Magnums and more

Second blog post in a month shocker! I'm now trying harder to make sure I have a notebook to hand when drinking the good stuff. 

A couple of weeks ago we opened this magnum of Auxey Duresses 2005 from Michel Prunier, which had been lying in my wardrobe for a very long time. I bought several of these and last drank it in 2013 - we decided to give the others some time to come round. Our view was that it is now drinking. It was on the rustic side, old school Burgundy. It reminded G of wines from Doudet-Naudin, and if you told me it was from the 1960s I'd have believed you. I think a couple more of these are residing in Middle England somewhere so it may be one to run by the SPNS in due course... 

A few nights later we had this Savigny les Beaune 1er cru Les Marconnets 2015 from Domaine de la Vougeraie. This was an attractive glossy ruby colour. It had black fruit on the nose, not a typical Savigny nose. It seemed quite big to me but G detected a certain stemmy quality. This went away when we drank it with the lamb tagine and our view was that improved over time. I wondered if it was a bit young, but for me it was lacking in fruit and I'm not sure it would ever really improve. We gave it a 7 on the premier cru scale so a little disappointing to be honest. 

Things improved when G wheeled out this half bottle of Gould Campbell 1980. He has shared a lot of port with me over the past few months which I've enjoyed very much but failed to report on. This was very interesting with fig on the nose, panforte and even milk chocolate - very high quality milk chocolate, G said. The texture was wonderful, lots of glycerine, and there was a hint of Turkish Delight on the finish. It needed no more time and was now a "pop and pour". 

Last weekend we were extremely decadent and ordered a takeaway from Otto's which I have written about before here. To begin with, we drank this Rully 1er cru Montpalais 2016 from Jean-Baptiste Ponsot. This was a beautiful golden colour and had a very attractive nose of unwaxed lemons. It was rounded and creamy in the mouth with a burst of acidity at the end, almost salty. We thought it would be excellent with fish and chips. G declared that marginal villages make great wine in hot vintages, something to bear in mind for future reference. We gave this a 9.

The first course of the very complicated Otto's offering was brioche with duck liver on the left and morels in a sauce on the right. The toaster was brought down from its place above the kitchen cabinets and dusted off for the occasion, and fortunately G alerted me to the fact that the brioche would toast very quickly and we timed it to perfection. The duck liver may be the most delicious thing I've ever eaten, and I plan to attempt to replicate it in the near future - we think port, brandy and butter were all involved. It's hard to believe Otto's doesn't have a Michelin star.

The second course involved duck breast, the famous sauce and some pommes souffles - a miserly portion as we were splitting it over 2 days.

The intention was to have this Beaune 1er cru Cent-Vignes 2005 from Albert Morot alongside. Like the Auxey discussed above, I'd come to realise that 2005 is taking forever to come round, so this had been stashed away in the come-back-to-it-later branch of the cellar. What can I say. It would certainly have been undrinkable young. It reeked to high heaven with famyard aromas and sousbois and there was something weirdly pungent about it. G charitably looked for positives but even he was eventually defeated and agreed it was getting worse with time, so down the sink it went. We gave it a 5 on the premier cru project scale, a disappointing result, as I did enjoy some of the wines from this domaine when I visited it in 2007. 

Next, we opened my last bottle of Santenay Comme Dessus 2010 from Domaine de la Choupette, but something wasn't quite right about it either - it had a stemmy quality reminding me of bad cabernet franc, and a bitter finish. I'm pretty familiar with this wine and it's usually very pleasurable, so something wasn't right. Down the sink it went. 

The pressure was on! Fortunately a bottle of Audiffred Bourgogne Rouge 2016 was on form with the usual exotic fruits on the nose, and went down very well. 

