Sunday 27 December 2009

Xmas drinking

So the drinking on christmas day way - Waitrose Amontillado Sherry, pretty nice, and a lot better than it ought to have been, a small glass of the Figeac 96 that had been in the decanter from the previous night, very figeac like, as it had a bit of the medoc about the nose, then an almost embarrassed core of ripeness, like it didn't really want to admit it was a St Emilion.
Some Joseph Perrier 99, which was good, quite rich, but lacking a touch of intensity and acidity.
Tinon Dry Szamoradni 03, which was almost Proustian in the way that the scent of it took me right back to the cellar and scrubbing the barrels.
Josmeyer Samain 00 Riesling was utterly revelatory, rich, tight, minerally, creamy, complex and frankly one of the best things I've put in my mouth over the last year.
Then Clerc Milon 96 - earthy/farmyardy with this lovely chocolatey shitty sort of nose.
After that I went to sleep.

Wednesday 23 December 2009

Latour

So having chatted to one of Fred's friends (via Matthew at Pacific) I'm going to be the proud custodian of a bottle each of 61 and 78 Latour. Should be fun to try and sell.....
Oh and also some 1970 Cos d'Estournal, though I've a feeling that a bottle of that might make it into my personal cellar..

Monday 21 December 2009

Bugee jumping without the rope

Tonights featured wines will be...

Both from the Rubin Winery

A varietal Vranac, and teh Car Lazar, Stono Polusuvo Vino (Merlot, Vranac and Gamay) - neither wine appears to have a vintage, though there is a printed barcode like date on the back of them, so Vranac is 201108 and the Car Lazar is 231009, if that helps.

Vranac first - (Gergely has just suggested I think about what I'd like read at my palettes funeral, which I think might be a bit unfair)
Seems dark in colour, but then I'm sat in a dark corner. Slightly volatile fruit, there's a cakey like character here - almost a cinnamon, raisin marzepan like note - a bit more volatility and then I realise it reminds me of the German Christmas bisquits. On the palette it's quite light, with low tannins and a volatile plummy sort of character. Gergely rekons there might have once been a red fruit character..... Well I'm inclined to agree that there isn't really much concentration here, though once again I'm in agreement that the alcohol is balanced (there's only 11.5%) though that probably reflects the lack of character..
Also Gergely isn't allowed to make any more comments as they're getting a little of message.

Car Lazar
Now after the inauspiciousness of the Vranac, what will the Car Lazar reveal (apart from the cool name - Major Lazar!Q!!!!!!)
A reasonable amount of fruit on the nose - red berries and a touch of bramble, again lacking in any sort of intensity on the palette, one imagines that several decades of civil war impedes concentration, well at least imparts a certain skittishness.
This is ok, at least it's fruity and doesn't seem like a concerted effort to extol the virtues of dirty volatility. Right time to BBQ some lamb and get stuck into some seriuously convoluted regional politics.

Saturday 19 December 2009

Thinking about the new year

So I'm sat around with a Negroni, thinking about the new year. New chef, hopefully a new menu too. What I want to see is a smaller menu that will let the chefs have a bit less general prep to do, which will let them focus on regular specials. If I can then tie this into a daily staff meeting then we can improve the standard of staff knowledge regarding the dishes, and offer our regular guests something more interesting for their visits. Also on a more personal note I might have more of a chellenge regarding food/wine matching..

Friday 18 December 2009

So that was Christmas

Well Christmas is pretty much over now, and I can start to contemplate sleeping. Not loads of interesting wines sold, but a lot of covers passed, and lots and lots of time spent at work.
However late nights on the bus reading Black Swans by Nassim Nicolas Taleb has left me posing some questions. Principally regarding the way that people actually experience wines and food;
The effect of post hoc justification regarding wine quality, particularly when there is a big name or a big price tag.
How dopamine release influences perception of quality, examples would be the holiday rose phenomenon, where the wine that was ethereal when being sipped as the sun set in the south of France becomes disappointing ordinary back home. Now I'm sure that I've read articles talking about studies that show how spending money whilst shopping can trigger dopamine release and thus engender feelings of satisfaction and pleasure. How much of the excitement of actually spending lots of money on a bottle of wine is actually reflected in the pleasure garnered in the drinking/experiencing of it.
Then more generally what is the root cause of pleasure experienced in relation to food and wine consumption.
Obviously with wine, the alcohol present has an effect. There is also an element of taste present, and we are all suckers for things that taste nice. However it is evident that wine is something that we learn to appreciate, does this make it more susceptible to learned preconceptions regarding it's quality and complexity?
The Fat Duck cook book has many interesting facets to it, central to Blumenthals philosophy seems to be engaging the brain, so creating an experience, adding extras to the experience that complement the food. What is the spit between direct appreciation of flavour and appreciation that is related to the environment/existing preconceptions etc..
Reading the opening chapter to Noble Rot, about Bdx, there was a comment about how the new world had made wine labels more decipherable by listing grape varieties, rather than obscure place names et al. However I got to wondering whether this was actually any real use, as simple listing that the wine is a Merlot or a Shiraz doesn't neccecarily make things much easier, and with reflection, how different is this to the old old tradition of labelling things after the place from whence the best known proponent of the style they were copying originated. Australian Claret, Haughtons White Burgundy, Californian Hock? Did the European insistence on the trade marking of certain geographical denominators actually do them a disservice in the long run, as it forced the newer wine regions to forge identities for themselves, surely now Chardonnay is a bigger brand than Burgundy ever was... Certainly Sauvignon Blanc is much better known than Sancerre will ever be. However how much use is Sauvignon Blanc as an indicator of style when you compare an Alto Adige with an oaked example from San Antonio?
A few things I've been musing on.

