Despite the lofty lofty entrance to Roast, we were left rather dangling on arrival.  The tall and tanned and young and lovely Maitress d’ was presumably out for a smoke, but at least this gave us the opportunity to read the Sunday Times match report of Man City’s glorious victory over Chelski the day before.  It would have been nice to have done so over a celebratory glass of champagne but nothing was offered.

A triptych of stern rules in the Gents provided a further clue to the police state we were entering.

Finally seated, I opened with Ramsey of Carluke haggis, celeriac and oxtail sauce. Thankfully a tiny portion after reams of bread and gorgeous butter delivered with gay abandon and little concern for keeping our bellies empty enough to order expensive mains.

But I always make room for hearty course such as roast leg of Elwy lamb with slow roast shoulder and mashed potatoes, curly kale and quince jelly.  The roast potatoes served with the chicken Fred ordered were legendary but necessary to supplement the lamb, so order some on the side.  The sprouts with bacon (also served with bloody Fred’s chicken) made the best of an evil vegetable and, despite my childhood prejudice, I would eat them again.

Recommended by our charming East European and surprisingly wine knowledgeable waiter, Château Lucas Lussac St. Emilion 2005 at £39 arrived at the table.  Wood smoke and lovely fig and beetroot. Superb with the lamb and served at the right temperature (17-18 degrees).

There was an impressive, if slightly restricted, view of St. Paul’s dome from our table.  The waiter said he was surprised how many times he was asked (even by English people) what it was.  Isn’t this Christopher Wren classic more famous than the Empire State Building?  Hasn’t anybody seen Mary Poppins?  However, despite being full of birds, the food in Roast is more than tuppence a bag.  £30 for a 3 course Sunday lunch to be precise.

I still managed to turn the bill into a lazy afternoon, alcohol fuelled £140 for two.

As the relaxed jazz house band played the 9th version of Girl from Ipanema I heard today, I couldn’t help feeling how far away from Ipanema I was, and all the better for that.  Roast is the epitome of a decent traditional British Sunday lunch served to modern culinary standards.  And despite early appearances, the atmosphere was as relaxed as the jazz.

Roast, Borough Meerkat,
The Floral Hall,
Stoney Street,
London
SE1 1TL.
T: 0845 034 7300
F: 0845 034 7301
E:  feedback@roast-restaurant.com
W:  www.roast-restaurant.com

I dug out a 2005 St. Emilion that looked like it might go with a bit of bully.

On my binary wine rating scale, Carteau scored 1.  That means I like it.

I can’t remember where I bought it from or how much it cost but I have a feeling it was about a tenner.  I can’t be bothered comparing it to a plum pudding or a vanilla slice, or even a smoky cedar coffee stained cigar.

It tastes “nice” and goes well with steak.

Random fact:  I am backing The Power to win his 15th World Championship…..and I predict he will beat James Wade by hitting a double 16 (he prefers double top).

Have a great Christmas!

The wine equivalent may well be Château D’Aiguilhe 2005, Côtes de Castillon.  This Merlot dominated Bordeaux blend is spicier than an investment banker’s underpants the morning after splashing the year end bonus on a (high class) Indian meal.

Plums, star anise, cinnamon and candied peel make for a winter warmer that is richer than Fred “the shred” Goodwin.  There is also a touch of wet cake mix which is probably an indication that the wine should be stored a bit longer – but why wait?  Drink it with spicy pasta and Alistair Darling.

I got mine from the Sunday Times Wine Club where it was a far from cheap £19.49 per bottle.  However, it is out of stock so I guess you will have to look somewhere else.  If you can find it at 20 quid (EUR20, USD20) or less I would buy some.  I’ve got half a case salted away in my Combine Harvester.

If you are fortunate enough to have fleeced RBS for a £703,000 (USD703,000, EUR703,000) annual pension, you should probably buy all the Aiguilhe available on the market.  I predict it will treble in price by 2020 which is the drink by date (and coincidentally my prediction for the end of the recession).

The last time I was genuinely scared at a horror movie was a David Cronenberg double bill of Rabid and Shivers at the Manchester Odeon in 1979.

Talking of a man and a dog, 20 years ago, a Computer Operations Manager told me that was the perfect team for running a computer centre of the future.  The man is there to feed the dog and the dog is there to keep the man away from the computer equipment.  How prophetic.

