Proceedings commenced with this bottle of Meursault 1er cru Perrieres 2007 from Latour-Labille, donated by G. It was a beautiful golden colour, opulent and rich with a marvellous finish. It was still drinking nicely, but perhaps coming to the end of its plateau. G commented that it still had that core of lemon which you find in great white wines. Perrieres is considered one of the finest vineyards in Meursault and is a contender for grand cru status but luckily for us, it's still a more affordable premier cru.
With our starter of smoked salmon, we had this trio of half bottles of vintage Alfred Gratien champagne - 1998, 1999 and 2000. These came from the Wine Society in a particularly self-indulgent order towards the end of last year. A quick trip had to be made to Habitat in the afternoon to pick up enough champagne flutes for us to drink them side by side. It was worth it, because the vertical comparison was very interesting.
The 1998 was fully mature, rich and honeyed, and had a wonderful finish. Apparently it was "autolytic" which you can look up on Wikipedia or take ACC's word for it that it means like a digestive biscuit, with those yeasty flavours characteristic of vintage champagne. The 1999 seemed fresher and much more youthful, while the consensus was that the 2000 wasn't ready yet, remarkable as it seems. I have one more half bottle of each, so now the difficult decision will have to be made as to when to drink the rest...
We moved on to the reds with our main course - a Volnay 1966 from Bouchard contributed by the Baron, and this Pommard 1966 from Patriache which G had brought along. With a label like that, how could one resist? I failed to take a photo of the Volnay, and the Baron took the bottle away with him, but I do recall that the label said it was specially selected by the Financial Times. The FT knew what they were doing in those days, as this was serious old Burgundy, smooth and with lots of fruit still. In the glass (on the left in the photo below), it looked remarkably youthful.
The Pommard, on the other hand, had a distinct whiff of the sugar bag and wasn't particularly subtle. By this stage, as usual, my notes began to tail off and became illegible, but I think the general view was that the Volnay was distinctly superior.
With the cheese, we had the remaining half of a bottle of Maynards 40 year old port which I was delighted to find in Market Harborough Aldi before Christmas. Aldi have a tendency to knock out some excellent port at Christmas, and three years ago my father visited practically every Aldi in the East Midlands in a quest on my behalf for the 30 year old, which they were selling that year. The same shop came up trumps again this time. It had notes of toffee, coffee and chocolate, and was exceptionally smooth. Although it had been open for a couple of weeks and kept in the fridge, it was fine, and actually rather nice chilled. It went down very fast and reminded me how much I love tawny port!
G then nipped downstairs and came back with a big bottle of vintage kirsch, which was served on the rocks. This was a very fine digestif and we sat around imagining running our own wine bar selling similar rarities. That sounds far too much like hard work to me - think I'll stick to drinking them instead. Thanks everyone for a great evening and sharing such old and fascinating wines, a very good start to the year!
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