Recent drinking roundup!

Apparently I haven't done one of these for a while, so as we hurtle towards winter it's time to get caught up and get rid of the mountain of empty bottles in the corner.

G and I drank this half of Alfred Gratien 1999 champagne back in July but it seems I never reported on it. "No harm in that" reported G, quoting my Irish grandmother, quite accurately in this case. It was fully mature, with notes of brioche and toast. G said it was almost custardy and it reminded me of a croissant. It didn't have many bubbles left and we felt it was at the end of its drinking life but it was refreshing on a hot summer Sunday. That seems a long time ago. I actually just discovered a lingering half of the 2000 on my wine rack this afternoon, so that needs to be put out of its misery in the near future!

Between August and October, we guzzled several wines from the Finger Lakes which D has been so kindly transporting back for us. This Red Newt Riesling 2013 from Lahoma Vineyards was lovely. Pale in colour, it had a Mosel style nose but was richer and spicier on the palate, with a burst of lime and G thought a hint of quince on the finish. It was beautifully made and had great balance, with a refreshing core of acidity. It's currently retailing on their website at $24.50 - compare and contrast with the 2012 Sawmill Creek Riesling for sale at Hedonism for £35.10. We wistfully imagined living nearby and being able to buy it by the case.

As an aside, I saw several red newts last time I went backpacking in Pennsylvania!

Another Finger Lakes white we tried recently was the White Springs Dry Riesling 2015 from Ravines. Regular readers will know we absolutely loved this winery. This wine was also pale in colour and had a nose of lime or possibly lime blossom. It was light, elegant and clean, dry but ripe. G said he felt a better person just for drinking it. It was definitely drinking now but we know they make wines for the long haul so it's possible it might get even better in time.

On to the reds - this Ryan William Pinot Noir 2012 amused me by stating it was 12.4% alcohol on the label. It was a dark colour and reminded us of the Cote de Nuits with notes of black cherry and black forest gateau. It was very easy to drink and even had something of a peacock's tail. G thinks it cost $27 which was excellent value.

A few weeks ago we had this Thirsty Owl Pinot Noir 2016, a name which always brings a smile to my face. This was apparently 12.2% alcohol and cost $17 according to G. He also remembered that the winery was founded in 2002 so the vines are young. It was really classic lightweight pinot, pretty but not particularly serious - a vin de soif. We served it lightly chilled, which worked very well, and we thought it was drinking nicely now but would last another year or so. G used the word "unforced" and we agreed it had an honesty about it, reflecting its terroir and climate, not buggered about. It actually reminded us slightly of Giboulot's wines, which is praise indeed. A virtually perfect Tuesday night wine, and again, one that we'd buy by the case if we lived nearer.

I had a trio of wines from the Wine Society recently too, just to see what's going on there. I failed to take a photo of the Cote Roannaise Perdiziere 2016 from Domaine Serol which was a gamay and came in at 12%. It was a little disappointing, to be honest. It lacked any interesting feral notes, nor was it one of those light, pretty gamays. At £16.50 it wasn't particularly great value and I won't be rushing back. I've just realised I actually tried the 2011 back in 2012 when it cost £7.95, and wasn't particularly impressed with it then either! Memo to self: read own blog before ordering wines...

This Naoussa 2016 was much more my cup of tea. It's from Greece and made from the xinomavro grape which is a new one on me, but was described as being like a cross between pinot noir and nebbiolo. It reminded me of a decent bourgogne rouge and at £10.50 it certainly hit the spot.

I cracked this "La Belle Romaine" from Chateau Merande last night. This is a Vin de Savoie made from a grape called mondeuse. It was fine but didn't wow me. It's only 12% alcohol, but at £17 a pop I'd rather be drinking that lovely Coteaux Bourguignon from Romain Chapuis.

We've started drinking this St George gin from California which was a gift from G's fan club in Grand Rapids and it has been going down very well in a G&T, with more floral notes than your average. The style reminds us a little of Plymouth which is always my go-to gin, so that works for me!

Finally, a couple of disappointments. G brought a bottle of Gevrey-Chembertin 1er cru Craipillot, 2001, Gerard Seguin round the other night. It had an amazing nose of liquorice, leather and earthiness, but when we came to taste it we found it rather tertiary (G's word) - it dried out on the palate and had a chewy finish. In the end we agreed we weren't actually enjoying it, and it went down the sink. The same thing sadly happened to two bottles of Combe D'Eve from Giboulot on Wednesday which broke my heart a little. Possibly being in the wardrobe over the hot summer didn't do it any favours. Must do better at maintaining stock rotation in future! Fortunately I have just got some wines out of storage so I'm looking forward to trying those soon.