Thursday 12 November 2009

Got a cold but it's all go here

So still feeling the effects of a slight cold, which I've informed must be gone by tomorrow afternoon at the very fucking latest. However it's all go go go here.
Flying out tomorrow for the European sommelier of the year comp, not really sure what to expect, but I'm sure I'll enjoy myself.
On a slightly different note apparently in my absence the powers that be have decided that they want to have a trial of my wine and food tasting menu in December rather than the January date that I was expecting. Soooo, it's push on and get the thing finished time.
The original concept was to go month by month and explore the possibilities that are presented by various different ingredients, starting with Beef, as it's something everyone likes (those that don't I'm going to pretend don't exist) and it's also usually just Pigeon holed with red wines, particularly powerful ones. So here we get ot play a little with expectations and generally show off it's diversity within the confines of classic(ish) french cuisine.

Carpaccio with orange flower and jasmine flowers
Condrieu
What I'm looking to do here is show how delicate the uncooked meat can be, as all our beef is grass reared there is always a slight herbal character to it, esp when raw, this with some floral and perfumed dressing should go beautifully with a rich and opulent viognier... Guigal La Dorianne?

Blanqutte de Veau
White Burgundy
Classic, very creamy, cooked and with a delicate rice, mushroom accompaniment, what I'm imagining here is a little loose tian, rice, then the veal, and the sauce topping it, just a baby version. I think that the cream, the mushrooms and the veal will go stunningly with a mildly aged white burgundy.

Pot au Feu Jelly - ideas including lavender flavour, saffron infused carrots substituted for the actual carrots, pos all the veg cooked separately
Red Burgundy (pos Sangiovese/Nieluccio)
Here I want to play with the ideal of the bouilli, the beef that's had collagen slowly cooked out, so that even though it was rich and tough to start with it's much more delicate after the cooking. I want to have it as a small gelatin terrine. So quite concentrated stock, but pos slightly perfumed, as I want to serve this with a nice Burgundy, so what I want is for the meat and the stock to provide the heart of hte dish, but the veg to provide the cues to the exotic spicing of the wine. Hence the original cooked veg being discarded and replaced with the same ingredients but cooked differently. Carrots cooked with some orange peel in the water and saffron, must think more about the other veg, celery, onions, turnips etc.

Beef Sashimi / Fillet v v rare, quite peppery on the edge
Quite light weight Northern Rhone Syrah
Possibly leaning towards a fillet here as I could serve it having been rolled in cracked black pepper, just maybe 2 slices, also involve some juniper?


Roast Beef injected with it's juices / wine that's been delicately infused with liquorice, then roasted with a salt herb crust. All this extra aromatics would be nicely complemented by a nice Priorat (pos look for some older vintage)
Priorat / Rousillon
or.... if the idea of injecting juices back into the meat is too much for the kitchen, then just the salt herb crust and then I'll serve it with some Bordeaux, or pos a Margaret River Bdx blend.


Bavette with a bone marrow and shallot sauce
Something quite rustic St Chinian etc more thoughts later..


