Beschreibung:

Romanee Conti 1996 Domaine de la Romanee-Conti Romanee Conti 1996 Domaine de la Romanee-Conti Cote de Nuits, Grand Cru Lot 6078: Bottle #s 814-819 and 784-789, cases banded prior to inspection, Lot 6079: u. 4.5cm, jeroboam # 3, banded prior to inspection, slightly scuffed label The total experience in this great vintage. The bouquet has everything. Violets, peat, raspberries. A mind-blasting total taste. A huge mouthful of wild cherries with plummy fruit, liquorice, all backed up by terrific tannin and ace acidity. Peat and black cherries on the finish. Monumental wine - a pillar of the vinous century in Burgundy. SS. See illustration Lot 6079 1 jero - 3 liter (owc) per lot: HKD 160000-240000 per lot: USD 20000-30000 1.80 ha (4.32 acres), average production: 450 cases, average age of vines: 52 years In 1760, the Prince de Conti bought the lower part of La Romanee, and a myth was born. The de Villaine and Leroy families acquired Romanee-Conti in 1850 and they still own and run the Domaine jointly. It is interesting that in 1850 Romanee-Conti was estate bottled - then this ceased for a period and restarted in 1911. Thus, the essence of Romanee-Conti was captured but, in my view, never tamed! It is a wild, extrordinary wine, unpredictable and constantly mutating as it matures, but always true to its indubitably great self. The care lavished on Romanee-Conti is shown to all the wines of the Domaine, but the breed and refinement in the taste of Romanee-Conti would point to an indefinable "something extra" in this 1.80 ha plot. Tradition is respected (Romanee-Conti is always vinified in wooden vat number 17 which dates from 1862), but not blindly revered for its own sake. Short pruning, organic fertilizer, low yiields, high average age of vines, late picking, selection of grapes, long fermentation with natural yeasts, 70-100% vin de press added to give quality tannins and good acidity, new Troncais oak barrels from wood the Domaine dries itself, almost no racking (and then only by gravity), fining with 3-4 egg whites per cask only in some years according to the character of the vintage, no filtration - all this is taken for granted. But Romanee-Conti is more than the total of a mass of intricate manoeuvres - it is the pure silk and intoxicating aromas and flavours that appear, as if by magic, from mere marl and limestone. SS. This great, beautifully defined vintage has a particular characteristic that is, in fact, found all over France this year - a remarkable concentration of both sugar and acidity, due to the combination of hot days and cold nights, a North wind and dryness. This immediately confers strong personality and longevity to the wines. The Domaine harvested as late as possible to exploit this exciting marriage of high natural degrees (more than 13 degrees in Romanee Conti and La Tache) and high acidity, giving high-wire balance to the wines. Romanee Conti was picked on the glorious morning of 1st October and the harvest finished on 3rd October with La Tache. A luminous vintage with wines of great length and precision. SS. Quantity: 1