SPECTATOR WINE CLUB
From the interesting to the supreme
Auberon Waugh
Next, a thoroughly mature minor claret which has already passed the ten-year test. Old fashioned people in England who did not know much about wine reckoned to drink French reds (except, perhaps, beau- jolais) ten years after vintage, and there is more wisdom in that simple rule than many experts might care to acknowledge. Unfor- tunately, it is quite hard to find ten-year old claret around, except at a silly price. This 1979 C6tes de Bourg(2) has a nutty, autumnal smell with a touch of cedar on top of the blackcurrant. It should keep well and is delicious now at the very reasonable price of £4.15. Hats off to Dr Theodore Redpath for having found it. Regnie(3) is a new Beaujolais cru, prom- oted in 1988. I had never seen it before, and don't suppose it can possibly keep up this standard. Nearly everybody made good beaujolais in 1988, but this one is brilliant, and at under £5 the bottle it had the whole panel cheering. It is very rare to find such a rich gamay taste. The panel member who took it away declared it was delicious to the last drop, several days later. I see it won a silver medal at the 1989 Concours de Paris. I would have given it a gold, and, at the price, a special trophy. This is a beautiful wine. Anybody who has ever liked beaujolais should run for it. There are 114 cases available, which should be enough, but it would be foolish to loiter.
Next we go up £1 to an excellently rich, uncomplicated Margaux(4), full of whort-
leberries and velvet and good expensive sensations, with very little complexity in the taste but greater depth than you would expect from a grand bourgeois at £5.78. It has 35 per cent of merlot, but none of the
ratty taste of young merlot. I should drink it now — I doubt it will get any better, and it is agreeably satisfying as it is.
Previous followers of Redpath and Thackray wines may remember their
Chateauneuf from Usseglio(5). The 1986, in its handsome embossed bottle, is beauti- fully forward, with a creamy, burned smell,
a little sting at the end and a first taste which is not very strong but very, very high class. The taste develops. Rather oddly, it was still drinking well after five days. I am sorry it costs £6.20, but that is the price of classical Chateauneuf, and this one is ready for drinking.
Finally, a bit of a joker. I suspect nobody will spend £7.25 on a Barbaresco(6), and it rather puts up the price of a mixed case, but those who take the mixed case may well find it a revelation and wish to re-order. Without any of the metallic improprieties of so many heavier Italian wines, this Barbaresco presents a cheesy violets smell, and its rich, sweet, heavy attack is finished with a good sting. It goes very well with tomato and garlic and strong cheese or pizza. It is lovely but not cheap.
The mixed case works out at £5.29 the bottle — all red, all (except the first) interesting. The first is admirable, in its own way, but the beaujolais Regnie is supreme.
Previous page