Daube de Joue
Ribero del Douro

Monday 19 October 2009

Smith Haut Lafitte

Snuck away from work this afternoon to attend a tasting of Smith Haut Lafitte's wines over at the Bibendum head quarters. Both Florence and Daniel Cathiard, SHL's charming proprietors we're present though it was the effervescent Florence who did most of the chatting.
Smith Haut Lafitte is in Pessac Leognan, pretty much in the outskirts of Bordeaux, they've got excellent Gunzian gravel terroir and in the Cathiards, owners with the ambition to raise their estate into the top tier of Bordeaux wines.
Well, I ought to recant that, SHL blanc is already one of the top 3 white wines produced in the region, and up there with the best whites that France produces, age worthy and complex.
SHL blanc 06 (90% Sauv Blanc, 5% Semillon and 5% Sauvignon Gris).
Creamy delicate Peach/Apricot fruit, some white flowers and a touch of some sweet herbs. On the palette it demonstrates how to do power with sublime creamy elegance, minerally but not austere and in possession of a wonderfully long finish.
(I might be able to find my notes on other vintages, more later...)
The red wine is classic Graves, almost always showing the flintiness that supposedly marks out the wines, and almost always displaying an enviable elegance.
Earlier in the year the 08 was one of my favorites of the 08's showing lovely weight, some fragrant blackcurrant fruit and just a touch of gravelliness.
03 - from the heatwave vintage is flinty, toasty and shows lots of shaved graphite pencil aromas, dark fruit (though still a bit fresh, no raisiny notes here), and the beginnings of secondary characters, a bit of tobacco a bit of forest floor. Though quite tannic there is a muscular brooding quality to the wine, and an almost haemoglobin like ironiness. The finish then starts to exhibit the cream and licorice notes that I expect to develop as it ages.
02 - a restaurant vintage, this was lighter, and the freshest of the three we tasted. A spot of farmyardy, flinty and undergrowth infused red currant fruit opens the nose, then, a rather gravelly palette leads on. The lightest of the SHL vintages on show, but it rather grew on me as we tasted the others.
00 - wine of the day, complex medocienne red berried fruit notes, lots of flinty gravel, some cedar wood/tobacco, a woody forest undergrowth character. This was a wine hitting it's drinking peak. Still with ripe red fruits, the tannins taking on an almost silken quality, but still very much in evidence, and a perfumed haunting sort of finish.
Once again, I really like SHL, and a great little primer for the Union de Grand Cru de Bordeaux 2007 tasting tomorrow.

Friday 16 October 2009

DEux Montile whites

All 06 whites from the De Montile negotiant stable, DEux Montile, which I believe is overseen by the daughter (though a quick google check would probably tell me).
Montagny 1ere cru Les Coeres
Smoky bacon, fennel leaf, citrus and some mineral notes. Lovely subtlety and complexity. On the palette a lovely acidity that's tending towards some apricot flavours and turns a touch creamy on the finish.

St Romain
A much cooler bit of Burgundy this, and it's reflected in the .5% lower alc. Tighter more citrus and herbal nose, overlaying some unripe stone fruits. A hint of some lactic characters lead onto a very minerally palette, again showing a touch of cream on the finish.

Auxey-Duresses (under duress)
Quite floral, peach and creamy apricot fruit notes, minerally and angular on the palette, but with a slight void or hole where the alcohol is just a little bit visible.

Meursault 'Casse Tete'
As well as having the best name for a Meursault I've ever come across, this was very feminine and attractive. Tight, floral and pear like on the nose, there was just a suggestion of hazelnuts, (Gergely suggested green hazelnuts, which neither Toby nor I had ever come across so...). Again on the palette some cream though in this case the minerality lasted longer before it arrived.

Lovely wines, though as usual one feels that at the prices they're maybe too subtle to pop on a restaurant list. Ideal for home purchase though. All available from Genesis wines..

Eileen Hardy tasting with Bill Hardy:


After spending several hours traversing London (Leyton to Earls Court is a long way) we were upstairs at the Atlas Pub for a mini tasting of Eileen Hardy Shiraz and Chardonnay.

I think this was the first time I’d come across the Eileen Hardy wines, the flagship Shiraz and Chardonnay from the Hardy portfolios.

Released originally to celebrate Eileen Hardy’s 80th birthday in 1973 the wine proved so popular that it was made a yearly release, initially just being the best red wine the company could produce, before being pegged to the best Shiraz (Thomas Hardy is soon to be released as the best red wine of the year). A Chardonnay joined the fold in 87 as a Chardonnay.

Chatting with Bill was great fun, as he is a great conversationalist and took some time explaining the evolution of the styles of the wines, taking in the move to increasingly cool climate vineyards for the Chardonnay, from the Padthaway home of much of the early fruit through the Adelaide Hills, Thumbarumba, and currently Tasmania. Along with this the wine making has become less clean and technical, with fermentation and malo in the barrel, and less new oak.

This was all very evident in the difference between the 02, which was fully mature and showing loads of creamy, earthy overripe fruit and very obvious barrel notes, yet was starting to come apart.

Then jumping to the 04 which was the first vintage to have a majority of Tasmanian fruit, and consequently was much lither, showing a beautiful balance between ripe fruits, citrus, and mature barrique and batonnage characteristics.

The 05 and 06 both bade very well for the future with the 06 in particular showing a beautiful creaminess as it opened up on the palette.

As for the reds there was a rather odd truculence of character about the two middle wines with both the 98 (best vintage of the decade), and the 01 seeming very muted and closed, especially when contrasted with the exuberance of the 95 and 04.

The 04 was a joy to drink, being awash with a fabulous purity of ripe dark fruits, plums, violets, some menthol and eucalypt, but more of the herbaceous characters of youth. Then as a total contrast, and quite interesting lesson – we all need reminding as often as possible how wonderful Australian reds can be at over 10 years of age – the wonderfully complex 95, a slightly medicinal edge to the eucalypt, dark fruits, a slight leatheriness and a lovely sweet berry fruit palette that segues into a meaty savoury finish.