The following night, we had this Beaune 1er cru Greves 2013 from Domaine de la Vougeraie. This was more typical Beaune, medium weight, supple and elegant with nice acidity and complexity. It went very well with the remains of the duck, although I wondered if a big Cote de Nuits red might have gone even better. The nose took a while to open up, and after 2 hours in the decanter it brightened up with notes of black fruit, red fruit and clafoutis. It had a burst of sweetness at the end. Originally we gave it a medium 8 but it was upgraded to a high 8 as time went on. 

Finally, I've been drinking this magnum of Beaujolais Villages 2016 from Maison en Belles Lies for the past few days - not really the ideal size for solitary lockdown drinking but what's a girl to do. It has lots of fruit and is very gluggable, and it's been reminding me of the Coteaux Bourguigons from Romain Chapuis with its slightly feral quality. High praise indeed as that's one of my favourite wines. 

And so on we go... at least there are daffodils outside, the magnolia trees have their buds and I'm looking forward to resuming tastings and dinners soon!

Birthday celebrations

On Thursday it was my turn to clock up 40 years on the planet, so some celebrating was in order. G and I met up outside La Maison du Chocolat on Piccadilly and walked to Bar Boulud at the Mandarin Oriental for dinner. En route, G was approached for directions by several lost tourists which we deduced was because he was looking very posh in his suit and therefore the tourists thought he was a local.

I went to Bar Boulud last year with my friend M and regretted not having the Piggie burger, as I was too embarrassed by the silly name to order it. I didn't let that get in the way this time, and it was utterly delicious and definitely the thing to go for on all future occasions.

To drink, we had a glass of Ayala rose each and then a bottle of Auxey-Duresses from Coche-Dury. We had the 2007 last year and it was one of the stand-out wines, so when I was reading the Bar Boulud wine list on the internet and saw the 2005, I knew this was the wine for me. But it turned out they only had the 2007. We asked the waitress if any of the 2005 was still available and full credit to her, she said she wasn't sure and would get the sommelier. He told us that an alarmingly high proportion of the 2005s had been duffers, so we were better off with the 2007. Decision made. Once again it was absolutely wonderful and lived up to my very high expectations with its heavenly heady sweet berry fruit nose.

After dinner, we hopped into a taxi and arrived home for a marc tasting!

I currently have three marcs on the go (sound of tumbrils rumbling in the distance) - the Felettig vieux marc de bourgogne, which we believe is about 25 years old, the Lamarche 1961, and the d'Angerville from the 1930s which G gave me for my birthday. This is the same one that I got him for his birthday and which we consumed over the course of that long weekend away.

It was amazing how similar they were in colour! The verdict was that each was very good of its type. The Felettig was relatively rustic compared to the other two, with raisins on the nose, while the Lamarche was smoother and had more sultanas going on. The d'Angerville had lost the fruit on the nose but had turned into a very fine old spirit, still quite fiery. G repeated his theory that with old spirits you can't really tell what they were originally - if someone had told us it was Calvados, for example, we would have believed them. For once I think the price differentials genuinely reflected differences in age and hence quality.

Lurking in the background on the left was a bag from La Maison du Chocolat containing pieces of chocolate-covered orange peel, an extra surprise present from G. These will join my recent discovery, Willie's Sea Salt Caramel Black Pearls ("It's a journey of endless surprises with these rare and precious pearls" according to the back of the box), in future assiettes de chocolat.

Then last night it was off to the Perseverance for a small celebratory dinner with family and friends. We had the room upstairs to ourselves, which was great.

We got there in plenty of time to get the wine sorted out, as there were things to be decanted and things to be put in ice buckets. Fortunately for me, G took care of all that stuff.

It was quite a line-up!

Alfred Gratien champagne 1995 "Cuvee Millenaire" en magnum with some gougeres as an aperitif.

Corton Grand Cru 2005 from Domaine Parent with our starters - poached sea trout with samphire and cucumber in my case.

Chateau Latour 1960 with the beef - 50 day aged Dexter. A stunning combo, absolute highlight of the evening! Once again I think I have taken my sister-in-law's claret habit up a notch and my brother probably won't thank me for it.