Dinner at ACC's, 25th August

On Saturday evening, G and I caught the trusty 68 bus to the wilds of zone 3 where we joined ACC at his new gated residence for dinner.

We kicked off with an elderly gin and tonic, made from gin that was of unknown age but seemed pretty old, and was 49%! This was a recent acquisition from the second best wine shop in Beaune. In fact it's described as "genievre" on the bottle so may be closer to Dutch jenever than gin. Either way, it made the best gin and tonic I've ever had - very floral and refreshing. Memo to self to get some high-strength gin. With this we had a lovely beetroot and broad bean dip and pitta bread, which I mystifyingly failed to photograph.

ACC lost no opportunity to show off his jeroboam of marc, photographed with the gin bottle for contrast. Sadly we didn't open it on this occasion...

Then we moved on to a white, which G brought along. This was a Domaine Leroy Bourgogne Blanc 2008. He got this in Paris for the princely sum of 38 euros, and we had high expectations because Domaine Leroy is a top domaine and because 2008 was a great year for whites - Anne Parent's bourgogne blanc in particular has been giving us an enormous amount of pleasure lately. The Domaine Leroy had a whacking amount of new oak, no sense of terroir, and all in all we felt it was rather "international" i.e. aimed at the US palate. ACC suspected that there was a problem at the domaine in 2008 and that this bourgogne contained a lot of declassified premier and even grand cru wine, which you might think would be a good thing but not if they were being treated with lots of new oak which didn't suit the wine. So in summary, it was drinkable and I found it pleasant enough, but we'd expected something more.

Our starter was some duck and calvados pate served with ACC's home-made bread and a very jazzy salad of leaves and toasted almonds dressed with olive oil infused with garlic.

Next up on the drinking front was a magnum of red Chassagne-Montrachet 2005 from Domaine Ramonet. This immediately made up for the disappointment of the white. It was rich and smooth, with lovely integrated berry fruit. All in all, it was excellent, and slipped down a treat with our cassoulet, which was the perfect thing to eat on a damp Saturday evening.

Then we moved onto cheese, which I'd procured from what is now my favourite cheese shop, Pascal Beillevaire in Montpelier Street, earlier in the day, braving flash floods in Hyde Park as nothing was going to stand between me and my cheese. I can't recommend this place highly enough. On this occasion, I got a Langres, some 24 month old Gruyere, a Banon which turned out to be seriously evil (a good thing!) and finally, the piece de resistance, an artisinal Roquefort which was absolutely sensational. I was also given a chocolate mousse and rice pudding with salted caramel - you can see why I like the place.

As a dessert wine I also brought along a bottle of this Samos Anthemis muscat, which is an old favourite and never fails to please.

Finally, we were treated to a glass of this exciting old Mirabelle, which made a lovely digestif.

At least my new camera took some photos in focus, which is a turn-up for the books. All in all, another wonderful dinner and thanks to ACC for hosting.

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!

Dry Marc-tini

I originally set up this blog as an online aide-memoire and took the view that if anyone else cared to read it that would be lovely, but I wouldn't be at all surprised if they didn't, as premier cru burgundy is fairly niche as hobbies go, and me wittering on about whether G gave something a score of 9 out of 10 while I only gave it 8 would be of little interest to anyone except ourselves and perhaps our favourite wine merchant.

However earlier today I was messing about on here and belatedly came across a page which shows me my blog stats, including which posts have been most viewed. I was quite taken aback as the most popular entries have been the two about gin, so much for a blog about burgundy!

Anyway, it's good timing as we did a Wine Society order this week and a bottle of Blackwood's 2007 was amongst the goodies procured. I've alluded to this before but my previous bottle was pre-blog, so I feel it deserves a proper entry and as I've spent the day tidying up and cleaning, I felt I could justify a marc-tini this evening which is like a dry martini but with a smidgeon of finest old marc de bourgogne instead of vermouth.

From the Blackwoods website: "We make Blackwood's Vintage Dry Gin with hand-harvested Shetland botanicals. Local crofters harvest our Shetland botanicals each summer, roughly between June and September (depends when summer comes, and whether it's warm and dry like 2003 or cool and wet and windy like 2005) in proportions that do not disturb the fragile local habitat. We have a sustainable harvesting programme to ensure harmony with Shetland's unspoilt environment. The sustainable sourcing and harvesting was developed with us by Highland Natural Products, FWAG and the Orkney Agronomy College. The plants are brought down to the mainland of Scotland to be gently small-batch distilled. Blackwood's is truly the essence of Shetland, and the world's only handpicked gin."

