Why do people buy really old undrinkable Bdx

WINE TALK
41

I’ve had some off bottles of older wine. However, I think that people may pay high prices because they’re chasing an unknown (hopefully positive) experience. I bought some amazing wines…for a song that should not have been good…but they were.

42

This is my new go-to insult.

43

I might have thought the same thing about Bordeaux from “worthless” vintages until we opened a bottle of '73 Beychevelle a few years ago for my wife’s birthday (not her birth year). I warned the sommelier as she took the bottle away for cork removal and decanting that she might not want to even bring it to the table.

Ten minutes later she came back and said, “I think you’re going to want to try this.” It was terrific! Not just passable, super enjoyable, and we drank it over the period of an hour. Never faded.

Parker rates that wine a 65, last tasted in 1981, and says “Now totally faded and dissipated, this light wine should have been drunk by 1980.”

Frankly, I was astonished by how good the wine was. It was part of a Santa Barbara cellar that had been very well stored and showed really well, as most of the old wines from that cellar have done. I wouldn’t bid up a bottle at auction – and almost certainly wouldn’t have to – but I think there are many pleasant surprises in old wines from off vintages.

I have had similar astonishing experiences with BV pinot noir from '58 and '59 – terrific wines! Who would have thunk it!

44

While I certainly have no illusions about the Bordelais saintliness vs. greed, it could also simply have been the weather. A certain number of degree/days is needed to get ripe berries for rich, deep wine.

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Back to the OP’s original query: I would suspect that Bordeaux enthusiasts are also more likely to hold vertical tastings, and in that context, even old undrinkable swill, is still a useful comparison, when side by side with something the same age, but ripened under better conditions.

For example, I remember a 64 Lynch Bages vs. a 66, and it was like night and day for those years at that vertical. It was suprisingly hard pinning down an 82 for that.

45

To stage an Open House showing? [wow.gif]

46

FWIW, the average auction price for 1974 Mouton is about $300 per. For 1972, it’s about under $250.

Most often, people buy wines likes this for birthday’s, anniversaries etc.

47

Oh yeah, same auction. Stupid of me. [head-bang.gif]

In whic case, a little over priced but not terrible.

48

Sorry, I didn’t mean to sound like Trump, but yes, it was a little nasty.

49

The real oddity is what people pay for Marilyn Merlot.

50

Victor, it is a very sexy vertical.
In your situation, if it turned you on, it could lead to a verticle Victor(via Viagra?)
Very Sorry!

51

We shall have to call you Prince Albert after that comment. pileon

52

I just do not buy Bordeaux in off vintages, which is not to say I didn’t buy the 2009, because it was not a bad vintage but a forward one.

53

Well, undrinkability is more a question of bottle condition than vintage or producers - if you stick to Bordeaux or other reknowned French regions
(if you are not talking about Bordeaux superieur or Bourgogne Passe toutes grains …).

I´ve never had the 1974 Mouton but several other 1st growths from “small” vintages … generally (if in passable condition) they have been at least “interesting” …

What puzzles me more are the prices paid … I´m quite sure that a 1974 1st growth will NOT provide more drinking pleasure than the 1970, 1966 and 1964 (well-known) Bx that I tasted over the last 3 days - usually available for two-figure prices …

So for me it´s more a question of money - I´d always like to taste a Mouton 1974 … for 30, maybe 50 bucks but no more !

54

Ha! How about the 1973 Mouton. I have a bottle I got for about $10. Supposedly worth more empty because someone took the time to spill out the wine. I will open it one of these days, maybe when ALfert makes it to NY.

I bought a case of 1974 Haut Brion in about 1977, gave half of it t a friend for a wedding gift and kept the other half. I drank the last one with a couple of pre-Berserker Berkerkers about 10 years ago in Connecticut. It was on the way out, but still enjoyable. Some of the earlier bottles had been outstanding in the 1990s.

And I’m the one who likes Saxum and SQN. Palates are so varied that there will always be someone who likes, and someone else who hates, a given wine. Chacun a son gout, as they say. If you don;t like it, find something else and leave it for those who do.

55

Not everything that is interesting in some wines can be expressed in a points score. Simple as that IMO. For some wines of particular interest pondering “what went wrong” can be very interesting if your interest goes beyond simple drinking pleasure.

56

I said before and I will say again. A tasting within the last year of all first growths from 1975 was incredibly good. I don’t really consider e’66, '70, '78 to be off vintages either. I have had some nice '78, '79, and '81 but not stellar years.

57

At 10,- this is a no-brainer.
However - it tastes like a (too old, but) interesting mid-level Bordeaux from a light vintage, worth some 30,-
The label is GREAT!

Who said that ´66, ´70 , ´75, ´78 are off-vintages must be an idiot - or has no idea at all …
There are also some great ´79s … and a few excellent ´81s …

(off-vintages in Bx are ´73, ´74, ´77, ´80, ´84 … )

58

Generally speaking, in a blind tasting, most people will like wines from off and even poor vintages more than you would think. Especially if the tasters have not had the chance to sample a lot of older wines.

59

La Mission Haut Brion 66 is one of the most stellar Bordeaux I’ve had. It clearly outperformed a Latour 61 the same evening (less than a year ago) - not the best Latour 61 I’ve had - but still.

60

Mike,

I disagree with your vintage comparisons.

My 1959 experiences being referenced are multiple bottles consumed over a dozen plus years in the 80’s and 90’s of Lafite, Mouton, Haut Brion, Latour. They were vastly riper, darker, richer, more full bodied, more forward than their 1966 counterparts. It was an atypical vintage with nothing like it going back to the odd year mid and later 1940’s and 1950 in the Pomerol.

1966 was nothing like the “exceptional” years 59 and 61 producing more classically structured, fruited/ripe wines. No opulence found by me.

The 1970 versions were interesting with Mouton barely opened for biz in the 80’s, Lafite and Haut Brion significantly less rich, ripe and forward than the 1959’s and Latour was an emerging big boy, more similar to 1959 than the others.

I had fewer bottles of 1961’s: Petrus, Haut Brion and Latour were huge, ripe and fruit laden, Lafite not so much and Mouton like the 70, reserved into the 90’s