All that was left was for be to rant about the lack of appreciation for aged new world wines, before shooting off to Planet of the Grapes to get tipsy and set myself up for being late the next day…..

Wednesday 7 October 2009

The Very Best

Quite excited about hearing the new album from The Very Best, Warm heart of Africa. Loved the mix tape released last year. Esau Mwamawaya and Radioclit.
Also new Vivian Girls album, much (legally purchased!) new music...

Round up of the today and yesterdays tweetnotes

Ch d'Angludet 95 - still bold, cederwood and dark berries, quite structured

Pichon Baron 97 - slightly earthy sweet berries, elegant with a redcurrant and sousbois medoc palette and pencil shaving finish. yum

Tignanello 01 meaty black tea scented sweet red berries, seemingly just relaxing into early mid age with big tannins swaddled in soft fruit

Catena Zapata Nicolas 05 - powerful liqorice and creamy dark fruits touch of raisins. Big big stuff (also just ordered some 01,02,03&04)

Dobogo tokaji aszu 6 puttonyas 04 still v v young all apricot peach bitter tangerine but with a slight salty mineral finish - fab

Jacques Prieur Musigny 01 - unfortunate infanticide..... But a nice leathery edge to the powerful fruit

en suite Pichon Comtesse 86 - sweet redcurrant and griotte jam, ripe and assertive

Gruaud Larose 85 - inredible nose of tobacco and sweet red berries, still v youthful and very long finish

Grand Village - Petit Bordeaux

Right, for the end of the night tasting we have a couple of entry level Bdxs from Armit, Grand Village blanc 07 and rouge 08.
Blanc first (5.48) - unappealing nose, lacking freshness with a sort of dirty edge. Good acidity and some citrus fruit. Come to think about it it might just be a bit sulphur retarded aromatically so trying the copper coin thingamybob. 12.5
Rouge (5.98) - simplistic dark fruit but noticeably Bordeaux (if you're thinking Bordeaux whilst tasting it as I am, possibly undermining the objectivity of the tasting here). Refreshing, a touch of balanced tannins and a pleasant finish. Not bad at the price.
Might take a few bottle of the red, it'd be £25 on the wine list, and would probably sit ok at that price.

Monday 8 June 2009

Schlumberger Rieling Kitterle 2001

One of the wines I bough in Alsace last year, showing a couple oof extra years maturity and it's gorgeous - creamy mineral, citrus, some hints of peach, lovely complexity and great weight. There's something about really good whire wines where the minerallyness seems to shimmer, not quite anything that you can put your finger on, just thing little glittering of a sense of place. Lovely, though I really ought to go to bed, especially as I need to work tomorrow then I have to get a silly early flight to Hungary for this little competition....

Sunday 7 June 2009

Aromatic white wine tasting with Denis Doubourdieu and the wines of the Cave de Ribeauville

So I spent a very enjoyable Monday afternoon over at the Bibendum offices in Chalk farm. First was a quick lunch with Valeria (our rep) and her good friend Mariela Molinari who’s the assistant winemaker at Bodegas Catena, which gave me a good opportunity to talk about tannins (a current sidetrack), and more specifically ask whether she knew of any research into the thorny issue of tannin, protein and lipids and their interactions – basically I’m looking for some sound science with which to base food and wine recommendations, as what seems currently to be the case is a lot of anecdotal evidence, and what I’m going to call the locality fallacy, i.e both food and wine come from very close to each other, there for they must complement each other. Now I’m aware that co-evolution of food and wine within a region would suggest that very tradition styles of wine might work, but my gut feeling is that given the changes wrought over the last decades even if this was the case it no longer really applies. Anyway, enough of my digressions.

Denis Doubourdieu is a very interesting person, a professor of Enology, and also a well travelled consultant. He’s particularly know for his work with aromatic white wines, growing up on the Sauternes Estate of Chateau Doisy Daene, sweet wine runs in his blood. But increasingly Doisy Daene Sec is the wine people get to know first, as he’s made it one of his tasks to get Bordeaux Sauvignon back on the map. You’ve probably tried at least the Dourthe no 1 white, which was one of his major commercial wines.

The aim of the tasting was to look at the relationship between sugar, acidity, and perceptible sweetness in wines, particularly apt as Doubourdieu has recently started working with les Caves de Ribeauville in Alsace, an area beset by issues of sugar and sweetness levels.

