Archive for the ‘burgundy’ Category

Pernand-Vergelesses, Vallet Frères, 2009

Monday, April 15th, 2013

A good test of expensive Burgundy wines (white or red) is whether they go with beans on toast.

I paid Virgin Wines £23.99 for this Pernand-Vergelesses, gulp…. If you join one of the opaque monthly payment schemes, you can make it cheaper. Personally, I’m sick of trading £20 per month for a “discount” on wines, so I have stopped all such accounts (including Virgin) and I am sticking to retailers with simple principles: Join up, look at the website, decide whether to buy, secure in the knowledge that you can nearly always find a competitor price in the event of lingering doubt.

P-V Vallet Freres and a remote control...for some reason.

Clearly meeting the expensive moniker, this Vallet Frères is rounder than a grapefruit, zingier than a grapefruit, and fruitier than a grape. This is important because to stand up to the shock and awe of (Branston) baked beans requires a good slug of fruit, gentle tannins and battery like acidity. Tick. Tick. Tick.

BRING OUT THE BRANSTON!

Is Chablis Grand Cru worth the extra?

Friday, March 1st, 2013

Hosting a dinner party? Got a few sample bottles that you’ve been meaning to taste for ages? Want to follow up an amateurish and inconclusive post on Grand Cru Chablis? A perfect storm for a blind tasting. The brief is simple: take a Chablis Villages, a Premier Cru, and a Grand Cru and see if there is a meaningful, that is to say pecuniarily justified, difference. All wines were from the 2010 vintage.

Usual suspects - Chablis line up

The bottles, elegantly disguised in blue carrier bags whose former contents were the meat for tonight’s main course, looked like three prisoners in front of a firing squad. As the wino of the party, to be blunt, I could feel the rifles aiming in my direction. I was papping myself. Here are my notes in the order we tasted.

Wine 1: fruity but full bodied,very smooth and tastes well oaked. Not so much flinty steely pebbles as rich plummy apricot and honey. I’m guessing this is the GC
Wine 2: bit steelier but lovely acidity, not oaky. Grassy more than fruity and a little bit of afterburn in the throat. This is probably the Villages.
Wine 3: appley, some flint, quite rounded – I think this is the PC.

Wine 1 in the centre of the podium turned out to be Christian Moreau Chablis Grand Cru Les Clos, a deserved winner but at a price. Imported by Thorman Hunt & Co the RRP is £33.80.

Wine 2, on the right, is Vincent Dampt Chablis and a bronze medal winner which might explain the difficulty in differentiating it from the Premier Cru. Corney & Barrow do this at £13.95.

Wine 3 is the Premier Cru, this one a Christophe & Fils, Fourchaume that is imported by A & B Vintners and the RRP is £14.58.

The main conclusion to be drawn is that a blind tasting livens up a dinner party and focuses people’s attention on the wine. It’s a lot of fun. The consensus was that Grand Cru Chablis clearly stood out and is worth the extra for special occasions. Telling the difference between the Villages and the PC was very difficult and the scores were split, which is reflected in the close price range, to be fair.

So, that may be another amateurish analysis, but at least this time, it’s conclusive.

Tesco Finest Chablis, 2011

Tuesday, December 4th, 2012

Are you a bit snooty about supermarket wines? I am, but I shouldn’t be. After a warm experience with a couple of Asda whites recently, I was intrigued enough to attend a Tesco wine tasting where this Chablis stood out from the “Finest” range.

Steely, minerally Chardonnays from this northern Burgundy region can occasionally taste like putting your tongue across the poles of a 9v battery. Conversely, on opening, this one is full of soft ripe peachy fruit, a bit too soft. But, as the wine warms (best left out of the fridge for about an hour before drinking) the fruit starts sucking on a black Welsh beach pebble. Not at all over-acidic, very classy and smooth and, as a result, better with roast pork than seafood.

If you shop at Tesco, you might be interested in the code XXH4H4 which, when entered into the Tesco website before Dec 31, 2012, will get you a “no strings attached” £5 discount from a case of wine of your choice.

Have a rethink about supermarket wines, some are better than two slaps across the thigh with a wet kipper from the fish stand. Depending on your sexual persuasion, arguably much, much, better.

Camus-Bruchon, Les Pimientiers, Savigny-lès-Beaune, 2006

Sunday, October 28th, 2012

Tipped off by Bob Tyrer, I mined The Wine Society for a “bargain bin-end”: Camus-Bruchon Savigny ‘Les Pimientiers’ from ancient vines, but a drink-up date of 2012.

The quid is a heavily discounted price of £14.95. But what is the pro quo?

If you are a red Burgundy aficionado, you will probably love this: Composty, full of fruit, chicken shit, and with ‘bright acidity’ (whatever that means). But I thought it tasted just a smidgen sharp and a little old. Nothing technically wrong. Just better stuff around to drink at this price.