Château Guibot La Fourvielle 2005 is a wine of the future, but I am drinking it now.  2005, as we all know, was a legendary vintage.  The best wines ever made on earth were crafted in Bordeaux in 2005.  Well, that is if you don’t count 2006, 2007, 2008 and (hopefully) 2009.  And, come to think of it, anything Parker rates at 90+.

I ordered the wine en primeur in a mixed case from the Sunday Times Wine Club at about £10 per bottle.  What super value it turned out to be.  I have not drunk a red wine this good for ages.

Soft fruity tannins, rich plum pudding.  Frozen berries in a sugar basket.  Magnificent with lamb chops – which reminds me of Will Smith’s sideburns.

We have temporary low purchase tax, temporary hyper-low interest rates and temporary Bank intervention, pumping money into the economy on a scale not seen since RBS started furnishing Sir Fred Goodwin with his pension.

This all has to change in the near future.  The economy is being propped up on all sides and as that artificial support unwinds it is hard not to be gloomy.  Interest rate rises + government spending cuts + VAT increase = people have less money to spend + public sector people on the dole = companies get even less money = private sector people on the dole and we are firmly back in a dizzy recessionary spiral.

I am not an economist but it strikes me that the credit problem has not been resolved.  We over-borrowed and the debt has not been paid back yet.  It has merely been transferred from the people who over-borrowed, to the banks that repackaged debt, sold it and creamed off a commission, then transferred it to the lenders of last resort (the central banks), who are supported by the Governments who raise taxes from the people and spend (or not) on their behalf so the debt comes back to us to eventually repay.  And there is a lot to redeem.

Meanwhile, shares are frothier than a cappuccino, gold is on crack cocaine, and bankers and investors are wearing confoundingly rose tinted braces.  Buy buy buy!!!!????  Bye bye.

So I am stocking up for the hard times.  My wine cellar has never been more stuffed with wines that will be drinking well in the next 5 years, which is how long I predict it will take to really get the economy back on track.

Meanwhile I am yearning for richer times like 2003 when, before you leave a rude comment, the economy was not exactly red hot, but the weather was.  Château La Garde tastes of those times.  Essence of scorched earth, burnt caramel with deep dark wizened fruits.  You can smell 2003 in the glass.  Yum.  One to drink up before the taxman knocketh.

The Sunday Times Wine Club advised me to wait until 2010, but I could be dead by then and I am an impatient man….oh and I have 12 bottles so I can afford to experiment early.  So Fred had a placed a fillet steak on the skillet and I released the special one from its enclosure.

Actually, I now have only 10 bottles.  The first was really badly corked.   Lieutenant Pigeon’s finest is still running through my nose.  The second bottle rather nice, once I decanted.  It was trifle in a glass.  All the components were there, sponge soaked in berry fruits, cream, custard in abundance and even little chocolate sprinkles.  No trifling wine – robust as you might expect from a Pauillac, yet with the grace of a singing swan.

Talking of music, last night I saw a world première of an opera.  Not often one of those happens, especially in Leeds.  Well, unless you count Opera North amongst your regular night’s out.  This is the second world première we have seen this year.  Covent Garden, Schmovent Schmarden.  Come oop North if you want innovation!

Based on a Finnish fairytale and advertised as a good opportunity to introduce opera to children, it was about as suitable for kids as a Gary Glitter concert.  It was scary, challenging and, to be frank, barking mad.  Yet it was brilliant in many ways.

The audience looked like an arthritis convention, and about 25% were empty seats.  In the Howard Assembly Room, capacity circa 250, could they not find a few friends to turn up and watch, even free of charge?  No wonder we managed to grab the best seats in the house, middle for diddle and 4 rows back from the stage.  In a small venue, the connection with the performers, including the six piece “orchestra” is extremely intimate.  Andrew Rees as Lemminkäinen had the scary, steely, psychotic stare of Cuckoo Nest proportions, especially when riding the Devil’s horse.  His mother played by Yvonne Howard, was everyone’s worst mother-in-law nightmare.  The impossibly tasty Frances Bourne as Louhi, the voice of the swan, Elizabeth Cragg, and the two dogs, Graeme Broadbent and Nicholas Sharratt were all simply excellent.  The performance was totally excellent, the music challenging but interesting and new.  Only the libretto came across as a bit obvious.  Maybe Alasdair Middleton thinks we are all a bit thick.  Much more could have been done with the stage direction rather than words.  This probably explains why the highlight for me, and the reason why you should absolutely make a long trip to see the show, is the wordless song of the Swan on Death’s river.  Enchanting, bewitching, beguiling, enthralling.