We started with a short flight of Doubourdieu’s Bordelais wines;

Chateau Reynon 2008, Alc: 12.69%, Sugar:0.9g/l, T/A:4.57g/l, pH:3.18. 100% Sauvignon Blanc grown on limestone covered with thick clay and matured in very large old oak barrels. A ripe nose some hay, lemons, hints of peach, quite elegant ripe fruit, underlain with some white bread notes (lees characteristics). The acidity in the wine was quite noticeable, but as was the ripe fruit on the palette giving an impression of sweetness but with effectively no residual sugar, oh and there was a lovely peach guava like finish. 82

Doisy Daene Sec 2007, Alc:12.5%, Sugar: 1.4g/l, T/A:4.85g/l. From Barsac, this is Sauvignon Blanc from a limestone base covered with very thin top soil, also this has seen 10% new oak. Slight grassy herbal character, white pepper and a touch of medium browned toast. A somewhat muscular palette, there is an interesting persistence of body to the wine, the ripe slightly peachy fruit working very well with the creaminess of the lees characters and the oak, the grassy character of the Sauvignon Blanc manifesting itself more as a peach skin scent, then a lime and peach finish. 84

Clos Floridene 2007, Alc: 13%, Sugar:1.7g/l, T/A:4.53g/l, pH:3.15. Clos Floridene is from just next to Doisy Daene, but the macro climate is somewhat cooler, also Clos Floridene has 50% Semillon, of which 30% sees new oak. Sticky apricots and a much more mineral tang. Very fresh and direct acidity with a real lemon citrus character, some ripe fruit but an odd stickiness to the fruit on the finish. 81

Clos Floridene 1998, Alc: 13%, Sugar: 1.4g/l, T/A 3.49g/l. This was shown to prove that well made wines can age, Dubourdeieu is of the opinion that so long as you don’t damage the wine in their youth, i.e. expose them to excess oxygen, whether through unnecessary fermentation times, of bad handling then they have the potential to age well. Bread, beeswax, and oxidative characteristics, citrus and some bruised apple notes. Still fresh acidity some fine tropical fruit notes mixed with a nutty brioche palette. Lengthy with a nutty and tight mineral finish. (not scored as it was more interesting than a serious drinking wine)

 

We then moved to a flight of Rieslings from les Caves Ribeauville, Ribeauville is pretty central in Alsace and is located pretty much at the heart of the geological fault that gives Alsace such a grab bag of different soils and terroirs. Les Caves themselves are the oldest coop in France having formed in 1895, and have been pretty forward looking ever since, taking things up a notch in the 90’s when they inaugurated their quality charter for members. No dusty wineries and disinterested semi peasant growers here.

Riesling Prestige 2008, Alc 12%, Sugar 3.5g/l, T/A 10g, pH 3.00. All were agreed that Prestige was a stupid name, as it wasn’t a tete du cuvee, but moving on, this was from a 10km spread and was sourced from the best parcels from their growers. It showed delicate white flowers, minerals, some slight tropical fruit hints and some fresh ripe pear characters. Tight and sharp on the palette, the very low residual sugar and quite high acidity were just about kept in balance by the freshness of the varieties fruit, this wine is apparently aimed at the UK market. 83

Apparently one of the first things Doubourdieu did  on arrival at les Caves, was enquire as to whether they knew Riesling was an aromatic varietal, so often in their youth Alsatian Rieslings are somewhat mute and austere, which makes them rather hard to market to countries like the UK who are increasingly weaned on fruit salad bombs from the new world. Yes he understands that given a few years they can show fabulous complexity and tertiary development, but this is isn’t worth toffee if you’re trying to shift volume in a modern market.

Riesling Terroirs Reserve 2008, Alc 12.5%, Sugar 3g/l, T/A 10.1g/l, pH 3.00. This wine had a similar sugar : acidity balance, but much more body. Citrus, mineral nose, a tough of leesiness with a hint of peach, full bodied and very minerally with touched of citrus and mandarin peel. A slight roundness from the lees takes you to a direct and minerally finish (authors note – it’s worrying how much quite and shite look the same in my handwriting – as a shite minerally finish isn’t so nice). A good wine that’s very expressive of what Alsace can do, but it lacks the focus that single site and terroir specific Rieslings can bring. 85

Riesling Grand Cru Osterberg 2007, Alc 13%, Sugar 5g/l, T/A 7.35g/l, pH 3.15. West of Ribeauville, the Osterberg (East Hill) is an east facing slope with clay over limestone. The Ribeauville estate is in the centre of the hill. Citrus, rose petals, a touch of some exotic asian spice, very minerally. On the palette there is some ripe citrus characters intertwined with the creamy mineral core, all wrapped round a good core of acidity. The Osterberg had much lower acidity, and consequently was vinified to a lower level of residual sugar to maintain the balance of fruit and sweetness that Dubourdieu was aiming for. For me the wine showed exactly the kind of ripe exotic aromatic characters that speak of Riesling grown on a mainly clay terroir, exactly the kind of focus that was lacking in the terroirs selection. 88

Dubourdieu explained that what drew him to working in Alsace was getting to work with Riesling at the edge of it’s climatic range, as he feels that grape varieties do not express their full potential unless there is a degree of struggle in ripening them. This applies across the board, where it might be difficult getting full ripeness in Aglianico in southern Italy, Merlot achieves it far too easily, so it’s no surprise that Aglianico produces the better wines from the region.

