Last evening was a good chance to have a relaxed midweek wine
dinner at The Salt Yard in Goodge street, what I will call good European tapas.
Very wine friendly with good, not over fussy, service and a nice atmosphere.
Sussex (you can seem him in other posts) supplied all but one of the wines,
which was the Prum brought by Burdhoud. We were six in total which was a great
number for the seven wines we had. We kicked off with a magnum of Wehlener Sonnenuhr Spatlese 2009 from Prum, these mags are seriously
splendid looking bottles, not easily chilled down but visually great and a
bottle of Riesling is never enough! The wine was just open enough, not
reductive (stinky) which Prums can be when young. I really enjoyed the balance
and completeness of the wine, it has a way to go but there is no harm in
drinking it now.
Up next was a pair of 1er Cru Burgundies - Puligny Montrachet 1er Cru Les Perrieres
2007, L.Carillion and Meursault 1er Cru Le Porusot 2008, G.Roulot. Whilst both
are young and a tiny bit closed it was a great comparison with both showing the
characteristics you’d expect from both the vintages and the appellations. The
Puligny was taught and focussed, almost under oaked (a good thing!), very
refined with a long future but cracking now. The Meursault from one of the
villages greatest names was more closed on the nose with a tell-tale weight
from both the site and the vintage, there was considerable texture here. The rich,
honeyed, smokey Meursault character you would expect is there it is just held
in check at the moment.
Next up was a trio of 2000 Barolo’s. None of them are growers
I know well, all three are more modern, using new barriques. I find 2000’s to
be a good, 4 star, but not necessarily serious vintage with most of the wines
open for business and accessible without the potential to make “old bones”.
These three: Barolo Cannubi 2000 from E.Pira, Barolo Cannubi 2000 from Damilano
and Barolo Rocche 2000 from Vietti did conform to those thoughts. The Vietti
was the one wine that will repay a bit more time the others were in no way
declining but are not worth extended cellaring, enjoy then from now on. The Damilano
was the most overtly intense with a good density of fruit, the Liquorice and
tar you expect of the modern producers was evident but not too much, a good
wine. The Pira was harder to assess, I couldn’t quite decide whether it was
more elegant or just a little bit of a lightweight, a decent glass but slightly
stuck between a rock and a hard place. The Vietti was the most serious, they
grow good fruit and you can see this, I do just find it a shame they use the
oak but this is purely a personal thing…it was great to get the chance to drink
these.
With a little cheese to finish we had Gewürztraminer Cuvee Laurence 1998
from Weinbach. I loved this bottle, ever since tasting the Zind-Humbrecht’s (a
few blogs ago) I have been finding a lot to like in Alsace. This showed enough
Gewurztraminer fruit, spice and ripeness without being over the top. It was off
dry but not to a VT or SGN level. Just a really good wine with balance and
elegance, drinking perfectly from now onwards and versatile enough to have at
beginning or end of a meal. One note on the venue, it is definitely best to be
a group, four to six I would say and get one person to do the ordering…the just
relax and enjoy, I’ll be going back…
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