Now Trending:
Home
A reasonably heroic evening

A reasonably heroic evening

4 April 2008 Australia, Bordeaux, Burgundy, General drinking, Germany, Rhône, Sub-interest wine 2 Comments

Well, we’ll be eating steak tartare, and drinking all that is listed below.

Puligny-Montrachet Premier Cru Clavoillon 2001, Domaine Leflaive

This smells really toasty, with round, buxom lemony fruit there. It is really creamy and mineral. Smells, perfectly balanced between youth and maturity. The palate is really fat and full-bodied, but has great fruit and lovely acidity. The balance is simply superb. It is incredibly complex, really long and screaming with style. This is tests-good white Burgundy, really excellent.

Riesling Auslese Bernkasteler Doctor 1996, Dr. Thanisch (Erben-Thanisch) Auction Wine

Dead, bereft of life it rests in peace. If I hadn’t pulled its cork it would be pushing up the daisies.

Riesling “Polish Hill” 2006, Grosset

Well, Vosne-Romanee Premier Cru les Malconsorts 2005, Hudelot-Noellat

A lovely nose of spicy fruit and earthiness, it is multi-dimensonal and terribly interesting. The fruit is really tasty and there is real exotic class. The palate is very silky and svelte with layers of intense fruit which is really lovely. There is soily richness and real depth of character. This is a really excellent bottle of very young Burgundy, but hey, sometimes very young Burgundy is a lovely thing.

Chateau Montrose 1999

Fuck me, it is fucking claret. I fucking hate fucking claret. It smells of dirty cedarwood, like some tired out old fart. The palate is hard and dry, with a lot of nasty, astringent tannins. This is positively vile. I hate it.

Hermitage 1997, Domaine Jean-Louis Chave

A truly amazing nose of dark fruit, undergrowth, earth, pepper and probably many other things if I wanted to write a note like Robert Parker. This smells divine, complex and classy, refined and completely lovely. Quite forward and ready to be tackled. The palate has a very silky, very refined tannic structure, interlaced with lovely, lovely fruit. Ir is perfectly balanced and all the flavours are really harmonious. This is really delicious, completely fantastic, wow
Tweet Share Pin it

Related Posts

About The Author

Davy Strange

I am a very charming loony, supremely well-endowed with epidemiology and wine qualifications, who has finally found that severe PTSD, Generalised Anxiety Disorder and chronic psychosis are, on one of my all too rare good days, only a moderate impediment to having crazy fun with wine and food. Fifth top red trouser wearer in the international wine trade.

2 Comments

  1. edwardtully 6 April 2008

    steak tartare with that? Goodness. Gone off it myself. I’d rather have very rare hamburger. Must be losing it. And your anti-claret prejudice is becoming tiresome!

  2. Peter 6 April 2008

    Thanks guys. The two Burgundies were two of the loveliest wines I have had in a long time. The Leflaive was perfectly balanced, wonderfully complex, with all its elements, oak, acid, toastiness, citrus friut, perfectly integrated – absolutely delightful.
    The Malconsorts was pure pleasure. Sometimes I feel – perhaps age is making me jaded – that tasting wines becomes an intellectual exercise, in which we list the reasons why a wine is good or not. This wine reminded me of how beautiful Burgundy is. Intense and complex, one could get carried away with adjectives. But most of all, it was just lovely, endlessly enjoyable. Silky and velvety, a wine without rough edges. It is a wine to make an old git feel optimistic again.
    The Polish Hill was just boring. Lots of acidity, but lacking character either of the grape or of any terroir. No joy in it whatsoever. Riesling should be much nicer than this. Maybe it was an interesting, if bizarre, experiment to drink this with steak tartare. Not a combination to be repeated, however.
    The Montrose was disappointing, it’s true. However, I think David enjoyed having an opportunity to rant against Claret again.