Gourmet dinner and elegant wine flight
Fellow
Pour Boy,
wine buddy, Dr Dan and Linda hosted us for a artfully prepared gourmet
dinner with an elegant flight of wine pairings. They prepared pork chops
in a brown mushroom sauce, haricot verts, an imaginative BLT - bacon
and lettuce stuffed tomatos and extraordinary stuffed giant portabella
mushrooms (shown below) and rosemary potatoes.
Before dinner we had a selection of artisan cheeses, stuffed peppers, and a baked shrimp casserole.
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| Pork-chops in mushroom sauce |
After dinner, for desert featured baked apple strudel with vanilla bean ice cream. For the desert course Dan served
Rosalack Schloss Johannisberg Riesling Auslese and I brought a
Sonoma-Cutrer Winemaker's Release Late Harvest Chardonnay.
The wine flight:
Château François Gaunoux Pommard 1er Cru Les Grands Épenots 2011
Château Clinet Pomerol 2005
Château Larcis Ducasse St Emilion Grand Cru Bordeaux 2004
Château Grand-Puy-Lacoste Pauillac Bordeaux 2011
Rosalack Schloss Johannisberg Riesling Auslese 2009
Sonoma-Cutrer Winemaker's Release Late Harvest Chardonnay 2012
Tasting notes:
Château François Gaunoux Pommard 1er Cru Les Grands Épenots 2011
With the cheese course of artisan cheeses, olives and cheese stuffed green peppers, Dan opened this Burgundy Pinot Noir.
Garnet
colored, light medium bodied, this was elegant and refined with fresh
with dusty rose violets, earthiness, red currant and plum and fruits. It
showed smooth silky fine-grained
tannins with excellent length on the balanced, delicious and
complex finish.
RM 91 points.
https://www.cellartracker.com/wine.asp?iWine=177948
Château Clinet Pomerol 2005
We just tasted the spectacular
2016 vintage release of this wine earlier this week at the UGCB release tour tasting with owner Ronan Laborde at the Drake in Chicago.
This
2005 was amazing, arguably the best Clinet I've experienced and is
certainly at it's apex; hard to imagine this improving further with more
aging.
Dark garnet colored, medium bodied, silky smooth
polished, nicely balanced, dark fruits accented by tantalizing elegant
floral notes of lavender and violets with subtle notes of mocha, spice
and tobacco on a lingering soft tannin finish.
RM 95 points.
https://www.cellartracker.com/notes.asp?iWine=224074
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( Pomerol )
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Sea Smoke Santa Rita Hills Pinot Noir Southing 2009
Cellartracker Somm David T's tasting notes sums up this wine eloquently and thoroughly.
"The nose reveals, sweet, slightly sour and ripe; blackberries, some
black raspberries, dark cherries, plum, blueberries cranberries,
pomegranate, candied cherries and baked strawberries. Big vanillin, soft
cinnamon stick, touch of clove, dark spice, herbaceous notes, mixed
berry cola, dark, rich, moist soil, dry clay, dry stone, limestone
minerals with dark red, blue fresh & withering flowers.
The
body medium full. Tannins nicely resolved but, still have tarry teeth.
The structure and tension nicely softened. The 09 is beautifully
integrated. The length and balance have hit their high point. Ripe;
blackberries, some black raspberries, dark cherries, plum, mix of some
purple fruits, blueberries, cranberries, pomegranate, candied cherries
and juicy strawberries. Red licorice/cola, good presence of vanillin,
soft cinnamon stick, touch of clove, dark spice, black licorice,
herbaceous notes; bay leaf, mint, eucalyptus, dark, rich, moist, soil,
clay, river stones, limestone minerals and dark red, blue fresh &
withering flowers with violets. The acidity is round and like a rain
shower. The finish is extremely well balanced, seamless, elegant, rich,
persistent for minutes with ripe fruit, medium dark spice that brings
some mild heat and haunting fragrant violets for minutes".
https://www.cellartracker.com/wine.asp?iWine=1025980
Château Larcis Ducasse St Emilion Grand Cru Bordeaux 2004
Like the Clinet above, we tasted the
2016 vintage release of this wine earlier this week at the UGCB release tour tasting with commercial director David Suire, so I pulled from the cellar this twelve year old vintage release to compare.
This was dark garnet colored, with a slight brown/orange rim starting to
set in, medium-full bodied, smooth polished with delightful complex
aromas and flavors of plum, black currant and blackberry fruits with
tones of earthy leather, black tea, cigar box and spice with hints of
truffle, cedar and cassis on the smooth polished tannin finish.
