View Single Post
  #1 (permalink)   Report Post  
Posted to alt.food.wine
DaleW DaleW is offline
external usenet poster
 
Posts: 4,554
Default TN: SOBER @ my house- Champagne, Alsace, Bdx, Piedmont, Burg, Rioja, Loire

My turn to host SOBER. Next time I take the afternoon off! A little
frantic, but although Betsy was going out she made the first course
and gave general assistance. Nice group as always, who demonstrated
patience with the tight spaces, needy dog, and hard vegetables.

We started off as people drifted in with various cheeses, duck
rillettes and prosciutto, sweet capicola, and 2 bubblies.

1998 Billecarte Salmon Blanc de Blancs Champagne
Fresh and zippy, mineral and citrus, nice length. I really enjoyed
this (actually more than the '98 Cuvee Nicholas-Francois I had last
year). B+/A-

1996 Pommery "Cuvee Louise" Champagne Brut
I found this not nearly as fresh. Yeasty, appley, but flat. One person
thought it was just being a grumpy adolescent. But while I caught no
sign during dinner, a sip as I was putting stuff away seemed to show
trace TCA NR

On to the blind flights. It's fun to be the one who knows for a
change. :

First Flight
1993 Drouhin Clos de la Roche
Showed a bit of diaper on opening, but that had mostly dissipated by
serving time. Someone called this low acid, I'd say moderate, but I'm
surprised as I remember previous bottle being a bit brighter.
Pleasant, solid, but lacking a bit of depth. B

1993 Chandon de Briailles Corton-Bressandes
Some mixed opinions on this one, but I quite liked. Red fruit, smoke,
earth. A bit lighter than I expected for Corton, but I enjoyed. Group
got CdBeaune quickly, but took a while for the wine. B+

First course was a Marcella Hazan seafood salad, with squid, octopus,
clams, mussels, and shrimp. Due to some trepidation on opening the
whites, I warned people to hold on to their Champagne.

Second Flight
(not served) 1983 Trimbach Cuvee Frederic Emile Riesling - this had a
bit of a fill issue, but a similar fill from same source was stellar
earlier this year. This, however, was not stellar, but instead dying.
NR

1996 Trimbach Clos Ste. Hune Riesling
A quick guess of white Rioja, then Dan said "no, we're in Alsace." The
problem was the guesses then turned to 25-30 year old wines. My
original plan was to do a Loire flight, but after recently seeing a
note on a dinner where John had a PremOxed '96 CSH, I thought try this
now. Well, if it was 30 years old, this might be acceptable, but this
is not what one wants in a 14 year old CSH. C+

1999 Trimbach Clos Ste. Hune Riesling
This was the backup for the CFE, but needed to do duty for both. Not
as advanced as the 96, but worrisomely soft. A glass during cleanup
actually showed better than it did during dinner, but still at best a
B.