Lunch at Le Montrachet, 30th October

No visit to Burgundy is complete without a visit to Le Montrachet and on Friday a table had been booked for lunch. I was very much looking forward to it!

We'll be taking a left then...

To start, we had this mushroom vol-au-vent, but to call it that doesn't do it justice - there was bacon and chicken liver in there too.

Salmon with potatoes.

Cheeses from the state-of-the-art cheese trolley (this was quite amazing - made of wood, it unfolded to reveal a wonderful selection), including some seriously good Epoisses.

This was a sort of praline concoction with different flavoured fillings, "comme un eclair" - they do like their visual jokes at Le M!

To drink, we had some Chablis 1er cru Montee de Tonnere 2011 from Raveneau, which I seem to recall cost less than it would have done retail in the UK.

As always, the service was impeccable and the atmosphere in the dining room very calm and content. I'd love to stay there some time and go for dinner!

Quiet Monday night in

On Monday night, D came round for dinner and brought a splendid selection of wines with him. I think this may be the most decadent Monday evening I've ever experienced. Sensitive readers may wish to look away now.

We started with a bottle of Chablis 1er cru Montee de Tonnere 2004 from Raveneau. We shared a bottle of this with ACC a few months ago and I promptly bought the rest. As G hadn't yet turned up, I had to do the honours and chip off the wax seal, while D admired my "sabre" technique. Possible sarcasm there, I think.

I'd put a spare bottle in the fridge in case of any problems but had forgotten that the wax seal is reckoned to have protective properties and all was well. The chablis was on excellent form, crisp and drinking perfectly now. We had it with some organic smoked salmon from Northern Ireland by way of Selfridges food hall, and rye bread from the Nordic Bakery, which was very successful.

Next up, a half bottle of 1983 Chateau d'Yquem provided by D. This was only the second time I've had d'Yquem and it was absolutely stunning with intense Seville orange marmalade characteristics. As with all the best Sauternes, it wasn't too sweet and had good acidity, creating perfect balance. Above all, it was very elegant. I adored the slightly bitter edge on the finish and had fantasies of making some kind of breakfast martini with it (which would be sacrilege, of course). We had it with some duck pate which was an inspired choice on D's part.

Next was this bottle of Latour 1975. How on earth did D know about our sneaky Latour habit? G and I hadn't had this vintage before so it was great to try it. As usual, it looked wonderful, dark and glossy. It was quite dry, savoury and downright delicious, still all there. Apparently 1975 was a light vintage that faded - that was emphatically not the case here, and it was still going strong after 90 minutes. The label claimed that it was 11.5% alcohol - it might say that, I couldn't possibly comment.

Alongside the Latour, we had this 1973 cabernet sauvignon from Martha's Vineyard, which I have to confess I was not familiar with until this evening. As the Bordeaux glasses had been used for the Latour, it had to go in the Burgundy glasses, which failed to disguise the extraordinary cabernet sauvignon characteristics of the wine. I've never come across anything like it. D mentioned eucalyptus and there was also prominent mint and blackcurrant leaf. It would be just the job if you were suffering from a cold. Again, this wine did not seem in the least bit old (of course 40 isn't at all old really) and the finish was sensational.

I took a couple of close-ups of the label since it is such a joy - banging on about Heitz Wine Cellar with the Martha's Vineyard bit hidden away in a corner. It claims to be 13% alcohol, which is probably accurate.

Note that this was bottled in 1977 and had been in D's cellar pretty much ever since. G and I are painfully aware that 1973 was a terrible vintage in Europe so it was a real pleasure to drink something from our year that was so delicious. Enormous thanks to D for sharing all of these with us.

As we'd polished off the d'Yquem already, we had nothing to go with pudding. Disaster! But as luck would have it, I recently acquired some Rieussec 1976 which had just arrived and was in G's flat, so I dashed downstairs to get a bottle. It was the most amazing colour.

We took the rest of the bottle to the SPNS dinner on Tuesday. To be continued...

Lunch at A de V Towers, 18th November

Last Sunday, ACC and G came round to my place for lunch. We kicked off with a terrine of lapin from Beillevaire, apparently made by the people who provide their eggs, which are truly excellent. I didn't take a photo of the terrine as it wasn't very photogenic, but it tasted all right and went well with toasted date and walnut bread. To drink, G provided this Riesling Auslese 2005 which one knew would be good just by looking at the terrible label. It was a lovely colour, quite sweet and grapey, tingly and delicious and with a great finish.

Next was a real treat, a Chablis 1er cru 2004 Montee de Tonnere from Domaine Francois Raveneau, provided by ACC. When he gave it to me on arrival the only part of the bottle visible was a yellow wax capsule which was highly promising. I was delighted when I saw what it was.  I've only had Raveneau once before but it immediately went into the pantheon of great Burgundy producers whose names begin with R. It seemed very dry after the Riesling and was tres Chablis, with that classic mineral quality, an amazing purity and no oak. There was some discussion about the wax seal - apparently wines age more slowly under wax as no oxygen can get in.

To go with this, G constructed a very fine chicken salad. Move over, Ottolenghi!

For the cheese course, we had a baked Vacherin Mont d'Or also from Beillevaire, served with a baguette. When buying it, I checked with Cheese Girl whether it was acceptable to bake it and she confirmed that indeed it was, and that the shop had recently had a baked Vacherin night and they nearly managed to set fire to the place. Sounds like a good evening. This is what it looked like before it went in the oven.

Alongside this we drank a Beaune 1er cru 2005 Les Tuvilains from Bertrand Ambroise. I bought this several years ago and it had been stashed away in G's cellar at the parental home for a while. It was big, fruity and quite sweet - not very Beaune at all and lacking elegance. Ambroise is based in Nuits-St-Georges so this probably had something to do with it. We did enjoy it, but it was marked down for not being typique and scored an 8.

Coffee was served and we got down to planning future events and our trip to Burgundy for New Year. I'm really looking forward to it!