I am not a multimillionaire, nor am I poor. I will not review Petrus, or Montet Cadet. My golden mean is the clutch of quality Cru B’s and middle Classed Growths. And I will only comment on those I deem wonderful, or at least highly interesting. Don’t care to talk about those that are average, or bad, the domain of drain.
Reclusing to our mountain lake cottage on Friday night, the first time in over a month, my wife, Lynn, and I treated it more special than usual. The temperature was in the 60s, the sun shining, the snow melting, the lake looking as if it might shed its winter coat a month early, and Woody, our chipmunk, scurrying around looking for nuts – which I quickly made easier for him, or her. You can count me in the group that thinks global warming not to be much of a problem. It’s something we can be thankful for: those of us living on high ground in the north, anyway.
So, on Saturday I gambled that 2001 Beychevelle might be special. I am sure it is much better when you know what it is, than if you tasted it blind. The Minoan sailboat on the label looks to be Dionysus’s, the one he sailed to Naxos after Ariadne. But why would a god dip his sales to any thing mortal? Ah, part of the magic, and he was only half a god. Accolades I have read of the property go back to the fifteen hundreds, and they probably made wine there long before that. I guess they would know what they were doing by now.
I accepted our bottle by its gorgeous popped cork alone. Poured, the bouquet immediately soared. Fully mature, sensuously soft, and ready, classic Bordeaux. Lynn and I spoke at once. She said, Pauillac, as I said it could have been a Graves (because of its wonderful earth and tobacco balanced with the classiest aromas of phenomenally glorious dark fruit, of course knowing what it was; I’m the sommelier of our union). "Saint Julien!" Lynn cried. And then we both would have known so blind as the spicy finish lingered for a full minute. That factor seems to be the most common distinguisher of a Classed Growth as opposed to a good Cru B. Cru B’s can smell and taste great, but they rarely kick out a minute-long finish. And initial confusion as to appellation often points to Saint Julien, the Medoc chameleon.
Since last night I have eschewed the descriptor ‘complex’ from my wine lexicon. Word 2007 code is complex; wines like 2001 Beychevelle are not like that; they are integrated with lots of intuitive associations, like a perfect spring you almost remember from early childhood: beautiful memories, smells, notions of great music, chthonic roots and cosmic time, etc. Immensely interesting and connected to our whole being (for those of us who think so, anyway), but ‘complex’ speaks too much like rationality for me to apply to such a biologically intimate liquor.
Lynn said if we never had a better bottle, it would be enough.
Digression: My first shipment of 2007 Bordeaux arrived on Saturday to an empty house, while we were at camp; so it will travel around like Charlie on the streets of Boston until I can catch up with it. Away one day out of a week, and of course that’s when it arrives. I will likely review a couple of those.
