Notes from an interesting dinner tasting of Grand Cru Burgundies.
1999 Delamotte Brut Champagne – young, lots of spritz, good acidity, clean and tasty, too young to have developed any secondary interest buy promising.
2000 Henri Boillot Corton Charlemagne – the two whites were very different wine, each excellent in their way. This one had some sulfur in the nose, but below my personal rejection limit and it abated with time in the glass. Once you got past that, there was some nice vanilla and hints of pear, and in the mouth excellent fruit and acidity. Very nice.
1991 Bonneau du Martray Corton Charlemagne – the nose on this one wasn’t nearly as forthcoming nor interesting as the previous wine, showing only a bit of lime and maybe a hint of toffee, but we forgave it (I did anyway) when you got it in your mouth. Lush tropical fruit on palate and more body, finishing well with good acidity and length. Good bottle!
1998 Groffier Bonnes Mares – the first staff screw up was this pair where they got the person presenting it wrong, so we ended up thinking this was either a rather weak DRC or one of the best Grofiers we’d tasted. Medium body and colour, excellent cherry fruit, soft tannin and a very slitht astringency in the finish. Good.
1993 DRC Echezaux – darker wine with a very decent nose with vanilla and red fruit, marred only by a slight volatile acidity that somewhat abated with air, at which point some Asian spice kicked in and made itself known. In the mouth medium body, excellent concentration and rounder and fuller than I usually expect from this vintage with very good length.
1999 Girardin Corton Clos du Roi – darker wine with an excellent nose of earth, mushroom and raspberry, with a funkiness at first that passed with air. In the mouth, tons of acidity, bordering on the brink of excess, moderate tannin, some warmth and sweet fruit. nice and still on the way up.
2001 Jadot Corton-Pougets – this was the one I’d told them would be lighter and to serve it early. Unfortunately, it also turned out to be bizarre. The nose was very stewy/swampy, but that did go away with air. Unfortunately what it left behind wasn’t what one would look for - light fruit on palate, elegant but lacking concentration, and someone suggested (and I couldn’t disagree) a very faint hint of TCA. I buy this wine because it is the least known of Jadots Grand Crus and often offers good value, but there was something wrong with this bottle. Not clearly corked (though it probably was, mildly) and otherwise just downright odd. Hadn’t tasted it before, but had checked up on good reviews by others, so must conclude that this bottle was a bad one.
2004 Jean Michel Guillon Mazis Chambertin – another middling vintage, but a wine that showed well. Dark, excellent red fruit nose, sweet in the mouth, good with and very well balanced.
2005 Nicholas Potel Ruchets Chambertin – very good vintage but sadly a less convincing wine, for me. Lighter in colour, with a nice briary fruit component to the nose, but on palate I thought it a bit light in fruit and a bit simple. Pleasant, but I was surprised to learn the vintage.
The restaurant was a mixed success. The food was excellent (I only took issue with a sweetbread course, where they had over floured/breaded the sweetbreads, making them a tad doughy. I flour them and get a nice crisp outside with a nice soft inside that does them better service, IMO).
The wine service was a bit of a joke. Fortunately the person that organized the event insisted on proper Burgundy glasses. We brought our wines, as usual, in brown bags with our name on them and gave any instructions we thought would enhance the order of service. The staff listened, and then totally disregarded all they had been told, throwing out the bags and not keeping track of whose wine was which. The also ignored advice (I had indicated that my Corton would be a lighter wine and should come early in the dinner) and simply put wines of like origin together regardless of weight or advice. I give them a 9/10 for food and a 4/10 for paying attention to the customers wishes.
Good event, thanks to the organizer.
. Am typing on an iPad from high above downtown Vancouver, so won't get into more detail until I have a proper keyboard, but I must clarify something regarding the wine service. And that is that, though yes they made the mistake of not keeping track of whose wine was who's, my instructions had been to serve the wines in order of oldest first. Thinking there would be more older bottles that would be delicate in the way of your 91Jaboulet la Chapelle last week, and that my DRC might be one of them, I wanted the softest wines with the 'lighter' dishes and the younger boldest wine with the cheese course (my last post on Fanatic advised this intention). Whether in hindsight I would put THAT set of wines in that order again, or would feel the need to differentiate between dishes with this new chef's food (I would not--the lamb dish was not in fact heavier than the duck), the proprietor was 100% right to obey his master.