Gérard Bertrand : Legend Vintage Rivesaltes 1949

Tasting Notes and Serving Tips for the Legend Vintage Rivesaltes 1949 by Gérard Bertrand

Tasting

Appearance

The color reveals an amber hue with distinctive tawny highlights, bearing witness to more than seven decades of oxidative aging.

Nose

The nose opens with delicate notes of rancio, interwoven with aromas of macerated dark fruits and gingerbread. With aeration, the bouquet evolves toward warmer nuances of cedarwood, honey, and dried fruits evocative of prune and raisin.

Palate

The attack is precise and balanced, revealing a full, silky texture. The palate shows fine complexity, where natural sweetness harmonizes with sophisticated tannins developed over time. Flavors of candied citrus peel, prunes, cocoa, and nuts follow one another through to a warm, lingering finish with spicy and lightly toasted accents.

Food and wine pairings

This Legend Vintage Rivesaltes 1949 is ideally suited to a contemplative tasting at the end of the evening. It pairs beautifully with blue cheeses such as Roquefort, creating a harmonious balance between sweetness and salinity. Intense dark chocolate desserts, walnut-based creations such as walnut or almond tarts, as well as aged cured meats also make excellent matches. This wine can also be enjoyed as an aperitif before serving cheeses.

Serving and cellaring

The Legend Vintage Rivesaltes 1949 can be enjoyed now, having reached exceptional maturity after more than seventy years of aging.

A historic Roussillon Rivesaltes by Gérard Bertrand

The estate

Gérard Bertrand embodies one of the most influential figures in contemporary Languedoc winegrowing. The heir to a winemaking lineage dating back to 1920, he took the helm of the family estate in 1987 at the age of twenty-two. A former professional rugby player, he founded his wine business in 1992 and gradually built an empire that today includes seventeen properties spread across around one thousand hectares throughout Languedoc-Roussillon. A pioneer of biodynamics on a large scale, Gérard Bertrand is recognized as the world’s leading producer of certified biodynamic wines. His commitment to excellence and respect for terroirs has earned him numerous international accolades, including the title of World’s Best Winemaker awarded by The Drinks Business in 2023. At the head of his family company, he continues to champion the ambition of elevating the wines of southern France to the rank of the greatest appellations.

The vineyard

The Rivesaltes appellation stretches across a vast area of eighty-six communes in the Pyrénées-Orientales and nine communes in the Aude, in the heart of Roussillon. This region benefits from a Mediterranean climate ideal for growing the grape varieties grenache blanc, grenache gris, grenache noir, macabeu, and malvoisie du Roussillon. The Legend Vintage Rivesaltes 1949 is produced primarily from grenache noir, reflecting the traditional practices of the time for crafting the red vins doux naturels of this historic appellation.

Winemaking and aging

The Legend Vintage Rivesaltes 1949 was made using the traditional mutage method, a process characteristic of vins doux naturels. This technique consists of stopping fermentation by adding grape spirit, thereby preserving the grape’s natural sugars. The wine then underwent more than seventy years of oxidative aging in wooden barrels, gradually developing its aromatic complexity and its range of tertiary flavors so characteristic of great amber Rivesaltes.

Grape variety

Grenache noir