I have two more bottles, so maybe I’ll change my mind next time. That’s the beauty of wine. Every bottle’s taste varies depending on the ageing, the environment you drink in, the temperature, the glass etc etc. I carried this bottle across the Irish Sea to drink with hummus, cured meats, veg and breads from Dublin’s premier supermarket, Superquinn. The food was disappointing to put it mildly. There’s a Tesco down the road from my mother-in-law’s. Next time I’ll try that for dips, with meat from Michael Dolan in Finglas Village, and veg from Ciaran’s rustic and adorably amateur greengrocer up near Dunne’s. If I bring the same wine, I’m convinced I’ll enjoy it a little more.

I guess Bob placed a bulk order because the bin has ended, but you can get the 2009 from The Wine Society at £22.

Pernand-Vergelesses, Domaine Rollin, 2007

Sunday, September 16th, 2012

I’ve had many warm intimate moments with 2007 white Burgundy. This is another sexy beast. Rich and buttery, it brings to mind one of those glazed fruit tarts that are rarely found outside high end French Patisseries. Almost certainly involving blackberries – I found myself picking imaginary seeds from my gums.

Wine Society £18.50. Not cheap, but one for that L’Oréal moment.

Hedone, Chiswick, London

Tuesday, September 11th, 2012

Listening to old Genesis albums on Spotify is a good way of reminding oneself that simple things, done well, rarely disappoint. There wasn’t an enormous amount of complexity in Genesis’ soft 1970’s rock, but every musician (yes, even Phil Collins, doyen of French Europop radio) was packed with talent and, if the quality of the anthemic melodies are anything to go by, spent many hours learning their craft. And yet, whilst Trick of the Tail, for example, sounds like it is mixed on old chipped plates and rusty frying pans, and the electronic keyboards were played inside an old Heinz Beans can, it has stood the test of time simply because the ingredients are first class, and orchestrated with skill and care. You sometimes feel concern for the band’s collective mental health, but only in an English eccentric perfectionist sort of way.

Hedone - pleasuredome

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Chablis, 1er Cru, Domaine Collet 2009

Wednesday, August 15th, 2012

From Domaine Collet et fils comes this interesting Chablis, 1er Cru Vaillons “Sécher”. 2009 RRP £21.

Wowzers, I thought Chablis was supposed to be steely, flinty, dry and crisp. This is smooth and buttery honey albeit with an appealing apple sourness.

The normally reliable Wine Searcher iPhone app couldn’t locate a British stockist but I understand it’s available from posh importer, Marc Fine Wines, living up to their claim that they service the on-trade with wines that can’t be sourced elsewhere in the UK. I hope you stumble across it at your local restaurant.

If you do, it’s probably better paired with cheese or chicken than shellfish. Les bourgognes recommend drinking at 10-11 degrees, so ignore restaurant advice,and take it out of the ice bucket if it is served straight from the blast chiller.

Drink up your wines before you die (or they do)

Monday, July 30th, 2012

Buying wine for laying down is fraught with problems. Aside from the financial investment, and whether it would have actually been cheaper to buy that 1990 claret when you wanted to drink it, rather than cellar it away for 25 years in the hope it’s not oxidised or corked, the storage is a bit of a pain. Also, not all wines age well. In fact, very few should be drunk more than 5 years or so after the vintage date.

I’ve found this out to my cost in a recent exploration and dredging of the nether regions of my wine rack and combine harvester. Over a period of at least four weeks, every alternate bottle has been used to clean the sink rather than rinse my liver. An expensive mistake.

There have been some pleasant surprises. For example, a 2002 Labouré-Roi Meursault tasted of fresh pineapple and lemon despite a recommended drink-by date of 2008.

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Dujac, Morey-saint-Denis, 2006

Thursday, April 19th, 2012

If you are ever in Manchester and fancy a decent glass of wine, Hanging Ditch is my recommendation. The only negative is that, even in this alco-city, where poor restaurants barely survive next to pubs, bars, lounges and drinking dens, Hanging Ditch has the temerity to close at 8pm, even on big nights. On the plus side, they know their wines and you can enjoy a wee glass in their tiny premises largely undisturbed whilst one of the guys advises you how to spend your hard-earned wedge on Burgundies, Albariños and Godellos. At least, that is what I was persuaded to walk out with on a recent visit that included a whopping £40 for this Morey-St-Denis.

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Charmes-Chambertin, Armand Rousseau, 1995

Wednesday, March 14th, 2012

I’ve had mixed experiences with different vintages of this wine. For example the 1996 was not great, and the 1998 was OK but not worth the money.

The oldest of the batch I bought from the Wine Society was a 1995, advised to be drunk by 2011. Oops. It’s 2012. Better get the corkscrew! But, at £80 a bottle, will it be charming siren or a case of more chafing dissonance?

I found this wine totally awesome. Stewed strawberries with a touch of balsamic and that classy composty nature. Burgundy wine is so frustrating because so many bottles disappoint, but when it excels – WOOHOO! It’s like you won the lottery on the same day as Sharon Stone turned up on your doorstep in that little white dress.

Although this is a fine wine, it matches simple food. Bangers and mash (no gravy) is a highly recommended pairing.