We finished up with a quick tasting of the other Alsatian varieties.

Muscat Prestige 2008, Alc 12.5%, Sugar 7g/l, T/A 7.4g/l pH 3.2. Now I don’t normally like dry Muscat as it usually flatters to deceive with too much on the nose, then a disappointingly flat palette and a slight bitter finish. So I was intruiged to find Dubourdieu make reference to working to reduce the bitterness on the palette. On pressing he linked it to tannins in the white wine, which in turn were strongly linked to water stress in the vines. So in the vineyard they keep yields very low, remove the cover crops and plough the rows between the vines to increase Nitrogen availability for the vines. This is followed by gentle pressing and gentle handling in the winery to make a wine that keeps the aromatics but does so with a balanced and complete palette. Grapey, floral, elegant nose, showing crisp acidity, bright floral and slightly tropical fruit, but keeping a degree of continuity between expectation and delivery.

Pinot Blanc Vielle Vignes 2008, Alc 12.5%, Sugar 7g/l, T/A 7.75g/l, pH 3.05. Minty citrus , apples, quite delicate with a subtle dessert apple character. Lovely fresh applpyness on the palette with medium acidity and a delicate fresh apply finish.

Pinot Gris Prestige 2008, Alc 13.5%, Sugar 8g/l, T/A 8.1g/l, pH 3.10. Ripe exotically spiced apricots, a hint of minerals, on the palette some spiced peach and citrus, showing dryish.

Finally we looked at the Clos du Zahnacker 2008, Alc 14%, Sugar 7.5g/l, T/A 8.95g/l, pH 3.10. This is an extremely ancient spot of vineyard in the middle of the Osterberg, records going back to the 14th century record vines being planted here. Traditionally the site was interplanted, les Caves have continued this, so the Clos du Zahnacker is a field blend of Pinot Gris, Riesling and Gewurztraminer. Rather like Marcel Deiss they report that the ripening of the vines is all remarkably consistent between the varietals, though for the 08 the Pinot Gris was harvested a bit later, the grapes were all crushed then the must blended for fermentation. The site dips slightly in the centre giving a range of different aspects so the different varietals can all be placed in suitable expositions. The wine was complex showing at various moments, citrus, mineral, lees notes, apricots, and tropical fruits, with great length and a nice balance of acidity and fruit. 89.

Final words to Doubourdieu, (not quite exact) “Some of my famous colleges give advice to producers on how to produce Bordeaux in Bordeaux and to producers who want to produce Bordeaux style wines outside of Bordeaux, I’m interested in helping producers make the most of their regional varietals and styles.” Can you guess who he might have been talking about?Aromatic white wine tasting with Denis Doubourdieu and the wines of the Cave de Ribeauville:

 

So I spent a very enjoyable Monday afternoon over at the Bibendum offices in Chalk farm. First was a quick lunch with Valeria (our rep) and her good friend Mariela Molinari who’s the assistant winemaker at Bodegas Catena, which gave me a good opportunity to talk about tannins (a current sidetrack), and more specifically ask whether she knew of any research into the thorny issue of tannin, protein and lipids and their interactions – basically I’m looking for some sound science with which to base food and wine recommendations, as what seems currently to be the case is a lot of anecdotal evidence, and what I’m going to call the locality fallacy, i.e both food and wine come from very close to each other, there for they must complement each other. Now I’m aware that co-evolution of food and wine within a region would suggest that very tradition styles of wine might work, but my gut feeling is that given the changes wrought over the last decades even if this was the case it no longer really applies. Anyway, enough of my digressions.

Denis Doubourdieu is a very interesting person, a professor of Enology, and also a well travelled consultant. He’s particularly know for his work with aromatic white wines, growing up on the Sauternes Estate of Chateau Doisy Daene, sweet wine runs in his blood. But increasingly Doisy Daene Sec is the wine people get to know first, as he’s made it one of his tasks to get Bordeaux Sauvignon back on the map. You’ve probably tried at least the Dourthe no 1 white, which was one of his major commercial wines.

The aim of the tasting was to look at the relationship between sugar, acidity, and perceptible sweetness in wines, particularly apt as Doubourdieu has recently started working with les Caves de Ribeauville in Alsace, an area beset by issues of sugar and sweetness levels.

