German Wine; Magnum

For the last five days I have been completly fixated on a bottle of German Riesling in Magnum format. The wine is a Donhoff 2003 Oberhauser Brucke Spatlese for $109 and is only the second German wine that I have ever seen in a magnum format. This things is crazy! It stands like three fet tall, is somwhat falac and peers over any other wine in the store with presence and mistique not unlike the Eiffle Tower. My intsint is to buy one and just cherish the oddity of such a bottle; not to mention a great producer in a highly anticipated vintage. My only hold out is a severe concern for how to store one of these puppies. This is a wine that I would obviouslt wnat to bring out with much adoo many years later when it is mature. The thought of even bring a bottle like that out of the store, onto the NYC subay and past my girlfriend is daunting enough, but what to do with such a monster for a decade?

Reply to
Jaybert41
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Lay down in the cellar like all your other bottles?

M.

Reply to
Michael Pronay

In the US, I seldom have seen German wines, especially the better ones, in large format bottles. Also I have seldom seen reviews that mention a large format bottle. Although I have many German wines stored, none are in large formats. However 1/2 bottles are very common for some of the better German wines such as BA and TBA. These wines are so rich that a little goes a long way. The best I can tell, large format bottles have never been nearly as popular in Germany for their wines as in France, especially for Bordeaux and Champagne. A large format German wine might age a bit slower than a 750 ml bottle, but probably not enough to get excited about.

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Reply to
Cwdjrx _

Liter size bottles of German wine used to be very common here and they caused some confusion because of the color change on the Mozels. Are the half size German wine bottles 350ml or 375ml?

Reply to
Bill Loftin

I believe that some Bordeaux bottles also used this size.

Reply to
Bill Spohn

Yes. From an unrepresentative sample of Bdx bottles and rescued labels:

1975: 73cl, 1982: 75cl. So the change seems to have happened somewhere between 1976 and 1981.
Reply to
Markus Dheus

Here are some more numbers for bottle sizes taken directly from my wine bottles. The 1976 Schloss Vollrads TBA is 700 ml while the1979 Oestricher Lenchen Beerenauslese Eiswein from the Deinhard estate is 750 ml, both on the label and on the extreme lower side of the bottle(not bottom). Quinta de Serrado Bual 1827 is 750ml.

Fonseca's Torna-Viagem Setubal is 500 ml., while a full bottle of their

25yr old Setubal and also their 1934 vintage is 750 ml. Monimpex Tokaji Aszu Esszencia 1957 is 500 ml. as well as a Tokaji Wine Trust Co. 1983 5 P. A half bottle of 1967 Yquem is 375 ml on the glass of the bottle along the bottom side(not thebottom), while the importer's add on lablel gives it as 360 ml (12 Fl. Oz). Either the importer label is a mistake, or it more accurately reflects the volume of wine in the bottle rather than the maximum capacity of the bottle.

Many very old bottles were hand blown and as a result varied somewhat in size. Also many older bottles do not contain a size mark on the glass. Heaven knows what is the size of my Constatia from either 1791s or 1809

- close to a half bottle from the looks of the bottle. In addition some wines sold in English speaking countries in the past were sold in English units. The one gallon bottle of old Chianti I mentioned in my first post is such an example. And then there was the "fifth", or 1/5 gallon that was used before metric units were used in the US. Also there are some differences in the US and British volume measurements.

I did make a typo in the difference between a 375 and 350 ml bottle whic shold be apparent to anyone reading my post.

I believe I may have sme more informaton on bottle sizes in old books in the attic. I have wasted enough time on thismatter, but I may try to see what else I can dig up.

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Reply to
Cwdjrx _

Both the Beaulieu 1969 and 1971 Private Reserve Caberet Sauvignons have

4/5 quart on the glass at the bottom of the bottle side. This is an US quart and not a British Imperial quart which is somewhat larger. This size of bottle was known as a "fifth" in the US. By 1974 a Charles Krug Private Selection Cabernet Sauvignon has 750 ml(25.4 Fl. Oz.) on the glass. A 1974 Beaulieu Private Reserve CS in haf bottle has 375 ml(12.7 Fl. Oz.) on the glass. The early 70s seem to have been a transition time for conversion from English to metric units for wine bottles in the US.

Fifths were so common at one time that there were jokes about them. A cartoon from the 1950's era shows a drunk in a grocery store asking for a fifth of milk. Of course milk was sold in quarts and gallons - not fifths.

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Reply to
Cwdjrx _

snip

I like the one about Baptists ( I am sorry if this offends anyone), but the saying goes

Where there is a fourth (Man, Woman, 2 children) there is always a fifth.

Walter

Reply to
Walter L. Preuninger II

The 1967 Collares from D. J. Silva has a capacity of 650 ml (22 Fl. Oz.) according to the Portugese label. There are some code markings on the glass at the bottom of the bottle, but no capacity.

It would appear that there is quite a range in bottle sizes in my cellar even not considering many old bottles that have no markings to indicate a capacity.

Another consideration is that many Bordeaux and other wines were bottled in England, Belgium, and elsewhere in the past. I do not have any such bottles. However it would not surprise me if some of the old English bottled wines use English Imperial volume, and that bottle sizes might or might not be the same as French bottled wines of that era.

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Reply to
Cwdjrx _
Reply to
Michael Pronay

Some mention has been made of Champagne. Patrick Forbes published a book called Champagne in GB with a coyright of 1967. He gives bottle sizes that have been used for Champagne as:

quarter-bottle: 6 1/2 fluid ozs; half-bottle: 13 fluid ozs; imperial pint: 19 1/2 fluid ozs; bottle: 26 fluid ozs; magnum: 2 bottles; double magnum or jeroboam: 4 bottles; triple magnum or rehoboam: 6 bottles; quadruple magnum or methuselah: 8 bottles; salmanezah: 12 bottles; balthazar: 16 bottles; nebuchadnezzar: 20 bottles;

Some of the above bottle sizes were no longer on the market at the time of writing this book. I assume he uses British ounces. If so, you multiply by 28.41225 to get ml. That would be 739 ml for a single bottle. There is a remote chance that the ozs used are US, because although printed in GB, the book was by Reynal and Company in assocition with Willam Morrow and Company of New York who could have insisted on US ozs for the book distributed in the US. You multiply US ozs by 29.572702 to get ml which would give 769 ml in a bottle. I believe the imperial pint size bottle many also have sometimes been used for Port in GB in the distant past.

I note that a few German wines now are being offered in 500 ml bottles. A catalog from Brown Derby that I just received listed two auslese wines in the 500 ml size in the $US50 range, so we are not speaking of cheap wine.

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Reply to
Cwdjrx _
Reply to
Michael Pronay

"Cwdjrx _" skrev i melding news: snipped-for-privacy@storefull-3172.bay.webtv.net...

Not just a few. It has been a tendency for some years that Ausleses, especially the best ones, are being sold in 500ml bottles. Anders

Reply to
Anders Tørneskog
Reply to
Anders Tørneskog

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