Hermitage, Grande Champagne Cognac, 1945 - 70cl, 42% abv

Hermitage Cognacs are renowned for their knowledge and supply of older cognacs. Our cognacs spend far longer in the barrels than average and this alone provides deeper, richer and more individual flavours. Most come from The Champagnes but there are exceptions in every cru. 

The range of Hermitage Cognacs changes as and when old vintages run out or new ones are added. Although there are many vintages available, we select only the very finest for sale under the Hermitage label.

Produced in the Grande Champagne, in the area around Bouteville, the landscape here is more undulating than that around the town of Cognac and the vines travel through several layers of porous chalk to find the underground water margins. This is one of the finest areas of vine production.

In most of the cognac growing area the vines are now machine picked but these would have been picked by hand when the vines were harvested. Handpicked grapes can often provide greater variation in final flavour.

This has a rather more delicate aroma than some of the Hermitage range. It has an initial aroma of pork crackle which continues on to cumin, green walnuts and fennel. The flavours in this cognac are balanced, much the same way as the cognac itself. They tend to merge together, and nothing seems out of place. There are flavours of lychee, passion fruit, rosemary and cocoa. There is a long grapefruit tail.

Distilled on a traditional Charentais Alembic still. It is likely that this was distilled on a relatively small still. We believe that a very small quantity of distilled water was used in the initial stages of its ageing. It has been aged in barrels for more than 50 years thereby developing good colour and flavour. The cognac was later placed in 30 litre bonbonnes.