anyone know a lot about brandy?

today i got a bottle of martell very old pale from a friend who has been living in france for the past year

he got the bottle, but ive just been looking online and theres no proof of how much alcohol is in it and i cant find an age for it, the bottle looks old, the clasp at the top is very unusual and the labels on the bottle are old and mouldy and very unusual, there were 3 bottles in the shop and he bought 2 (couldnt afford 3)

anyone got any info? http://img512.imageshack.us/img512/9563/ pict0111ka9.jpg http://img254.imageshack.us/img254/7421/ pict0112vv1.jpg

i dont wanna open it, i like brandy but dont want to ruin a good bottle for a normal drink

Post edited by: pip, at: 2008/08/09 21:45

sorry ive just noticed pics are too big ill edit them

Pip, welcome to the forum I hope you will like it here.


This is soooo extra-ordinary. I never seen a Martell bottle like that. I advise you to send the photos to the Martell company (in France by email) and ask them. I would appreciate it if your could tell me afterwards what they said

ok, thanks

ive sent the pictures to them, the only information ive been able to find is that the bottle says "j&f martell" who were the original martell owners who sold the company in 1988 so its atleast 20 years old

ooooo that's J & F I read JSF.....

I hope you will receive a response back from Martell soon. Would you let me know if they come up with an answer?

Pip,
neat stuff. It should be ok, its distilled and has probably about 40% alcohol so it should be fine.

Somehow you are right DGreene, one can only know if a bottle is good if one actually tasted the drink

These caps were the norm before ROPP (roll-on, pilfer-proof) were established around the late '60s/early '70s, so the bottle are at least 40 years old. Seals are intact, so the spirit should (I say should reservedly) be ok. If stored in a cool dark place. Looking at the labels, storage conditions seem to have been good, so we can assume that the spirit will be drinkable. The fact that there is no alcoholic strength on the bottle is another pointer to age, as it became mandatory in Europe to show the strength on the label from some point in the early '60s.
the strength will be 40% abv or 80 US Proof.
Yes, the company was sold in 1988 to Seagram, but Seagram was itself split up in 2002 and Martell is now owned by Pernod-Ricard.

whiskeytutor, thank you for that detailed information. I hope Pip will read this soon