Tag Archive for 'restaurant'

Back on the booze

Published on February 17, 2013 in My tasting notes. 2 Comments Tags: , , , , , .

As you may be aware, I have been off alcohol for a while on medical advice. I must admit I did make a few exceptions for particularly attractive tasting opportunities, but last weekend was the first one where my wine drinking was back to normal.  As it happened I managed to find three very enjoyable, though relatively modest wines, to break my fast with.  These are the experiences that really make wine worthwhile for me.

The Talbot was drunk at home with a shoulder of lamb, but the other bottles mentioned below were opened at our local BYO restaurant, Aladdin.  The restaurant was on fine form.  It has expanded to occupy all of the ex-Indian restaurant next door – it moved into the first floor a year or so ago, and has now taken over the ground floor too.  They do not sell alcohol, and so forgo the generous markups usually applied by restaurants, and I don’t think they have increased their prices in the seven years or so I have been going, but clearly they are successful.  Presumably it is because they offer a product that people like, and it always seems to attract a broad range of customers.  But anyway – the wine:

botb

Ryzlink Rýnsk, Víno S Prívlastkem, Pozdní Sber, Polosuché, Tomáš Krist, Oblast Morave, Podoblast Slovácká Obec Milotice Vinícní Trať Šidleny, 2009, 11.5%, members’ price at The Daily Drinker is £11.70. Firstly, I think some translation and explanation is in order.  I shall do my best – corrections welcome.  This is a Riesling produced by Tomáš Krist, in the Oblast Morave region of the Czech Republic.  Confusingly it is not easy to spot the country of origin on the label, but you do see the word Slovácká, which you might think is Slovakia – actually it is a subregion of Oblast Morave.  This wine is a pale watery green.  On the nose I get intense fresh lime and lemon.  It has medium high acidity, and perhaps the merest hint of some residual sugar.  On the palate the aromatics are as on the nose.  The wine is refreshing, but the acidity is not at all searing. In fact it seems to have a creamy note, so I wonder it has perhaps gone through a malolactic fermentation, which I believe would be unusual for a Riesling. Decent length and rather a nice balance.  Probably best to drink now, but I would be interested to see how it ages over the next few years.  Pleasant but simple. ***

Terra d’Alter, Vinho Regional Alentejano, Touriga Nacional, Portugal, 2010, 14.0%, members’ price at The Daily Drinker is £9.00. FWIW, this is an IWC Gold Medal winner. Medium pale purple ruby colour, with an intense, fresh, blackberry and raspberry nose.  Medium high acidity. Intense, but light. Fresh feeling to the wine.  Aromatics as nose. Medium low tannin. Excellent length. Good juicy fruit. Nice bitter finish. Drink now.   I am not sure about the extent to which sulphur was used with this wine, but freshness of the fruit reminds me of some of the best natural wines I have tasted.  Other Touriga Nacional wines I have tasted have been a lot heavier than this one.  ****

Cordier, Chateau Talbot, Saint-Julien, France, 1974.  I bought this recently for a very modest £8.00 from someone who picked it up at auction.  On wine-searcher at the time, I saw it being offered for £60 and £140 by different merchants.  Pale tawny colour.  On the nose and palate, it is has mature red fruit, and attractive gentle warm spicy notes.  Medium acid and medium astgringency, with excellent length.  Despite 1974 being a poor vintage, this was not at all dried out or oxidised.  It might well have been better many years ago, but is still a nice wine that gave me a lot of pleasure, and at £8 it was a bargain.  Not sure I would want to pay anything like £60, but those who appreciate mature wines more than me might see that as a reasonable price. ****

Nice food – pity about the wine service

Published on August 27, 2012 in General. 5 Comments Tags: .

Only under sufferance would I ever go to a restaurant that offers poor food, but with very few exceptions I have to resign myself to accept being disappointed with the way wine is served.

If you run a restaurant, please consider carefully what I say below.  I appreciate how much effort goes into providing good food and a pleasant environment, but so often find it sad that the same effort does not seem to be accorded to the wine.  Below I discuss two areas where restaurants are often lacking.

