Sunday 21 January 2018

Brandy Conde de Osborne Solera Gran Reserva 40.5%, Osborne

Appearance
Fairly deep mahogany with bright copper highlights and a faint green tinge to the amber rim.
Nose
Full and quite rich with a hints of brown sugar sweetness, walnut, caramel, vanilla, dried fruits and a hint of leather. There are slight toasted notes of oak and coffee as well as some PX, and everything is very well integrated into a fine and fairly complex bouquet.
Palate
Big and bold up front, then it softens into a complex and stylish mix of all the above. There is some grip but no aggressive tannin allowing the richness to come through. Lots of classic toffee, fig and date from the PX butts but not over sweet, with a drier than expected and very long finish.
Comments
This classic brandy is made from holandas distilled in pot stills at Osborne's own distillery in Tomelloso, la Mancha, established in 1880. The brand was launched in 1965 and has an average age of over 10 years which it has spent in butts seasoned with Pedro Ximénez at the firm's bodega El Tiro in El Puerto de Santa Maria. In 1869 Don Juan Nicolas Osborne was awarded the hereditary title of Conde de Osborne by Pope Pius IX for services to diplomacy. The brandy is available in a choice of two bottles; this one and the famous one commissioned from the surrealist painter Salvador Dalí in 1964. This glass bottle is blown by hand one at a time at a glass works in Barcelona. There is inevitably a big difference in the bottle prices for the same brandy, with the collectable Dalí version costing double.
Price
22.95, Roali



No comments:

Post a Comment