Provenance

The Coats Family Cellar is arguably the most prestigious fine wine collection ever offered in South Africa. It contains a deep collection of the worlds finest, most sought-after wines, spanning over 150 years. Collected over many decades, the cellar was imported from Ireland to South Africa via reefer. Each bottle within the Coats Family Cellar was authenticated by Michael Egan in August 2022 and given an ID number for tracking.

Michael Egan is a world-expert in fine and rare wines with more than thirty five years of experience. He was the principal expert for the plaintiff in the two major wine counterfeiting trials in Koch v. Eric Greenberg and United States v. Rudy Kurniawan, both of which occurred in 2013.

Along with Michael Egan, the Strauss & Co Fine Wine team have tasted extensively through the cellar and are confident of the wine storage and hence quality. The entire collection is currently stored at Wine Cellar.

Critics Ratings

‘From 25 to 55 year-old vines. Wonderfully subtly graded crimson. Very heady nose already. The malo finished in July 2006. Very complex and velvety already. This wine caresses the senses. Beautiful texture. Very, very fresh and elegant, lifted and lively. That precision of Amoureuses again but with much more voluptuousness. This wine expresses something that has absolutely nothing to do with ‘winemaking’ – juts place. Very fine tannins on the finish. Wonderful elegance. Seductive but in a very cerebral way somehow. This wine smells so amazingly fresh, in complete contrast to the more worked noses of the Dominique Laurent wines tasted earlier that day. Tasting the two wines alongside, it’s easy to imagine Amoureuses as a subset of the Musigny. There is minerality, elegance and sensuality too. Real éclat.’ – Jancis Robinson MW, JancisRobinson.com, 18.5/20 (Aug 2007)

‘A very pure, ebullient, multi-faceted nose of wild strawberry, raspberry, white flowers and citrus fruits, but very mercurial, becoming slightly flinty and minerally with aeration, then more peachy and sorbet in style. Decidedly understated on the entry, you wonder what all the fuss is about, but this wine just builds and builds. Beautifully knit tannins, perfect acidity with beguiling purity and minerality. More feminine than I predicted, but wow, what a wine this is going to be. The finish simply refuses to ebb. Drinking 2015-2040.’ - Neal Martin, Wine Advocate, 96-98/100 (Jan 2007)