Had dinner this evening at Soul Flavors in Jersey City with Jeff Grossman and Jay Miller; a wonderful time as always with great friends and some fantastic wines.
2002 Andre Beaufort Champagne Polisy
A little austere and reticent at first, showing yeasty and faint biscuity notes around a spine of steel and mineral notes; with air it gains depth and weight as bright fruit and fresh baked brioche-like elements emerge, keeps getting better with time.
2008 Jacques-Frédéric Mugnier Nuits St. Georges 1er Cru Clos de la Maréchale
From a bottle opened a day in advance. Very pretty, full of bright plum and black cherry fruit tinged with floral and mineral notes, but very light on its feet with a spine of bright acidity and grainy tannins and lovely to drink.
2007 Marcel Lapierre Morgon Cuvée Marcel Lapierre (MMVII)
Very ripe and luscious; packed with floral-tinged black cherries and some savoury earthy notes. There's plenty of weight and power here and it's very pleasant, though not showing the sense of sheer lightness and delicate touch I've found in the 'basic' Lapierre wines.
1999 Willi Schaefer Graacher Himmelreich Riesling Spätlese
Incredibly pure and fresh, seamlessly combining bright Mosel fruit with a vivid slatiness and faint herbal and creamy flavour elements. It's a little reticent at first but opens out beautifully with air, lovely wine that's drinking very nicely now but has the stuffing and balance to last a lot longer.
2009 Egon Müller Scharzhofberger Riesling Spätlese
Spectacular stuff. This is hard to put into words. Pretty much everything you can expect/want from a young Spätlese; a spectrum of bright Riesling fruit accented with floral, herbal and mineral elements; incredibly layered and nuanced with superb balance, a remarkable sense of lightness and finesse despite the intensity of the flavours, and tremendous length. What a wine.
1995 Dönnhoff Oberhäuser Brücke Riesling Auslese
Dominated by unpleasant chemical, bleach-like smells and very disjointed and awkward in the mouth - doesn't seem like a pristine bottle.
1898 Henriques & Henriques Madeira Verdelho Solera
Amazing, eye-opening wine. A little blocky and warm initially, but with air it comes together and shows an incredible flavour profile combining molasses, black tea, roasted nuts, candied citrus peel and other savoury and sweet flavours; so much depth and nuance here that it's hard to describe. There's moderate sweetness, superb balance and a finish that just keeps going while flavour after flavour unravels on the tongue, well after each sip has gone. What a treat, thanks Jay!