Sunday, May 27, 2012

Domaine Emmanuel Giboulot dinner, 19th May

The sports fans were certainly out in force last Saturday. Having encountered the boisterous Blackpool fans on the way to the vegetarian cookery class in the morning, it was my turn to meet the West Ham fans on the walk over to Marylebone for dinner. They surged past us in a flood of blue and burgundy stripes but seemed calm and I had no idea that their team had in fact won until someone told me afterwards. Occasionally they were intermingled with someone wearing a blazer and an MCC tie who we assumed had been to Lords for the cricket. It wasn't too difficult to tell the difference between the football fans and the cricket fans!

The occasion was a dinner organised by ACC under the auspices of the Burgundy Portfolio to taste the wines of Domaine Emmanuel Giboulot, one of my favourite producers. G and I arrived at the Perseverance and made our way upstairs where ACC greeted us with a glass of 2011 Terres Burgondes blanc. This was clearly very young and later it emerged that it had been in bottle for just two and a half months. It had high acidity and apparently was made from pinot beurot, not chardonnay. A few minutes later, to great excitement, a plate of gougeres emerged from the kitchen! These disappeared in approximately 0.003 seconds but it was early in the evening so my reactions were still lightning speed and I was able to get a photo in. 

Gougeres! But not as big as mine...

Eventually, after what sounded like a gruelling journey, Emmanuel himself turned up and we sat down to dinner. With the starter of rabbit and hazelnut terrine, we had the 2010 Cote de Beaune Combe D'Eve. This is made from chardonnay grapes, and was more my kind of thing! It had a lovely, rich nose and was big and complex yet still with the trademark Giboulot elegance. It's not cheap but it is seriously good white burgundy.

Although I've visited the domaine twice, the proceedings have been in French and I'm sure I've missed quite a lot of what Emmanuel said, but what has always come across has been his passion for winemaking and also his friendliness and warmth. This time we were fortunate to have both ACC and O to translate. Emmanuel explained that all of his wines are biodynamic (and there was some discussion of what that means exactly, which I won't go into here) and that he doesn't try to do the same thing every year, but aims to express the character of the vintage. 2010 was a challenging year - but this wine definitely delivered. I was delighted to discover I'd already got some on order, she says in a self-congratulatory tone.


Next up were some reds which accompanied a dish of roast charolais beef, baby onions, mushrooms, greens and dijon cream. Compliments to the chef on the beef which was fantastic. First we had the 2008 Terres Burgondes rouge and the 2010 Bourgogne Hautes-Cotes de Nuits "Sous le Mont". I bought a case of the 2008 Terres Burgondes which arrived a while back. G and I have probably had about half of it now, and discovered there is some variation in it - sometimes it's fresh and fruity, other times more earthy. This time I thought it had lively cherry fruit. Emmanuel apparently hadn't tried it for a while and said he liked its tartness.

I was very impressed with the Hautes-Cotes de Nuits which had been in bottle since September. I didn't make proper notes, but it seemed softer and perhaps more approachable than the Terres Burgondes, and I snaffled a case to tuck away.

Extremely runny Epoisses

The cheese course consisted of some excellently runny Epoisses. It was so good that Baron McG of Croque-Epoisses wondered afterwards whether there might be some more to be found somewhere (he has a separate Epoisses stomach and is used to putting away at least half a cheese in one go) but we decided not to attempt to raid the kitchen on this occasion. There was also a lengthy conversation about the meaning of "affine" and whether it means "maturing" or "washing" in marc de bourgogne in the case of Epoisses. One person said that it's "when it's so old that it goes runny" which seems quite plausible.
 
With the Epoisses we had the 2010 Beaune Lulune and the 2008 Beaune. Apparently the Lulune is up a hill and there was something about a Roman village fountain that was apparently highly significant but I missed why exactly. Anyway, it all sounds very romantic! This wine was light, delicate and pure and probably needed a few years. As for the 2008 Beaune, I have several bottles of it on the rack here at A de V Towers and it has been giving us a great deal of pleasure. It's a treat and definitely a wine to save for the weekend when we can give it a full couple of hours in decanter. 

I enjoyed the evening very much and it was great to have the man himself there to talk us through his wines. Thanks to ACC for organising it. Blogtastique!