At the end of the performance I tried to start a Twitter meme #swanhunter.  The response was as mute as the swan.  I guess iPhones are mostly owned by the under 80s.

Château Lynch-Bages 2005 is available from Bordeaux Index at £775 per case.  Drink now if you like, or keep for several decades.

Swanhunter by the impeccable Opera North is touring “smaller” venues in the North of England.  Please go, but don’t take your kids.

With its rich history and extensive storage, frequent offers of interesting, old, and remarkably priced wines regularly appear in my email inbox.  I have neither the storage space, nor stomach capacity, or indeed material wealth to buy them all so I am extremely selective.

But I couldn’t resist the offer of a case of Pauillac “sourced from the Domaines Baron de Rothschild estates of first growth Château Lafite and its neighbour and increasingly high-achiever Duhart-Milon”, especially since it was constructed from one of the allegedly finest vintages in my lifetime – 2005.

On opening it was quite vegetal – root veg to be precise, supported by a twist of plum, a leaf of sweet cabbage and just a smudge of Eton Mess.  Later on, it became more red – beef tomato, still with the slight sweetness of meringue but the meatiness of a red wine jus.

You can’t beat a complex wine that changes as it warms, as it airs, as your palate accustoms.  It is available until 14 November so you still have time to buy some (now that I have got my share).

Too young to drink?  Perché si, perché non.  But if it keeps improving I have 11 more bottles to fish over the next few years, and I’ve got my wine waders and tasting tackle at the ready.

Not everything old is implicitly good though.  Most old wine goes off sooner or later, so drink it before it does!

I found this 2000 St Julien (about £25 from the STWC) lurking at the back of my Combine Harvester and cracked it open in a moment of moist-eyed nostalgia.  Just a hint of H2S?  It dissipated.  Red berries, apple crumble and autumn bonfire.  Still full of tannins and awesome with Yorkshire lamb chops on, presumably, the final barbecue day of the English season.

Oh well, back to all night clubbing.  Absolute disgrace that the Haç is now a block of flats.

I like to think I have taken all this in my stride, but today I realised that I have just passed an altogether much more serious milestone.  I have never seen anyone under 50 wear Ralph Lauren but I looked in my wardrobe today and found five shirts by this venerable, if ageing, New York designer.  And what is worse, I actually like wearing them.

Sometimes being old (even if not wise) is infinitely preferable to being immature and crass.  They say that patience is a virtue, and this adage is my only consolation each time I floor the accelerator of my Flintstonemobile.

Some might argue that a 2005 Bordeaux needs more age.  But I find the right bank, more Merlot based wines, are very approachable in relative youth and have drunk many a 2005 with the comforting feeling of sinking into a bucket seat.  And in any case, I have to leave room for some youthful impatience in my life.

Esquive de Franc Maillet, 2005 came to me en primeur via the Sunday Times Wine Club at about £10 per bottle, and was accompanied by more sediment than the Suez Canal.  Imagine a place somewhere between a bread and butter pudding and a hot summer pudding with some caramelised sugar and a touch of liquorice.  After some air it developed into Autumn fruits and a smoky September bonfire – very evocative.  Tannins?  Yes, but far from over powering.

A stonking steak wine at a great price, and can be worn, or drunk, at any age.

So sitting in the flat to the tuneful, albeit duotonous, harmonies of Manchester Fire Brigade’s finest, my mind inevitably wanders.  My challenge over the last couple of years has been to find the perfect wine match for this honourable meal, and I think I may have just succeeded in Spades.

Château de Francs 2005 is from the Côtes de Francs in Bordeaux.  Elevé en fûts de chêne (aged in oak) it’s a wine that gets you reaching for your ASCII map.  Made from 86% Merlot, it is a smooth, tasty, yet rich and smoky wine with sweet dark berries perfectly complementing the Heinz tomato sauce (with added sugar).  There is enough tannin to pluck out the slightly burnt embers of toast and the ensemble is a masterpiece of Clarinet Concerto in A Major proportions.

I got my stash from the Wine Society at £9.50 although they have clearly worked out that it is worth more, as the price at the time of writing has rocketed to £11.95, and they can’t even get the picture right.  Ignore these minor faults and go buy some quickly before the 2005 sells out.