2007 Bergerac blanc - vin plastique - nice and showing some complexity
if a hint of oxidation.

El Vino Sercial Madeira - dry with the usual penetrating flavour
profile and great persistence, a marvellous match with:

A duck consommé finished with Madeira, done traditionally (preparation
takes 3 days!)

2002 Francois Mikulski Meursault Genevrieres - excellent balance with
the oak only one element rather than the main act, full flavoured,
long and tasty.

With crab (both light and dark meat) dressed with egg white and
parsley

1998 Conti Moulin des Dames Bergerac rouge - dark wine with
interesting Rhonish leather and dark fruit nose, the middle coming
together nicely, and the tannins still prominent but now manageable.

1999 Conti Moulin des Dames Bergerac rouge - similar but showing more
development. Both of these wines would fit nicely into a blind St.
Emilion tasting and would show competitively.

With Magret duck breast baked in salt - dark meat with all the flavour
sealed in, a very tasty way to prepare this dish - possibly the best
way!

The next 3 wines were carried through the last 3 courses together.

2001 Gerardin Ch. La Mourigne Saussignac - a botrycised sweet white in
the same class as Sauternes and Monbazillac, this wine was only medium
sweet and weight and worked better with the food than a sweeter wine
would have.

1996 Szepsy Takaji Aszu 6 Puttonyos - having said that, this wine,
much sweeter, showed not badly at all, due to the excellent acidity
and balance. Darker colour and darker more intense nose.

2001 Gerardin Florilege Saussignac - the premium version from the same
house was showing even more botrytis in the nose and was also very
smooth, a classy wine that matched the foie gras very well.

With Foie gras poached in vin rouge - silky smooth

Bleu des causes


And dessert - a wonderful tart tatin and the Tokaji came into it's own
here and mated with the sweet apples very well.

On Apr 6, 9:49*am, Mike Tommasi > wrote:
> Quintessential Ian selection!
>
> Hey Bill where else are you planning to be in France?

Mike, I won't be heading too far south (as I recall that's where you
live?) this time

Maybe down to Pau, but we'll see. Mostly to Madiran, Cahors, Bergerac,
some of the lesser known AOCs

Hi Bill,
On Sun, 6 Apr 2008 09:34:52 -0700 (PDT), "Bill S." >
wrote:

>2007 Bergerac blanc - vin plastique - nice and showing some complexity
>if a hint of oxidation.

I was dubious about serving this as an apéro, because Jacquie had said
that it wasn't as good at it had been last year. But then decided that
as we'd got 10 litres of it, we had better finish it before moving on!
The wine was one of the very last 5 wine boxes of Ch La Maurigne's
"basic" white before the new batch is ready this month. One could
argue it shouldn't have been sold even at the ludicrously cheap price
of €2.80 a litre, but honestly as Bill said it's not a bad wine.

>A duck consommé finished with Madeira, done traditionally (preparation
>takes 3 days!)

This was in fact a double consommé de cepes, with duck simmered with
dried cepes, but the cepes were by no means dominent. As the consommé
was clarified with minced duck breast, that element of the flavour
came forward nicely.

>With Foie gras poached in vin rouge - silky smooth
>Bleu des causses
>And dessert

And this is my real reason for writing.
An observant reader will have noticed that the foie gras _followed_
the meat course so that we could accompany it with a sweet wine (or
two) rather than serving it at the beginning of the meal.

Speaking personally - though the others (possibly being polite)
agreed, I found that despite this being the fourth of six courses, the
meal was not in any way too heavy and the foie gras went brilliantly
well at that stage of the meal. I knew that this "Cold Roti" was a
tradition at the end of the 19th early 20th century, and frankly I
think we were wrong to drop this tradition especially if the foie gras
it to be matched against a sweet wine.

Thanks to Bill for his comments, and thanks to him also for taking us
out to lunch today. We had originally intended to go to the St
Jacques, our local fine dining spot, but they're on holiday at the
moment. So we booked ourselves into the Rendezvous des Pecheurs, a
smallish private hotel with large dining room, overlooking the
Dordogne river in the middle of nowhere. They were bung full, and we
were glad we'd booked.

Splendid meal, though I think I might just have to give them a little
lesson on making crepes Suzette! Nice wines - Ch Laulerie - Montravel,
of which we had a couple of bottles first as an aperitif and then with
the first course. That was followed by a very good Cahors, Ch la
Pineraie "Cuvée Authentique" 2003. This was a huge great wine, with
legs that would look good on a sprinter, and a nose that came
galloping out of the glass and was all black fruits. Still slightly
tannic, it was still a baby - being made from Malbec - but being from
such a hot year, it had clearly come forward fairly fast. I think a
visit is called for!
--
All the best
Fatty from Forges

Bill S. wrote:

Thanks for those notes, Bill. It sounds like it was a great meal chez
Hoares. Please convey our best wishes to Ian and Jacquie should you
read this in time.

> 1996 Szepsy Takaji Aszu 6 Puttonyos - having said that, this wine,
> much sweeter, showed not badly at all, due to the excellent acidity
> and balance. Darker colour and darker more intense nose.

Ah, yes, I well remember this wine from our visit to Forgès in '01. At
the time, it was excellent but an infant, so now I suppose that it's an
attractive adolescent ;-)

Best wishes,
Mark Lipton

--
alt.food.wine FAQ: http://winefaq.hostexcellence.com

On Apr 6, 12:34�pm, "Bill S." > wrote:
> 2007 Bergerac blanc - vin plastique - nice and showing some complexity
> if a hint of oxidation.
>
> El Vino Sercial Madeira - dry with the usual penetrating flavour
> profile and great persistence, a marvellous match with:
>
> A duck consomm� finished with Madeira, done traditionally (preparation
> takes 3 days!)
>
> 2002 Francois Mikulski Meursault Genevrieres - excellent balance with
> the oak only one element rather than the main act, full flavoured,
> long and tasty.
>
> With crab (both light and dark meat) dressed with egg white and
> parsley
>
> 1998 Conti Moulin des Dames Bergerac rouge - dark wine with
> interesting Rhonish leather and dark fruit nose, the middle coming
> together nicely, and the tannins still prominent but now manageable.
>
> 1999 Conti Moulin des Dames Bergerac rouge - similar but showing more
> development. Both of these wines would fit nicely into a blind St.
> Emilion tasting and would show competitively.
>
> With Magret duck breast baked in salt - dark meat with all the flavour
> sealed in, a very tasty way to prepare this dish - possibly the best
> way!
>
> The next 3 wines were carried through the last 3 courses together.
>
> 2001 Gerardin Ch. La Mourigne Saussignac - a botrycised sweet white in
> the same class as Sauternes and Monbazillac, this wine was only medium
> sweet and weight and worked better with the food than a sweeter wine
> would have.
>
> 1996 Szepsy Takaji Aszu 6 Puttonyos - having said that, this wine,
> much sweeter, showed not badly at all, due to the excellent acidity
> and balance. Darker colour and darker more intense nose.
>
> 2001 Gerardin Florilege Saussignac - the premium version from the same
> house was showing even more botrytis in the nose and was also very
> smooth, a classy wine that matched the foie gras very well.
>
> With Foie gras poached in vin rouge - silky smooth
>
> Bleu des causes
>
> And dessert - a wonderful tart tatin and the Tokaji came into it's own
> here and mated with the sweet apples very well.

thanks for the notes. Around here the few Bergeracs we see not
especially appealing, I think from Ian's posts they are some of the
less appealing producers.