We started with a short flight of Doubourdieu’s Bordelais wines;

Chateau Reynon 2008, Alc: 12.69%, Sugar:0.9g/l, T/A:4.57g/l, pH:3.18. 100% Sauvignon Blanc grown on limestone covered with thick clay and matured in very large old oak barrels. A ripe nose some hay, lemons, hints of peach, quite elegant ripe fruit, underlain with some white bread notes (lees characteristics). The acidity in the wine was quite noticeable, but as was the ripe fruit on the palette giving an impression of sweetness but with effectively no residual sugar, oh and there was a lovely peach guava like finish. 82

Doisy Daene Sec 2007, Alc:12.5%, Sugar: 1.4g/l, T/A:4.85g/l. From Barsac, this is Sauvignon Blanc from a limestone base covered with very thin top soil, also this has seen 10% new oak. Slight grassy herbal character, white pepper and a touch of medium browned toast. A somewhat muscular palette, there is an interesting persistence of body to the wine, the ripe slightly peachy fruit working very well with the creaminess of the lees characters and the oak, the grassy character of the Sauvignon Blanc manifesting itself more as a peach skin scent, then a lime and peach finish. 84

Clos Floridene 2007, Alc: 13%, Sugar:1.7g/l, T/A:4.53g/l, pH:3.15. Clos Floridene is from just next to Doisy Daene, but the macro climate is somewhat cooler, also Clos Floridene has 50% Semillon, of which 30% sees new oak. Sticky apricots and a much more mineral tang. Very fresh and direct acidity with a real lemon citrus character, some ripe fruit but an odd stickiness to the fruit on the finish. 81

Clos Floridene 1998, Alc: 13%, Sugar: 1.4g/l, T/A 3.49g/l. This was shown to prove that well made wines can age, Dubourdeieu is of the opinion that so long as you don’t damage the wine in their youth, i.e. expose them to excess oxygen, whether through unnecessary fermentation times, of bad handling then they have the potential to age well. Bread, beeswax, and oxidative characteristics, citrus and some bruised apple notes. Still fresh acidity some fine tropical fruit notes mixed with a nutty brioche palette. Lengthy with a nutty and tight mineral finish. (not scored as it was more interesting than a serious drinking wine)

 

We then moved to a flight of Rieslings from les Caves Ribeauville, Ribeauville is pretty central in Alsace and is located pretty much at the heart of the geological fault that gives Alsace such a grab bag of different soils and terroirs. Les Caves themselves are the oldest coop in France having formed in 1895, and have been pretty forward looking ever since, taking things up a notch in the 90’s when they inaugurated their quality charter for members. No dusty wineries and disinterested semi peasant growers here.

Riesling Prestige 2008, Alc 12%, Sugar 3.5g/l, T/A 10g, pH 3.00. All were agreed that Prestige was a stupid name, as it wasn’t a tete du cuvee, but moving on, this was from a 10km spread and was sourced from the best parcels from their growers. It showed delicate white flowers, minerals, some slight tropical fruit hints and some fresh ripe pear characters. Tight and sharp on the palette, the very low residual sugar and quite high acidity were just about kept in balance by the freshness of the varieties fruit, this wine is apparently aimed at the UK market. 83

Apparently one of the first things Doubourdieu did  on arrival at les Caves, was enquire as to whether they knew Riesling was an aromatic varietal, so often in their youth Alsatian Rieslings are somewhat mute and austere, which makes them rather hard to market to countries like the UK who are increasingly weaned on fruit salad bombs from the new world. Yes he understands that given a few years they can show fabulous complexity and tertiary development, but this is isn’t worth toffee if you’re trying to shift volume in a modern market.

Riesling Terroirs Reserve 2008, Alc 12.5%, Sugar 3g/l, T/A 10.1g/l, pH 3.00. This wine had a similar sugar : acidity balance, but much more body. Citrus, mineral nose, a tough of leesiness with a hint of peach, full bodied and very minerally with touched of citrus and mandarin peel. A slight roundness from the lees takes you to a direct and minerally finish (authors note – it’s worrying how much quite and shite look the same in my handwriting – as a shite minerally finish isn’t so nice). A good wine that’s very expressive of what Alsace can do, but it lacks the focus that single site and terroir specific Rieslings can bring. 85

Riesling Grand Cru Osterberg 2007, Alc 13%, Sugar 5g/l, T/A 7.35g/l, pH 3.15. West of Ribeauville, the Osterberg (East Hill) is an east facing slope with clay over limestone. The Ribeauville estate is in the centre of the hill. Citrus, rose petals, a touch of some exotic asian spice, very minerally. On the palette there is some ripe citrus characters intertwined with the creamy mineral core, all wrapped round a good core of acidity. The Osterberg had much lower acidity, and consequently was vinified to a lower level of residual sugar to maintain the balance of fruit and sweetness that Dubourdieu was aiming for. For me the wine showed exactly the kind of ripe exotic aromatic characters that speak of Riesling grown on a mainly clay terroir, exactly the kind of focus that was lacking in the terroirs selection. 88

Dubourdieu explained that what drew him to working in Alsace was getting to work with Riesling at the edge of it’s climatic range, as he feels that grape varieties do not express their full potential unless there is a degree of struggle in ripening them. This applies across the board, where it might be difficult getting full ripeness in Aglianico in southern Italy, Merlot achieves it far too easily, so it’s no surprise that Aglianico produces the better wines from the region.

