Our Night at WhiskeyFest

We had an amazing time at the WhiskyFest event! Our table was very popular and we got to meet so many interesting people, and saw some familiar faces as well. The whiskeys that we had the honor of sampling were out of this world and unforgettable. So many stellar whiskeys with so little time, how can one choose a favorite it just would not be fair. Glenlivet's table poured several different vintages all fantastic and one super special 1959 Vintage bottling, the cost $4,000 a bottle and is not available for sale. Springbank's table was one I frequented because I'm such a big fan of the Longrow 14 and the Hazelburn. The guys from Pappy Van Winkle poured their whole line including the 23 Year Old Bourbon, what an outstanding whiskey! We're already looking forward to next year's event!

BUILDING A COGNAC

So there we are, most of the D&M staff, sitting around Mike and Karen’s dining room table with the semi-legendary Alain Royer. He’s the man who saved Fussigny Cognac for a while, at least, among many other things. We’re going to blend a Cognac for an upcoming club under his tutelage.

He has a kit, with a graduated cylinder just like you used in high school chemistry, and a bunch of miniature bottles of cognacs of various ages and provenance. First we pour each into a glass and pass them around. Everyone takes a sniff and mentions something about what they smell. It’s too soon to start tasting.

We build the Cognac from a base that is a blend of a 40 year old and a 45 year old brandy. You’ve got to start somewhere. The cylinder shows 50 cls. of volume. We put a little bit in a glass and taste that, so we know what we’re working with. Next we add 10 cls. of a Cognac from 1900. This dramatically adds to the aromatics.

We pass that blend around, and then add another ingredient, another Cognac that adds a pretty, fruity note, but we decide it needs something for backbone. Another little bottle comes out, and we put 10 cls. of that into it. At this point Karen announces “Allspice!”

The advantage to doing this at our proprietor’s home becomes clear right away. Karen runs to her spice shelf and produces a jar of allspice and passes it around. We confirm her judgment. And we’re having fun.

Of course, through all of this, Alain is keeping up a running commentary about how this is done, and how long he’s been doing this sort thing (close to 40 years). He is, it goes without saying, a charming Frenchman with a rich accent and a wealth of stories.

Now all of the cognacs we are using are at cask strength. Well, not exactly, because most of them have been out of cask for a while, and been stored in glass demi-johns, which is the custom in Cognac. If that 1900 Petite Champagne had been in a barrel all that time, it would only taste like wood. Still, the point is these are powerful brandies, all over 45% alcohol by volume. As we stack the brandies in the cylinder, even taking the tiny sips we take while blending, we’re noticing that. Once we’ve achieved the flavor profile we’ve chosen, Alain produces a tiny bottle of distilled water to lower the proof, just a little. After tasting that, one of us points to an earlier ingredient, the aromatic brandy. We add 5 cls. of that one, and we think we’ve gotten the job done.

“Of course,” Alain tells us, “when I go back home and put this blend together for you, I won’t be using water to bring down the strength.” He chuckles. “That would be silly. I’ll be using older Cognac of much lower proof.”

We all taste our finished product, and pronounce it good. We have a miniature of our blend sitting back in the office. In a month or so, Alain will send us a full bottle of what he’s put together in France, and we’ll compare it to what we composed on that foggy day in San Francisco. If we still like it (and I’m sure we will) it will become an exclusive bottling for our Cognac Inner Circle members. We can’t wait!

THINKING OVER A GLASS

Last night, over a glass of Armagnac (Dartigalongue XO, if you must know—a sturdy, commercial Armagnac that represents real value) about my high school Latin. It was the famous first words of Julius Caesar’s Commentaries on the Gallic Wars--GALLIA est omnis divisa in partes tres—All Gaul is divided into three parts.

The line came back to me because Armagnac is divided into three parts. There’s Bas Armagnac, to the west, Tenareze, in the center and Haut Armagnac to the east. Two out of three of those regions wind up on the labels of a lot of bottles of brandy, of course. Bas Armagnac is probably considered the sexiest sub-region, because of its high concentration of sables fauves, or iron rich sand. This seems to produce the best grapes for distilling, although the boulbenes, sand with pieces of clay, is also good for long-lived spirits; Tenareze is blessed with a fair amount of that kind of soil. Haut Armagnac produces grapes for brandy, but they mostly go into blends offered by negociants.

Most of the vines that produce Armagnac come from the rolling hills where the Bas Armagnac meets Tenareze. This is picturesque country, dotted with bastides, walled villages dating back to the wars with the English in the Middle Ages. It’s pretty country, and good for agriculture, great for brandy; however, the industry seems to be dying. As we drove through the villages, you could see abandoned vineyards everywhere—gnarled, venerable vines suffering from neglect, just waiting to collapse back into the soil. Many of the healthiest looking vineyards, we were told, are not producing Armagnac, but wines from Gascony, which can be sold every year, without waiting for the long aging process that makes a profound spirit.

Maybe that’s why my rudimentary Latin came back to me over the glass. That language is long dead, but there are remnants still with us. It seems that Armagnac itself may be going that way. Certainly there’s enough to last a while, we saw chais holding row after row of barrels containing aging spirit, but it seems like it is fading fast. Maybe the Slow Food folk can put this stuff on their ark and save it. Meanwhile, I’ll sip mine slowly and ponder the lessons I learned long ago.

History In A Glass

So it’s out last day in France after 10 days of covering most of the wine regions at a breakneck pace. That meant many wines and, it seemed like, even more food. We drove up from Cognac towards the Loire River. We are four weary, slightly smelly American males whose trip has outlasted their sock supply. We pull in, late, to the town of Saumur-Champigny. Charles Neal, our leader, translator and coordinator, calls Philippe Vatan on his cell phone asking where we should meet for lunch. We park next to a Gothic Cathedral and walk to the restaurant where Philippe treats us to lovely lunch.