Temperature

There are pretty well established conventional temperatures for serving different types of wine.  Look at the temperature chart at the back of Hugh Johnson’s Pocket Wine Book for example.  I do not think it is tremendously important to get the temperature precisely correct according to what any one authority recommends, but it helps if you know roughly what you should be aiming for.

In particular, note that the highest temperature that any red wine should be served is a couple of degrees under 20°C – it is not the temperature of modern rooms, and even less is it the temperature of your kitchen in summer.  The difference between 18 and (say) 25°C has a huge effect on wine.  Try it!  Too warm and wine is soupy, and has a slight alcohol burn; at the correct temperature it is refreshing and the aromas are better defined.  This is not a difference that only wine buffs will notice.  There is also a corresponding problem with white wines being served too cold.  In my opinion that is not normally so bad, as cold wines will often warm quite quickly in the glass and bottle, but it is also something to be aware of.  If in doubt, check your temperature chart.

A dark cupboard, ground level, or even a cellar, might be the most appropriate place for reds prior to serving.  Eye-level in the restaurant kitchen is almost certainly bad!  Or perhaps have a large stock of wine cooler sleeves in a freezer, and give reds a couple of minutes in a sleeve before serving in the summer.  For whites, it is probably just a question of serving from a correctly adjusted fridge.

If you can afford it, and have enough space, a wine fridge with multiple temperature zones might be a good idea – for reds as well as whites.   I do not think such wine fridges are really necessary, but they certainly make things easy, and if you get a model that displays wines attractively it could help increase sales.

Glasses

Most people who have an opinion on the matter would agree that  wine should be served from a tulip-shaped glass that tapers in slightly towards the top.   That enables the aromas to develop, but not escape too quickly, thus allowing them to be appreciated by the drinker. The glass should be clear to show off the colour of the wine, and ideally it should be thin, particularly at the rim.  I cannot rationally justify the requirement for the glass to be thin, but subjectively it seems to make a big difference.

A good benchmark for the size and shape of a general purpose wine glass would be the Riedel Vinum Chianti.  Port, Sherry and dessert wines should probably be served from a smaller glass - I would suggest the ISO tasting glass as a benchmark for size and shape.  But I am not at all suggesting you need to use Riedel Vinum glasses - there are many cheaper alternatives that will be fine for all but the most fussy of wine geeks.

As with serving temperature, I do not believe it is only wine buffs that will appreciate good wine glasses.  They do make a real improvement to the wine drinking experience.  Besides, a decent wine glass looks so much more attractive than a small stubby one.

Oh, and maybe one more thing…

Or maybe not.  I am tempted to go on to discuss wine lists, matching with food, quality of information, and the apparently thorny issue of BYO.  But I won’t – I’ll stop now.  Almost whatever wine you give me will be so much better, and I shall be so much happier, if you serve it at the right temperature and put it in a decent glass.

I am not touting for business as a wine consultant, but if you are a restaurateur and have any questions do please ask.  I’ll be more than happy to help, particularly if it will lead to me having a better restaurant experience.

Wines from Lebanon and thereabouts

Published on July 21, 2012 in General and My tasting notes. 0 Comments Tags: , , , , , .

At last – another event that reminds me of what wine is all about, and why I like writing about it.  A group of wine nuts from Manchester and thereabouts once again descended on the Aladdin BYO restaurant in Withington,  to eat well, and share wines from Lebanon and thereabouts.  The original brief was to bring bottles from the Eastern Mediterranean or the North Coast of Africa.  We finished up with no bottles from Africa, and stretched the concept of Eastern Mediterranean from Greece to Georgia (mercifully as far as the one in the USA), but it didn’t seem to matter.  Somehow it felt as though we kept within the spirit of the theme.

As usual, Aladdin delivered, and we paid only £20 per person all in, including tip and corkage.  Well actually they did not charge for corkage as we had our own glasses and opened our own wine.  I learned on leaving that they were going to expand to take over the Indian restaurant next door completely – they already have the first floor and will move in on the ground floor too.  Excellent news.  They do a great job, and deserve every success.