Auxey-Duresses 2005 from Domaine Prunier en magnum with the cheese - Stinking Bishop and some lovely oatcakes.

Chateau Rieussec 1976 with the lemon tart and raspberry sorbet. We brought a second bottle just in case and G was amazed that the first bottle whizzed round the table and was empty in seconds, so it was just as well we had the second!

And finally, the Lamarche 1961 marc de bourgogne and coffee, which brought the evening to a fine conclusion. I forgot to tell my friend L a joke I made up specially for her - what's a pirate's favourite digestif? Marrrrrrrrrrc.

I've just had an email from my mother saying that she and my father both "woke up feeling completely clear-headed" which just goes to show that the good stuff is good for you.

All in all, it was a really good dinner and went exactly to plan - nothing was corked or faulty, and everyone seemed to enjoy themselves. Now I need to get cracking and start planning my 50th!

Parmesan Syndicate Night

A few months ago I was listening to "The Menu" podcast and they had an interview with a cheesemaker in Wales who had set up Save a Cheese, a campaign to help the "devastated artisan cheesemakers in the Emilia-Romagna region of Italy hit by two earthquakes in a short space of time" in May 2012. I considered this a noble cause and signed up to "save" a kilo of cheese. It went down so quickly that when the second campaign started, G and I decided to upgrade to five kilos. ACC and Baron McG were also keen to help out and thus the Parmesan Syndicate was formed. I mentioned to G that the Parmesan Syndicate would be a good name for a band, and his response was that "Reggiano" would be the name of the splinter group.

Normal size cheese... and PARMESAN! This is just one kilo.

It arrived last week, so I arranged a rustic supper so the others could come and get theirs, since the rescue Parmesan was taking up most of my fridge. Fortunately it had arrived in one-kilo vacuum-packed bags, and a laser-guided cheesecutting machine was not required.

A sight to gladden the heart

As luck - or rather, good planning on the part of my favourite wine merchant - would have it, on the very same day, a case of magnums of Auxey-Duresses 2005 from Prunier arrived, so it was the ideal opportunity to try one. Auxey is a new favourite village for me, and G spotted this on the broking list of the Burgundy Portfolio. I looked Prunier up in Coates who describes him as "certainly the best grower in the village", the 2005 vintage was an excellent one, and there's something quite special about a magnum - so I decided to go for it.

As I don't drink many magnums, I don't have a magnum decanter, so I used two normal decanters about 2.5 hours before drinking. It was quite a dark colour, had a heavenly nose with lively red berry fruit going on and was quite sweet and delicious. A great expression of pinot noir in the lighter, approachable Cote de Beaune style. I'm very much looking forward to drinking the rest, but there's no rush and at least one bottle should be tucked away for another five years to see what happens.

To eat, I made gougeres, then served this rather successful chicken, apricot and pistachio terrine made the day before. G expertly got it out of the terrine dish intact so it still looked nice, rather than like Pedigree Chum as has been known to happen in the past.

For dessert we had some petits pots au chocolat (made to Maman AdV's closely-guarded recipe) with Waitrose's Seriously Plummy Maury which is £10.99 for a half bottle. Earlier in the week G had suggested I get some of this, and I had looked at him in confusion as first of all I thought he was saying "Morey" and secondly because I was not aware that Waitrose actually sold a Maury. Although I do look at their sweet wine section from time to time, the terrible branding and label has always acted as a kind of anti-visibility shield and I had genuinely never noticed it. It did however turn out to be just the thing to go with the petits pots, and the half bottle was the perfect size for four.

Don't drop it!

We rounded off the evening with this precious item - a bottle of 1925 Marc de Bourgogne which ACC gave G as an early birthday present. It's amazing stuff, quite pale in colour, and has that old spirit thing going on which we love so much. There is still a little bit left but I don't rate its chances of lasting till G's birthday...