Buying 1970s

[reschsmooth]

A client of mine is considering buying 1970 vintage wines for his wife's birthday in a few months. He would rather not spend a lot (meaning more than, say, $250 or so) as he doesn't think his wife would appreciate the meaning (notwithstanding his ability to buy a full flight of Grange if he wanted to).

My questions are:

1. If you were looking at 1970 vintage, what regions would you be looking at? That is, which region (Aust or international) had a good 1970 that would have aged nicely to now?
2. Given 1, do you expect that any could be had at a reasonable price?
3. Given 2, where would you be looking where you would also have confidence in the cellaring?

In answering the above, is it feasible to look at vintage ports of that vintage? I understand wife likes port.

Thanks in advance.

[griff]

Portuguese Vintage Port is the ticket. 1970 was a great year. Prices may may have shot up being a 'significant' year this year but you should still get them under budget. As for point 3 I would get a colleague to bring one back from Europe ideally. Less confident with Australian cellaring conditions for 35+ years. But port is something that might survive best.

cheers

Carl

[reschsmooth]

Thanks Carl

I had a quick squizz and I think a 1970 VP may be the way to go.

Know where I/he can find some?

[Michael McNally]

Hi reschsmooth

There is a Chateau Reynella and a couple of Cockburn's (portuguese) 1970s on the current Langtons auction (finishing tomorrow). hope nobody else had their eyes on these.....

Cheers

Michael

[Mahmoud Ali]

I agree with Carl, port is the way to go and 1970 was an excellent vintage in Portugal. I've had the '70 Fonseca and it was excellent, but I reckon any other good producer's port would be good too.

Good luck....................Mahmoud.

[darby]

Armagnac is the go. It is vintage unlike the more downmarket cognac.

[Gary W]

70 Bordeaux is going well..although unless you are sure of the provenance very tricky.
You can pick up a 70 Leo Las Cases for about $100 and a good bottle is a nice old drink. Lynch-Bages is pretty good too. Going up the scale - Palmer, Latour and Petrus are awesome (subject to good bottle).
GW

PS. It's my birthyear so I'm quite familiar with 70 Bdx.

[reschsmooth]

Following on from the previous posts, can anyone recommend a vendor of 1970 Port in Australia? Hoping to pick up a bottle.

[cuttlefish]

Your best bets would be Auction houses, such as Langtons, or eBay, or perhaps Isle Of Wine who seem to have a fair few older ports, and armagnacs, etc.

[Partagas]

Had a great 1970 (1974 I think) Reserva Chianti a couple of years back that was surprisingly very good (surprise cause I didn’t know much about Chianti) and was travelling fine in terms of its age. In fact it wasn’t even supposed to be a great vintage but still had good depth, complexity and not heading south as yet. So would definitely try this type of wine for an ager from the 70’s. Think you get them at a reasonable price too.

Sam

[reschsmooth]

Thanks again folks. I have found an Australian based on-line and mortar & bricks retailer who has some 1970 Fonseca Port for $245 for a 375 ml. I don't know if this represents good value or not (assuming sound provenance). Any ideas?

[DJ]

Cellaring is really important. I bought 3 St Henri and a Kalimna Bin 28 which I then took to the Penfolds clinic - All duds, Peter Gago thought the St Henri had been heat affected. Glad I bought them a couple of years early given where the prices have gone since.