Veggie cooking class at Claridges, 19th May

After enjoying last year's Summer Party Masterclass at Claridges, where we found out what were THE season's canapes and cocktails - I quote the promotional literature - Mum and I went on a vegetarian cooking class which was held last Saturday.

We met up at Euston where we survived a lively encounter with some Blackpool fans on their way to the Championship play-off final at Wembley (I had no idea who they were at the time, but have subsequently done my homework). They were clad in orange shirts singing "Where the fuck is Leicester Square?!" at the tops of their voices at 10.30 in the morning, so moving swiftly on we made our way to Brook Street for a quick whirl round Fenwicks before arriving at Claridges. Here we were shown through to the Foyer area for coffee and biscuits. There was no patisserie, which was a shame as I'd skipped breakfast to enable me to pig out on pain au chocolat. Oh well. We met the other people on the course - there were 7 of us altogether, including two blokes - and a lively conversation about bell-ringing ensued before we were whisked downstairs to the butchery room (the irony! but there was no meat in evidence) and seated round a rectangular table.

Once again the demonstration was given by Martin Nail, who's the head chef of Claridges. I remember being confused last year as the restaurant at Claridges is a Gordon Ramsay operation, but it's completely separate from the hotel kitchen and Martin isn't in the least bit shouty. There followed about three hours of lovely foodie discussion as various dishes were cooked in front of us. This included a demonstration of how to make a foam using a soda siphon, and the foamy pureed peas were indeed delicious. A lot of time was spent making pasta with a pasta machine, which was of less interest to me as there's no way I'll be making my own pasta in the near future, but it tasted jolly good. There was an opportunity for audience participation at this point but Mum and I preferred to watch, which was fine.

Throughout the various demonstrations, ingredients were passed round for us to look at, and occasionally a plate and teaspoon would appear and we would get to taste something. Martin gave us lots of tips and I made plenty of notes in the recipe booklet. I was interested to hear his experience of visiting Noma, who are coming to do a pop-up restaurant in Claridges for 10 days during the Olympics. I got an email about this a few weeks ago and G and I dithered about booking but eventually didn't - anyway, we wouldn't have got in because Martin said they were fully booked within an hour of the email going out. A snip at £195 per head!

After the demonstration, we were served lunch which was 2 courses with a glass of vino (a choice of red or white Rhone) plus coffee and petits fours. Eventually, aware that Dad was waiting for us, we made our excuses and left shortly before 5.00. Not a bad way to spend five and a half hours. Maybe it was because the mix of people was different and included some who had been to almost all the different classes, but this year the atmosphere seemed more relaxed and I was able to whip out my phone to get some photos.

Asparagus with almond puree (secret ingredient: amaretto!)

Aubergine tart with a courgette lattice - a real showstopper

Pasta thing with pea puree

Lunch is served!

Pudding

Petits fours (these weren't all for me, honest)


SPNS dinner, 18th May

Last weekend was one of those weekends where, after what seems like months of doing nothing in particular, suddenly there's a whirlwind of activity.

First up was the Swiss Pinot Noir Society which met at the Savile Club on 18th May. There were seven of us this time, as P's wife joined us, so we tasted more wines than usual, but had less of each.

We started with an Austrian sparkling red from P, called Strohmeier Rot Sekt. I have to hand it to P that he does come up with the strangest wines very much in the spirit of the Society! Unfortunately, red sparklers are not my bag and I only managed a couple of small sips before bailing out. The other verdicts were marginally more favourable but the similarity to fizzy Ribena was remarked upon and most found it interesting but not something they'd be particularly keen to have again. At least "undissolved paracetamol" was not mentioned this time!

Moving swiftly on, P presented a 2011 pedro ximinez from Chile. I wasn't the only one who had no idea that pedro ximinez came in a different style from the extraordinary sweet and gloopy sherry. For me, this was aromatic and went down a treat after the first wine (= it was cold and white!) but I suspect it was the sort of thing that would get boring after the first glass. D made an unusually sharp comment: "like a weak sauvignon blanc" and generally it was regarded as a little superficial but not bad. T said "This is fun; in the founding spirit of the SPNS". When P revealed that it cost less than £4 we were all pleasantly surprised.