We finished up with a quick tasting of the other Alsatian varieties.

Muscat Prestige 2008, Alc 12.5%, Sugar 7g/l, T/A 7.4g/l pH 3.2. Now I don’t normally like dry Muscat as it usually flatters to deceive with too much on the nose, then a disappointingly flat palette and a slight bitter finish. So I was intruiged to find Dubourdieu make reference to working to reduce the bitterness on the palette. On pressing he linked it to tannins in the white wine, which in turn were strongly linked to water stress in the vines. So in the vineyard they keep yields very low, remove the cover crops and plough the rows between the vines to increase Nitrogen availability for the vines. This is followed by gentle pressing and gentle handling in the winery to make a wine that keeps the aromatics but does so with a balanced and complete palette. Grapey, floral, elegant nose, showing crisp acidity, bright floral and slightly tropical fruit, but keeping a degree of continuity between expectation and delivery.

Pinot Blanc Vielle Vignes 2008, Alc 12.5%, Sugar 7g/l, T/A 7.75g/l, pH 3.05. Minty citrus , apples, quite delicate with a subtle dessert apple character. Lovely fresh applpyness on the palette with medium acidity and a delicate fresh apply finish.

Pinot Gris Prestige 2008, Alc 13.5%, Sugar 8g/l, T/A 8.1g/l, pH 3.10. Ripe exotically spiced apricots, a hint of minerals, on the palette some spiced peach and citrus, showing dryish.

Finally we looked at the Clos du Zahnacker 2008, Alc 14%, Sugar 7.5g/l, T/A 8.95g/l, pH 3.10. This is an extremely ancient spot of vineyard in the middle of the Osterberg, records going back to the 14th century record vines being planted here. Traditionally the site was interplanted, les Caves have continued this, so the Clos du Zahnacker is a field blend of Pinot Gris, Riesling and Gewurztraminer. Rather like Marcel Deiss they report that the ripening of the vines is all remarkably consistent between the varietals, though for the 08 the Pinot Gris was harvested a bit later, the grapes were all crushed then the must blended for fermentation. The site dips slightly in the centre giving a range of different aspects so the different varietals can all be placed in suitable expositions. The wine was complex showing at various moments, citrus, mineral, lees notes, apricots, and tropical fruits, with great length and a nice balance of acidity and fruit. 89.

Final words to Doubourdieu, (not quite exact) “Some of my famous colleges give advice to producers on how to produce Bordeaux in Bordeaux and to producers who want to produce Bordeaux style wines outside of Bordeaux, I’m interested in helping producers make the most of their regional varietals and styles.” Can you guess who he might have been talking about?

Nicolas Potel, Savigny Les Beaunes, Les Charmeuses

I love Burgundian crus with names like les Charmeuses, they're completely see through in what they trying to convey, and yet quite appealing with it. 
I don;'t think I tried any Potel wines since back in Hotel du Vin days, but I seem to hear good thinggs about him, and it's quite lovely - delicate cherry floral notes, a pleasant freshness of acidity, a slight metallic note on the finish is the only slight downside.
However I am drinking it as a light lunchtime accompanyment, when in reality I ought to be thinking about breaking fast, possibly with a cup of tea, and settling in for a days worth of revision on ethical wines.
Funny how merely saying the phrase makes me want to beat several small dispossed ethnic minority infants into working frankly unsustainable work hours to produce wine for me. Hmmn, I might have to think about my attitute to work here.....

Saturday 25 April 2009

Eternum Vini

Well tonight was one of the easiest busy(ish) nights at work, everyone played along really well, the kitchen was pretty spot on and I got alot of stuff done on the wine list prepping for the stock take beforhand in the day, so all in all not too shabby.
Had a bottle of Eternum Vini Toro red from Johnny at Bancroft to taste, 100% Tempranillo which we opened at about 7.30ish.
However the tasting not might have tp wait till I'm less shattered and more capable of writing.

Friday 17 April 2009

Apsley Gorge Pinot Noir 05

A little present from Francoise at Justerini and Brooks, a nice maturish Tasmanian Pinot Noir, showing a nose of framboise and slightly sweet herbs. On the palette there is a nice bitter red fruit character and some nice weight, elegant with a nice length and none of the soupyness that sometimes marrs new world pinots (though I appreciate that this rarely occurs from the Tasmanian examples).
What I'm liking is that it's sowing a bit of maturity, probably hasn't got lots and lots of life left - but it should be a treat with the confit duck that's just on the way for me.
Now then with the confit canard it was rather nice. The crispy duck shin really setting off the left over red fruit characters. However it did start to show a little bit too much heat on the finish. Leading me to check and yep - 14% alc, something that my current heavy exposure to french reds really leaves me cold.