RM 89 points
https://www.cellartracker.com/wine.asp?iWine=95970
https://unwindwine.blogspot.com/2018/02/larcis-ducasse-highlights-sunday-brunch.html
http://www.larcis-ducasse.com/
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| David Suire of Chateau Larcis Ducasse |
Château Grand-Puy-Lacoste Pauillac Bordeaux 2011
Like the Clinet and the Larcis-Ducasse above, we also tasted the 2016 vintage release of this wine earlier this week at the UGCB release tour tasting. Again we had the privilege of tasting this with sales director David Launay, (shown right with Céline Villars-FOUBET, Owner, of Château Chasse-Spleen) so I asked Dan to pull this one too from the cellar this twelve year old vintage release to compare.
If
you tend to procure wines based on vintage due to a particular
anniversary or birthyear, or to fill out a vertical collection, 2011 was
a challenging year in Napa and Bordeaux, this seems to be average from
an average vintage, but decent value since the higher end labels were
not markedly demonstrably better, this won't likely improve further with
aging.
This is a blend of 75 % cabernet sauvignon, 20 % merlot and 5 % cabernet franc.
This
is one of our stalwart favorite go-to wines for Bordeaux, being more
reasonably priced than the 'super second' more premium labels such as
Pichon Lalande and Pichon Longueville, and Lynch Bages. This is one of
my favorites of this tier of labels. It was fun to see David Launay move
from St Julien favorite Gruaud Larose to this label a couple years ago,
and seeing him in Chicago at the UGCB each year.
Garnet colored, medium bodied, good length, some leanness,
classic Bordeaux style with flavours of dark berry fruits accented by notes of . cedar, leather and a
touch anise and hint of mocha, nice balance of acidity with smooth polished tannins.
https://www.cellartracker.com/wine.asp?iWine=1356149
https://www.chateau-grand-puy-lacoste.com/en/#/en/
Schloss Johannisberg Riesling Rosalack Auslese 2015
Dan served this German Auslese with the desert course.
Schloss
Johannisberg, from the German Rheingau wine region, is one of the most
historic wine producers in Germany. They were the first German wine
estate entirely planted with riesling, in 1720. Schloss Johannisberg
tends to produce powerful
and spicy wines relative to other Rheingau wines. Their wines exhibit
minerality and elegance which are qualities of good quality Riesling.
Schloss
Johannisberg use large oak barrels for their
wines, which contribute to the spiciness.
Schloss
Johannisberg have 35
hectares (70 acres) of vineyards, just on the fiftieth parallel.
Rosalack
comes from the portion directly below the castle Schloss Johannisberg.
They are one of a few historical German estates that have their own
official
vineyard designation, without village name. The vineyard designation is
therefore simply Schloss Johannisberger.
This is a quality Auslese with nice acidity and good minerality with hints of
botrytis, it is fresh and crisp rather than heavy as found in many sweet wines.
Straw
colored, medium bodied, medium sweetness with high acidity, this is
complex with fresh scents of peach, subtle notes of dried apricot,
orange,
botrytis and honey, finishing with citrus, green apple,
honey and
mineral.
https://www.cellartracker.com/wine.asp?iWine=2377449
Sonoma-Cutrer Winemaker's Release Late Harvest Chardonnay 2012
We toured the Russian River Valley in remote Sonoma County with Dan and Linda during our Sonoma Napa Wine Experience 2017 last year.
Wine and Spirits writes of this release, "This takes the ripening potential of the Russian River Valley
and runs with it, melding the coolness of the region’s fog with the
sunny, floral notes of honeycomb. Its plump nectarine flavors gain
complexity from touches of botrytis, which took off in the vineyard
after several storms in late October and early November. Winemaker Mick
Schroeter can’t recall another vintage with such a complete infection of
botrytis. The result is a richly textured dessert wine, balanced to
drink on its own." They rated this
91 points in 12/2013.
Light honey colored, full bodied, extracted apricot fruit
flavor with hints of lemon citrus accented by notes of honey, crème
brûlée and vanilla bean on a smooth lingering finish.
RM 91 points.
https://www.cellartracker.com/wine.asp?iWine=1737186
As we have written in recent tasting reviews of wine acquired during this Estate visit, this label is from Piazza Del Dotto, Del Dotto's newest project, a new winery south on St Helena Highway featuring an Italian-inspired
“barchessa,” or barn, magnificently appointed with tasting rooms and dining areas. It is surrounded by fountain gardens with al
fresco tasting cabanas, vegetable gardens, 17th century
fountains and an outdoor barn with turkeys, peacocks, pheasants and
doves. There are wine caves as well, all surrounded by 8.5 acres of cabernet sauvignon vineyards. 
