A great night with truly great wines
I’d organised a small dinner at Sojourn in east Balmain last night as an excuse to drink Cam’s bottle of Bollinger Vieilles Vignes Francaises 1989.
As people began to find out about it, it turned into a more significant event. By 7:30pm last night, there were eight of us: myself, Gen, Neville, Danny, Cam, Mark AS, dy123 and Fred.
I’d asked Neville to field an aperitif champagne to warm us up before the Bollinger. He selected well: a Dampierre Family Reserve 1996. This was a very light, approachable wine. Toasty, autolytic aromas, then linden, citrus and apple. I found it a little oxidative on the nose as well and this came to the fore with time. The palate had beautiful balanced acidity, different and softer than other ’96s. Drink now or over the next few years.
Cam had the Bollinger Vieilles Vignes Francaises 1989 poured. I could write a page about this wine. It confused and challenged me. Firstly, it’s quite a deep amber colour. The nose needed considerable time to resolve after being poured, about 25 minutes in the glass. Then, it was extremely complex, with aromas rarely seen in champagne: earth, tea, baking crab shells, soy sauce, five spice, lots of truffle, wild berries and more. The palate is not overpowering. It has a soft, fine texture, luxurious and long. I’m surprised by the maturity of the wine and it’s frankly peculiar flavours. It’s difficult to say whether such a wine is enjoyable or even made for an emotion so simple as pleasure. Undoubtedly impressive but you cannot drink it as champagne. A real learning experience.
It was time for a change of pace, so I opened a Raveneau Butteaux 2002. I really love this producer, he makes Chablis in the old fashion way and it always humbles me. The nose is rich and complex with oysters, iodine, a suggestion of oak. The smell of a desolate, windy beach head! The palate has texture. That is why Raveneau is amazing. I feel it on my tongue, it’s like the texture of a red wine! It is long and complete in the mouth without any overpowering acidity. This will be a great wine in four years or so.
We then had another white, a Remoissenet Chassagne-Montrachet “La Romanee” 1995. I was impressed by this wine because I’ve never seen the Montrachet influence so strong on a Chassagne premier cru wine before. Fred tells me that Remoissenet was looking for that Montrachet like match stick and weightiness and it seems he got a bit of it. The palate is well structured and long, a really good example of white Burgundy. Not as good as the which came next, however.
Facing some pressure from the table, Cam reached for a bottle of a wine we all have come to love, the Bonneau du Martray Corton-Charlemagne 1986. There is no way to describe just how much I enjoyed this wine. This is an elegant, regal wine. The nose has honeysuckle, flowers, earth, a touch of vanilla. It is soft, confident in itself. When you put your nose over the glass, there is not a blast of aroma, just a subtle breath of perfume. The palate, for me, approaches perfection for a white wine. It is long, powerful but not weighty. It finds its way through your mouth an almost imperceptible lightness and subtlety. Once swallowed, you are left with a warm sense of inner joy, as when you part from a beautiful, honest person who has filled you with hope about the World. How can wine be this good?
While we’d been swooning over these wines, two Burgundies had been sitting in decanters close by. The first was a Rousseau Clos St. Jacques 1998. This wine defied its birth year, show casing the greatness of this vineyard and the producer. The nose was complex but expressive, with coffee, Vosne-like spiciness, cherries and blackcurrants, a smell of raw meat and rhubarb leaves the only thing which places this in Gevrey. These wines smell so much as if they come from further down the Cote! The palate is soft, almost resolved. Long, well structured, drinking well now. Not for the long term but a great example of Rousseau.
The second Burgundy was a Domaine Comte Georges de Vogue “Bonnes Mares” 1996. This was a very different wine to the Rousseau. The wine was opened at 5pm and was probably at its peak around midnight! The nose changed significantly. At first, it was soft, with aromas of wild berries and a hint of unripe plum. Then, it became floral. Later, there was coffee and fennel. Finally, candied red currants and rhubarb! All the time you got the sense that this wine is barely restrained by the glass and yet the colour was light and feminine. Such is the infinite variety of Burgundy! The palate needed food. The acid was noticeable, but with food it refreshed you and paced your eating! The tannins were austere, again, needing rich winter food — which luckily, was on hand. The finish was surprisingly long and complex. It pervaded the senses after swallowing. Like the Bollinger, a challenging, complex wine.
It was time to move into Bordeaux territory for yet more surprises. First up was Chateau Ducru Beaucaillou 1982. I am still amazed at the youthfulness of these ’82s. This wine was purple in colour. Is it possible that I actually know nothing about wine? Like other wines of the night, the nose on this was very elegant with raspberry, blackberry, cedar, graphite. Definitive example of St. Julien. It sits perfectly between Paulliac and Margaux. The palate too is impressively youthful, juicy and yet subtle, long and beautiful. A great wine.
Next to this was Chateau Mouton Rothschild 1988. Very tight on the nose, despite a few hours of breathing, all smoke, chalk, clay, crushed granite. With time, it showed some more with jasmine tea (very Mouton) and dried cranberries. The palate was very austere with lots of drying tannins. Despite the depth of experience at the table, we had to wonder whether this wine had the fruit to make it worth waiting for the tannin to resolve. I don’t know, but I’d love to try it again in ten years.
The final red of the evening was a Tenuta dell Ornellaia 1995 from Bolgheri. This was a little volatile on the nose, perhaps a little too warm. I got the typical Ornellaia richness though: violets, earth, juicy cherries but with the savoury complexity of hay and spice. I’m amazed at how different this wine is to the Bordeaux. The palate is concentrated and powerful. The wine drinks well now but needs even more time to resolve.
Finally, we had a Domaine Zind Humbrecht Tokay Pinot Gris “Rotenberg” Vendange Tardive 1994. This was ready to go straight out of the bottle. Rich, raisined complexity to the nose. Fred said ‘old tea pots’. There’s something different about pinot gris in Alsace, I think it’s a smell of gelatin. The palate was oily with very noticeably acidity to balance the sweetness. A long finish reveals mandarin, apricot and some cinnamon spice. Too late, we concluded that this wine is more suited to a rich dish at the beginning of the meal, like foie gras. A good wine but not the refreshing bottle I needed at the end of such a long night.
The food accompanying these wines was outstanding. There is enthusiasm, attention to detail and presentation. There were always little things on the plate to discover, bursts of flavour to contrast other elements of the dish. A dish of veal was accompanied by a cannelloni of braised bortelli beans. No one would have noticed their absence, but we were all impressed for their having been thought of. I would strongly recommend lovers of food to visit.
