Wine Only Made Once A Century!

2000 Trimbach Hommage de Jean

I've described on this site previously my belief that wine collecting should focus upon great, not merely very good wine. It's not that I don't drink merely good wines; heck, I'll drink boring wine if I need to.

But if you're going to put something in the cellar, make sure it's something that will excite you and your friends when you pull it out years later.

Perhaps now that you've endured this little diatribe, you may be surprised to hear me admit that my next scheduled cellar purchase is some Pinot Gris. Yep, that's right. Pinot Gris, the grape they turn into boring lemon/apple water when they make it in Italy. Well, okay, actually Jermann and Lageder and lots of other folks make delicious Pinot Grigio but I'm not usually going to stick it in the cellar.

But I'm buying some bottles of Trimbach Pinot Gris Hommage de Jeanne 2000. Why? Because this is very special wine, rare indeed. To explain, this is the first bottling of this wine that the venerated Alsace house of Trimbach has produced. They've been around since 1626, so they've had some time to consider the issue. The Hommage de Jeanne 2000 is a single vineyard (Osterberg Vineyard), Grand Cru in status, and a brilliantly rich Pinot Gris.

You won't find the words Grand Cru on the label; Hubert Trimbach thinks the Grand Cru concept has been abused in Alsace and he refuses to participate until the quality of Grand Cru Alsace wine improves across the board, not just among the top producers. But this wine reflects what we ought to expect from Grand Cru wine: richness, intensity, earth, terroir, and above all, balance.

Why Hommage de Jeanne? Jeanne is Hubert's grandmother and she was 100 in the year 2000. The family had long wanted to offer some sort of tribute to her and the 2000 Osterberg provided a wine they felt was worthy of her name.

Eight years later, the wine has proved worthy of her memory – she passed in 2003. The family plans to make the wine again: in one hundred years, assuming the 2100 vintage is up to the standards of the 2000.

So while I'm putting this wine in my cellar because I think it's delicious and wonderful, I'm also doing so because it's rare. That too is a reason to put a wine in the cellar. You should do so too.

Cheers,

Doug Frost, MS MW
Master Sommelier & Master of Wine