Ray Abercromby Wine Dinner
Establishment Restaurant, Manchester
1st March 2005
1998 Pirie, Tasmania
Full and rich on the nose: quite biscuitty with some peach kernels. Full and
round with a good gentle mousse on the palate. Quite a fruity style. Very
Good.
2003 Riesling, Mitchell Watervale, Clare
Valley, Australia
A waxy, citrussy nose that’s slightly oiled and has a touch of sherbert too.
Bright and clean on the attack. Very nice weight. Very good length.
Develops a real citrussy note on the finish. Very Good.
?? Viognier
A lovely perfumed nose. Very, very full and really quite overripe and
over-bearing. Rich and very lingering on the finish. But the overall
impression is of a wine with an excess of weight and body without any real
backbone behind it. It was interesting to try the wine with a bit of salt,
which helped balance the wine: I think it would be a good wine for smoked
salmon. Good.
1975 Ch. Magdelaine en magnum
This is not a wine that looks the thirty years old that it is. The nose is
dominated by leather with blackberry and a hint of leafiness. On the attack
this is immediately showing all signs of a mature, old claret: very immediate
sweet fruit with an underbelly of softened tannins, giving the impression of a
rounded, soft, suede-textured wine. Very Good Indeed.
2001 Pinot Noir, Bannockburn, decanted
around two hours earlier.
A really good burgundian pinot noir nose with lots of medicinal notes,
especially cloves: there’s definitely an air of dentist’s surgery about this.
Another glass from another bottle wasn’t quite as medicinal, but rather was a
touch bretty-stinky. Eventually, the medicinal notes start to blow off a touch,
and there’s more burgundian fruit coming through on the nose. A really lovely
attack: ripe, clean, fresh fruit. Really concentrated and a lovely wine.
Excellent balance followed by massive length. With more time, it’s evolving all
the time in the glass, taking on smoky/tobacco notes after a while. But the
paracetamol and oil of cloves mixture never quite goes away. This is a stunning
wine: very interesting indeed. Excellent.
1998 Clos de Bourg, Moëlleux, Huët
Quite an interesting nose, if a bit closed. Slight stinkiness too, which blows
off to reveal several layers of honey. Very fresh on the attack and then with a
good weight of restrained fruit on the palate. Rather high acidity. And a bit
unbalanced overall. Far, far too young: in Loire and Huët terms, this is still
suffering shock from bottling. Good.
Not included in the above, but drunk later that
night:
1983 Cabernet Bosché (Cabernet Sauvignon), Freemark Abbey, Napa Valley,
12.9%
Initially rather stinky, but that blows off. Quite a concentrated sweet black
fruit nose. Remarkable freshness on the attack. Sweet fruit on the palate,
with grainy tannins. Very dry on the finish. Very long, but not
over-attractive (long) after.
Back to Andrew Stevenson's web page
Last updated: 17 March 2006