins (bought retail in the US), and the capsules all looked like the ones in your picture. I haven’t tasted at Bonneau personally, but by all accounts it’s a very, very low-tech, artisinal operation.

I remember several years ago, when we were visiting with Paul Feraud at Pegau, he graciously sold us a bottle of 1983 out of his library stock. He stuck a label on the bottle by hand, grabbed a random foil out of a box, muttered something like “this one looks like it’ll do,” slipped it over the top, and squeezed his fist to tighten it. The wine was marvelous :slight_smile:

-Steve

6

One day I hope to try a Bonneau Celestins.
Personally I’d worry more about the Rayas. I assumed they’d have their own vineyard and thus use the same bottles that you usually see on CdP wine with the seal raised from the bottle? Do they really blend their reserve with grapes from other locations?

7

Mine were sourced from the same place as Siggy. Long gone now and I don’t think I kept any pictures. Here’s a tasting note taken from a bottle sipped on Siggy’s new (at the time) deck.

  • 1992 Henri Bonneau Châteauneuf-du-Pape Réserve des Célestins - France, Rhône, Southern Rhône, Châteauneuf-du-Pape (10/16/2011)
    Three Dinners: A beauty. Great nose featuring ripe black fruit, black olives, garrigue/herbs and brown sugar. The taste was equally thrilling with super ripe fruit (borderline raisin/prune) but with a great streak of iron/mineral. Great weight. Super smooth. Great length on the finish. These are drinking well now, but I wouldn’t hold them much longer. (93 pts.)

Posted from CellarTracker

8

Thanks for the replies, I feel more at ease about the bottles.

They were pretty much the first serious purchase my brother and I have made, so I wanted to make sure.

9

The Rayas looks just like mine. The 05 is stunning albeit very young FWIW.

10

Would anyone bother to fake a 92? Parker gave the vintage a 78, which is pretty much equivalent to undrinkable on his scale, so I’d guess these are the real thing that they hadn’t been able to sell.

11

Christopher,
I have several older Bonneau vintages with these caps (incl. the grape image), but there are also different ones with the pope-crest … I think it depends when and to whom Henri sold the bottle – in your case I asume it was a privat customer (and no tax mark on it!), probably the same one who sold it to you … (a cellar right hand (walking uphill) acessable from the road with a very low door, right?)
@Nick: yes, sure Henri made a 92 C. (and a 92 Marie Beurrier).
@John: Parker gave 78 point for the vintage, but some 92 (if I remember correctly) for the Celestins – well deserved, a very fine wine, almost Burgundian …
I cannot say anything about the missing corners on the labels (which look ok to me).
At Bonneau everything is done by hand, so the slumpy look is common.

Rayas: the triangular vintage label is usually (since the early 90ies) self-adhensive, while the main label is still glued on by hand – so the latter can come off easily due to damp cellaring. The green capsule with 84 R 178 is exactly as usual at Rayas.
A slight reason for concern is the indicated 14% alc.
I´m not sure if 2005 usually reads 14.5 or 14% - but even if … Emmanuel Reynaud often takes any label from his desk drawer and glues it on for a single bottle, no matter what it reads … (to me the main label looks older than the vintage label …!?)
Unfortunately my 2005s are stored in the bottom of a corner, with a lot of cases above … and I don´t have the time to rearrange everything today …
Since 1996 the corks are branded with „Chateau Rayas“ and the vintage, so you could check it by removing the capsule. (a possibility to fake is to take a Pignan bottle of the same vintage, and only change the main label to „Rayas“!) – the capsule and vintage label would be identical!
I´d sacrifice the capsule (can usually be easily spinned off - and put on again) and check the cork …!
@Peter: Rayas-bottles never have any Pop-crest on it - they are normal Burgundy bottles.
Hope it helps …

12

I had the same problem with 2 bottles of Rayas 2006. The bottles were stored in my Eurocave and I noticed that from one bottle the label came off as in the case of Chritopher’s bottle, and part of the label of the 2nd bottle came off as well. I guess Gerhard’s remark is a good explanation for these incidents.
Rayas 2005 is 14% from what I remember.

13

Sure these 14 or 14.5% are nonsense … the 2005 is actually closer to 15.5 … but usually the label is the same every year.
There were one or two exceptions with 14.5% (1989 ?) … but even this can end on a bottle of e.g. 1997 or 2002 …

14

@Gerhard Yep, that’s the cellar.

Thanks for the wealth of information. You’ve put my mind at ease.

15

Christopher - What kind of camera do you use? The clarity of those pictures is great.

16

There’s a Rayas bottle up the road at a local shop I think its the same year…I will check it out

17

Ah! Probably something that needs to be jotted down in a notebook and hidden somewhere in your cellar, especially the part about the corners missing. [wink.gif]

Seriously, selling counterfeit Chateauneuf-du-Pape wine in the centre of the village of Chateauneuf-du-Pape? Hardly… unless the Reyas label falling off is an
omen of some kind. rolleyes

Hank [cheers.gif]

** Hated to waste my 500th post on such trivia, but…