Corton and Montrose
Last night was time for a little bit of extravagance. I opened two pretty good wines.
The first was a Domaine Maratray-Dubreuil Corton-Bressandes (rouge) Grand Cru 2001. Classically Burgundian with plums, coffee, paprika, dried herbs. The palate was very dry with firm tannins and soft, mouth-filling fruit. The acid was high, the usual level for Corton. A good wine.
The second bottle was Château Montrose 1999. This was a less than stellar vintage but more approachable than the 2001 — the other option. Upon opening this wine was thin and I thought it might have rained especially hard over Montrose at vintage that year but 3 hours in the decanter saw it put on considerable weight. Already showing some secondary character, the nose was jammed full of dried meat, spice, smokey oak, a little brett and that characteristic St. Estèe wildness. The palate was medium bodied, soft and lingering — if a little lifeless.
I opened another bottle, a Château Cambon La Pelouse 2001 which is Cru Bourgeois in the Haut-Médoc. I’d been recommended this wine, having been told that it outshines Chasse-Spleen and others, particularly in 2001. Well, the old saying that the French can’t taste brett held true. Blind, this wine would almost always been picked as a Southern Rhône
The brett covered up a lot of the fruit so I poured it into a pot and made a (rather expensive) red wine and date sauce. This accompanied a rack of lamb with haricots verts wrapped in prosciutto and potatos.