Gosh, who would have thought there was an Agronomy College on Orkney eh? As for FWAG, that stands for the Farming and Wildlife Advisory Group, for those of you not up on your agricultural acronyms (um, which included me until I looked it up just now). The whole thing sounds terribly worthy and environmentally-friendly and very much a Good Thing.

I've just found out that, yet again, the Wine Society is a dreadful rip-off, as I paid a yuppie wanker price of £19 for it, but Googling just now has revealed that I could in fact have got it from Majestic for £16. Grrr! This sort of thing seems to happen rather frequently with the Wine Society, which is very irritating as it's supposed to be a co-operative and so one would assume it would be competitive as there should be no profit margin, but no. It's this kind of behaviour that gives socialism a bad name... take note, Red Ed.

Back to the marctini, which is excellent. I don't have the vocab to explain what is so good about the Blackwood's, but I just find it very smooth and harmonious. It's 40% alcohol too, none of your pesky watered-down 37.5% Gordons crap here. It does however come in a strange rather bulbous bottle with a cool picture of a Viking boat on it, which cunningly disguises the fact that it's only 70cl, as was the Sipsmith incidentally.

I'm eating a handful of Waitrose Lucques olives alongside, having had some of G's earlier in the week. I can't claim to be much of an olive expert but these are seriously good and compliment the marctini perfectly. Recommended.

Sipsmith Gin

Despite the name of this blog, I am not solely an Amatrice du Vin but also an Amatrice du Gin (and indeed myriad other alcholic substances).

The Waitrose mag had a huge plug for Sipsmith Gin this month and to show that I have not remotely learned my lesson after the blue gin debacle, I immediately went into credulous yuppie wanker mode and had to get some. It's made in Hammersmith and is all very artisinal and they only make small batches, the sort of thing of which I thoroughly approve. It's a remarkably precise 41.6% alcohol and cost the princely sum of £24. It also set the security alarm off as I left the shop but I decided to be nonchalant and pretend it wasn't me.

The article was illustrated with pictures of hairy men with beards who make the stuff, who look more like members of CAMRA than what I would expect a gin-maker to look like, although come to think of it I have no idea what I'd expect a gin-maker to look like. Possibly something like myself, after G discovered a juniper tree growing at the family estate in Rutland. But apparently the Sipsmith guys found it very hard to get a licence to distil so don't hold your breath.

Anyway, the same mag had a recipe for a pear martini so I also bought some ruinously expensive pear juice in order to have a bash, and that's the reason why this evening's post is even more rambling and inane than usual. This stuff is good!

My adaptation of the recipe (as I forgot to look it up beforehand and therefore forgot to get a lemon) is as follows: bung loads of ice in cocktail shaker, add a splash of elderly vermouth, then add equal quantities of gin and pear juice. This has turned out very well-balanced and not too sweet, which was my main concern, so I think the lemon can probably be dispensed with. The flavours complement each other well and it has a nice autumnal feel to it. This would be a good cocktail to make when you had company as the pear juice allegedly only lasts for 3 days after opening which means I have a lot of martinis to get through before Tuesday. Must get cracking!

I think a proper assessment of the gin will have to wait until I've made a dry martini or a G&T with it. But first impressions are favourable.

The London No.1 Original Blue Gin

I had some friends round for lunch last Saturday and was faced with the dilemma of what to give them as an aperitif, as these friends are not white wine, sherry or fizz drinkers. Amazing that we're still friends, really!

I decided to fall back on the traditional g&t, so headed over to Waitrose, which my henchgirl refers to as "the 'Trose" but not being Scottish I doubt whether I can carry this off. The usual range was on the shelves but as there were no enticing special offers I thought I might go for something a bit different. So when I saw this weird-looking blue gin, price £24.99, I fell for it. It was partly the colour and partly the London aspect which ticked my local pride box, as Northampton is sadly not famous for its gin, but only the Carlsberg brewery.

It's definitely pretty! It's also 47% alcohol which I hadn't realised until I looked at the bottle just now. No wonder lunch went with such a swing... It's surprisingly nice and I've found some more info about it here, but am not sure it beats Plymouth and certainly doesn't beat the vintage Blackwood. I'm glad I tried it, and the dry martini in the photo is going down a treat, but I won't be rushing to buy it again.