We moved upstairs at this point to have dinner and it was on to the serious wines of the evening. First up was a Nuits St Georges 1er Cru Clos de la Marechale 2005 from Jacques-Frederic Mugnier, provided by ACC. I wasn't familiar with this producer but we could immediately tell that this was serious stuff, very classy, rich and quite heavy, with a great finish. Everyone rated it very highly and G and I both gave it a 10 - hurrah! The only debate was over whether it would improve with more time. P said it was infanticide to drink it now but my end of the table disagreed, feeling it was on the plateau and wouldn't get worse with age but wouldn't get better either. Quite honestly, I don't see how it could. Have just done some homework on Mugnier and see that a certain wine merchant has the 2008 for £69 - ouch. Thanks to ACC for sharing this with us!

Then there was a rose provided by T, from the Loire, called Les Nuages 2009. G and I both found peaches going on in this, and D got strawberries. It was unexpectedly fruity which led us to speculate that perhaps it wasn't actually pinot noir. P wrote something provocative in the book about rose wines being girly and pointless. He's entitled to his opinion but I don't agree.

Not very Chassagne
After that it was on to the reds, starting with my Chassagne-Montrachet 1er cru La Maltroie 1999 from Domaine Amiot. I got three bottles of this at auction and this was the last one. It was generally well-received but once again didn't seem very typical of Chassagne, being big and rich and with black fruit. Still only an 8.

Blockbuster!

D provided us with yet another rarity from the US, this time a 1996 Napa Valley Zinfandel called Edizione Pennino from Niebaum-Coppola. This reduced the usually loquacious T to a monosyllable - "Wow!" I found it lovely, soft and mature with big blackberry fruit. G said "an honour and a pleasure to drink" which sums it up very well. When are we going to raid D's cellar in the US?

Sadly, the Inverse Law of Labels did not apply in this case

Then we had G's wine, Smerenie 2009 from Romania.This claimed to be a mixture of shiraz, (syrah surely?), pinot noir and dornfelder. Perhaps the New World-isation of the grape name was a sign of things to come, as this was your typical "international" wine, completely failing to display any sense of terroir. It was also incredibly alcoholic and basically a headache in a glass. G wrote his comment in the book first and seemed to like it at that stage, but I think we all started to get diminishing returns quite quickly.

P provided a third wine, the hilariously-named "Rikiki - Elixir des Anges" which was apparently a 15% Julienas. Was this actually from Beaujolais? Once again, it was seriously weird, but interesting. "What the hell is that? Late harvest gamay? WTF?" wrote G. Some detected prunes and fruit jelly while I found it like Ribena with apple. We all thought it got better with time and chilling, and when T tried it with his blue cheese, that was declared to be a good combination. So, it grew on us, but whether it could ever be described as the elixir of angels is, frankly, debatable.

Finally, I'd brought along a bottle of Pacherenc de Vic Bilh but sadly this turned out to be corked, so it was just as well I'd brought the Chassagne too. I've noticed that the corked rate seems to be high for me at SPNS dinners - is it sod's law or just that I'm taking more risks than I usually would, in a hopeless attempt to beat D who always wins? Either way, memo to self to bring 2 bottles in future.

A mixed bag

My prizes of the evening: best white goes to ACC for the Nuits St Georges, best red goes to D (of course) for the Napa Valley Zin, and most in the spirit of SPNS goes to P for his trio of curiosities. A bientôt!

Tuesday, May 01, 2012

A random white and a cocktail


First, the random white - this was one of the mixed bag we got from the Wine Society a few weeks ago. It's Hilltop Neszmelyi Cserszegi Fuszeres 2011. I wouldn't like to try pronouncing that... Apparently Cserszegi Fuszeres is a "unique Hungarian crossing" of Irsai Oliver (which I've never heard of either) and Gewurztraminer. It was light and certainly very aromatic and did indeed remind me of a gewurztraminer but at £5.75 a bottle, it's a bargain basement alternative - fantastic! It was only 11% alcohol too. We thought it would go well with curry and would also be a good party wine, and I'll definitely be getting some more.



As for the cocktail, this was a sloe gin martini! It was made with a combination of normal gin - I had some Hendricks lying around on this occasion - and a miniature bottle of sloe gin, which I was delighted to receive from a friend on her return from a trip round the Plymouth Gin distillery. We used the miniature it to make two martinis, one each, and they certainly looked beautiful. However if I ever get the chance to do this again, I'd probably use the miniature to make four martinis, as the ratio of sloe gin to normal gin was a little too high. Tant pis!