Scanning through my star ratings below, I must admit that some do seem very generous. But they are a measure of my enjoyment on the night, and I never pretend to be objective. To recreate the enjoyment, I suggest that you and a group of friends grab a bunch of similarly interesting wines and take them to your local Middle-Eastern restaurant. Perhaps with the exception of the Jars of Cana, if you buy one of the lesser known wines and try it in “the cold light of day” you might not be so impressed.

Domaine des Tourelles, Pierre Louis Brun depuis 1868, Bekaa Valley, Lebanon – Chardonnay, Viognier and Muscat d’Alexandria – 2011, 13.0%
Peachy. Medium low acid.  Dry. Slightly astringent. Good to drink now ****

Chateau Khoury, Rève Blanc, Dhour Zahleé, Bekaa Valley, Lebanon – Chardonnay, Gewurztraminer and Riesling – 2008, 13.0%
Intensely floral and petrol. Medium acid. Off dry. Good to drink now, but no hurry ****

Massaya, Silver Selection, Bekaa Valley, Lebanon – Sauvignon Blanc and Chardonnay – 2004, 13.5%
Flat and Oxidised. Faulty bottle or too old. But a bottle of this vintage was great last year, so if you see one don’t automatically write it off. I have one more, so let’s hope! Still drinkable **

Chateau Musar, White, Bekaa Valley, Lebanon – Obaideh and Merwah – 2001, 12.5%
Intense. Slightly oxidised. Slightly astringent. Big, and full of flavour. Beautiful. A tasting note of few words because I was struggling to describe it, rather than because it had little to offer. A great wine, and probably the wine of the night. Good to drink now, but no hurry *****

Pirosmani, Medium dry red, Telavi Marani (producer), Kakheti (region), Georgia – Saperavi – 2005, 12.5%
Vaguely raisiny. Medium acid. Medium dry. Medium low tannin. This really was not my cup of tea, but then I rarely like wines that are medium dry or medium sweet. Drink now **

Jawary, Bekaa Valley, Lebanon – Cinsault, Cabernet Sauvignon and Carignan – 2005, 13.0%
This is the wine behind the label featured in the image for this post. What a fantastic label – nicely expressing the exotic and, I suspect, the flamboyance of the cultural remains of French rule. At Aladdin I found it to be a good all-round wine. Medium acid. Off dry. Medium tannin. Finishing dry due to the tannin. The following evening, it seemed to have transformed into a Pinotage for better and worse – burnt rubber and meat, with a touch of (in the nicest possible way) vomit. ****

Jars of Cana, Clos de Cana, Vallée Lamartine, Lebanon – Petit Cabernet, Pinot Noir, Mouvèdre – 2002, 13.0%
Intense red fruit. Fresh and aromatic. Medium acid. Medium low acid. Another sadly brief note, but a very good and interesting wine with a score that fairly reflects the quality. It was not noted at the time, but I am sure there was some spice in the mix too. Manchester locals can pick up a bottle at the Cheshire Smokehouse. Apparently Petit Cabernet is an synomym for Cabernet Sauvignon.  Good to drink now *****

Chateau Musar, Bekaa Valley, Lebanon – Cabernet Sauvignon, Carignan and Cinsault – 2000, 13.5%
Intense soft red fruit. Spicy and volatile. Medium acid. As nose. Medium tannin. Excellent length. Could drink now, but was surprisingly primary compared to the 1999s I have opened and enjoyed over the last couple of years, so I would definitely keep at least another few years *****

Naturally sweet wine, Karelas (producer), Mavrodaphne (grape) of Patras (region), Greece, NV, 15.0%, 37.5cl
Intense. Raisiny. Medium acid. Sweet. As nose. Low tannin. Bitter. Excellent length. Drink now. You can get this, and other Mavrodaphne of Patras wines, for around a tenner a bottle. I am certainly going to be trying more *****

Chateau Musar, Hochar, Bekaa Valley, Lebanon – Cinsault, Carignan, Cabernet Sauvignon and Grenache – 2005, 13.5%
Just when we thought it was all over, we discovered a forgotten wine. For the avoidance of doubt, this is the Hochar ”baby Musar” – not the first wine of the Chateau. Intense. VA. Red fruit. Medium acid. A tad thin maybe. Good to drink now, but no hurry ****