Then we pile back into the green van and go up to look at the vineyards out of which Philippe produces his wonderful Chateau du Hureau (Hureau is the word in the local dialect for wild boar) Saumur-Champigny Cabernet Franc.

Now understand that the four of us have been traveling together for 10 days. We have looked at a lot of vineyards. We started at the end of March and it’s now early April. At this time of year, vineyards everywhere look about the same—gray, twisted stalks, tortuously stretched across various forms of trellises. They haven’t begun to bud yet, except deep in the south of France. The sky is gray. We drive down the hills, under that steely sky towards the broad river. We turn up to the beautiful Chateau that is home to both Philippe and the winery. It’s here that magic happens.

First, of course, we go into the limestone caves that burrow beneath the hills above us, where a modern, yet classic winery is tucked away. We taste current vintages from large, stainless steel tanks. Most of those wines were pretty darned good, and very interesting to us Americans, who don’t really understand Cabernet Franc as a grape. The Philippe starts talking, leading us back into the depths of his caves.

Much of this, he tells us, was blocked off during the war. We hid people here, he says, Allied Paratroopers, people escaping the Gestapo. I’m not sure how my parents and grandparents did it, except that the local SS commandant was a civilized man. He leads us deeper under the hill, behind all the tanks and the current winemaking equipment. There are bins and bins of bottles that look as old as time. He reaches into one of the darkest corners and pulls up a bottle, smiling as he shows it off.

“This is 1945. We can open it if you like!” Even four weary wine thugs know a treat when they see it. We nod enthusiastically.

We go back up into the chateau. Philippe produces glassware, and we taste some of the reds from the last vintage as we look across the broad expanse of the Loire River. Philippe tells us how he was cursing at Charles through the entire last vintage, since it was his idea that the vineyards be moved to organic methods. Still, he smiles as he says it, and tells us he loves the wines that were produced that way. We politely taste, spit, rinse and say nice things about the wines while we admire the view. Finally, Philippe decides 1945 has settled enough.

It is a 1945 Domaine du Hureau Saumur-Champigny Blanc Sec. In the middle of the century, most of the grapes in this region were white. The concentration was that favorite of the disco era, Chenin Blanc. This Sec started its life out slightly sweet. Philippe carefully removes the cork from the bottle and passes it around. Written on the cork are the numbers wand words “1945—Victoire.”

The wine is golden in our glasses. The nose is still amazingly fresh, alive with floral notes, hints of licorice and an abundance of fruit. We taste in silence for a moment or two. The range in ages in the room goes from Philippe—a few years my senior, through myself, in my fifties, Charles in forties, and Jon in his thirties. All of us are a bit overwhelmed by what we are drinking. Both Philippe and I reminisce a moment about our fathers, whose lives were changed by that war, and look in awe at this golden wine. It keeps changing and evolving in the glass. There is no question of spitting this out and moving on. We spent the better part of an hour with that wine, letting it change before our eyes and palates and noses. Finally it was finished.

As we were leaving Charles asked Philippe for a favor. Could Mark have the cork? It’s the only actual souvenir I have from France, and I can’t think of anything I would treasure more.

D&M's Champagne Tasting

What an evening we just had, Champagne Taittinger really knows how to throw a party! Jerome Jeandin was the speaker of the event and he definitely kept everyone's attention with his charm and humorous nature. The real star of the show were the bubblies of course. The whole Taittinger line up was fantastic but we have to say that the Vintage 2002 was fascinating and the complexity and beauty of the 2003 Comte de Champagne Rosé was unforgettable. We can't wait till next year's tasting, this one is going to be tough to beat.

Sine Qua Non 2005 Atlantic 203

Just last Friday we received our allotment of this sought after wine and within a few days it was sold out. Was it all a dream? The wine retailed for $264 and Parker gave it very high ratings.
So what is so special about this California Syrah?

This is what Parker had to say:

"The 2005 Atlantis Fe 203-1a is a blend of 93% Syrah, 5% Grenache, and 2% Viognier, with about 25% whole clusters (stems) utilized. The vineyard sources include the Eleven Confessions as well as White Hawk, Alban, and Bien Nacido. An inky/blue/black/purple hue is followed by sweet blackberry, charcoal, and chocolate aromas, graphite and blackberry flavors, full body, decent acidity, and a stunningly long finish. This terrific effort should turn out to be one of the most French-styled Syrahs Krankl has yet produced. It reveals the great intensity and purity of California fruit superimposed on a European structure and sense of harmony. To reiterate, it is a challenge to analyze these wines. I know they are distinctive, and I think I am beginning to understand why they are so much greater than just about every other Syrah or Grenache-based wine in California. In short, it is talent and incredibly meticulous hard work. No one works as hard or is as maniacal about a vineyard’s viticulture and winemaking as Manfred Krankl. Take that, add in exceptional talent, humility, top-notch vineyards, and I believe I understand the fundamentals of why these wines are so special."

D&M's Champagne Club

Our Spring Champagne Club selection for April is going to be so exciting, it's coming from one of our favorite house Pertois Moriset. This family owned champagne house is located in the sacred southern Champagne site of Le Mesnil sur Oger. This is in our opinion the best place for the Chardonnay grape to grow. Our lucky club members get first pick of the vintage 2000 bottle and rose, the price for Champagne Club members only $87.98 for the two bottles. What a bargain!