The Tesseron Lot 53 is excellent, but the price has gone through the roof and I am no longer a buyer. It’s now $200+ per bottle, double the price I paid four or five years ago and then, I got a Riedel Cognac Tulip glass as part of the package. It is not necessary to spend that much to get small batch well aged estate grown artisan cognacs. Robert Parker’s 98 point Hedonist Gazette review of the Tesseron Lot 53 was the catalyst that justified the price doubling in a few years. Try the Jean Fillioux Tres Vieux Tres Vieille Grande Champage Cognac. IMHO it’s very nearly as good at half the price. Binny’s in Chicago carries it.
Fillioux and Delamain are both great suggestions.
I haven’t had a Germain Robin for a while, but found them extremely oaky the last time I tried. Is the oak in less evidence in the XO?
One of my big problems with a number of Cognac producers is the oak.
John
I hate oak but love the Germain XO so it is not evident to me
Thanks. I may give it a try.
My favorites in no order:
Chateau Montifaud XO Petite Champaign - hard to find but great at about $100
Camus Borderies XO
Pierre Ferrand Selection des Anges - better than the more expensive Abel
Tesseron Lot 53
Delamain pale and dry - about $100
Delamain Tres Venerable - excellent, but a little over your price-point - never had the Vespers, but hear good things. It’s priced between the Pale and Dry and the Tres Venerable.
Hardy XO
Regarding the Big Four, the XO and better are good and even great, but you’ll pay more for the name. In general, if you’ve never heard of it, it’s probably good!
And more expensive is not always better. Often you are paying for age, which means more rancio. For me it’s often too much. The Pierre Ferrand Selection des Anges is a great balance point and is better than the Abel that loses some fruit in exchange for rancio.
What is rancio please
This link is probably as good as any explanation you’ll get here:
Delamain and Prunier for me.
Thanks for the links! Just ordered a couple bottles of the Prunier and need to look over the list on the other site.
I see Chambers is now carrying a Dudognon 40-year Cognac in the $200 range. I can only imagine how great it must be considering the quality of the rest of the line.
I have enjoyed the Delamain Vesper and the Camus Borderies XO.
Just tried that Germain XO last night…
The nose is very interesting with some rosemary notes I don’t think Ive caught in any spirit before. It might have the smoothest palate Ive ever encountered also but it is so smooth and burn free that I found myself wishing for something more. Its got great orange zest notes and the requisite caramel though nothing seems overdone. I just would’ve loved a touch of heat at the end. The nose certainly promises it.
If someone wants to find out what flavors that people pay a lot of money to enjoy, Pierre Ferrand Selection des Anges is a good place to start and one of the best values out there.
Palate preferences do play a role also. I did a complete tasting through PF lineup and liked the Abel the best. It had a degree of “smoothness” that was just above the Selection des Anges (for me). I also tried the Ancestrale and the 1914 which both had quite a bit of rancio that I did not like. The price was also quite different with the Abel around $250 and the Ancestrale at $1200 I believe.
I think the more expensive a spirit is the less the cost has to do with quality.
I find this particularly with single malts, the expensive bottlings are normally to old and have lost a lot of the character. Of course it depends, 30 year old Macallan is sublime but 30 year old Highland Park is not as good as the 18 year old
Of the few I have had I am keen on the young 1990+ single vintage/vineyard Darroze Armagnacs http://darroze-armagnacs.com/selection_produits.en.html. Same concept as burgundy…
I’ve really tried to like Armagnac and have tried numerous recommendations from Armagnac lovers, but haven’t found one yet that really hits the spot like Cognac. I find Armagnac to have almost an oily character, for want of a better descriptor, that does not appeal to me and that is not so pronounced in Cognac. I’m sure this must be due to the difference in distillation methods between Armagnac and Cognac.