Anthony Hall has fairly bad tastes in music. You know you’re in strife when the first song of the night is Dire Straits’ ‘coming home’ and it gets more boring from there. Anthony Hall has great tastes in wine and food and we had a terrific meal at his place last night with a brilliant meal cooked by his wife Kay. The theme was that rare and elusive gem, Faiveley Musigny.
As we milled around, bristling excitedly with anticipation a cheeky glass of Leclapart L’Amateur did the trick of igniting the gastric juices with its bone dry, green apple personality. There were a few nutty, yeasty things on the nose and the palate was strict, linear and quite minerally. Freshly shucked Cloudy bay oysters and Kay’s mother’s Gouges were the perfect accompaniment to the Champers.
Checkerboard of sashimi tuna and kingfish was beautifully presented and had a little gremolata and sea salt sprinkled on top. The belly tuna and kingfish were of the highest quality and sang with a brace of Salon.
1982 Salon: Some caramel and vegemite aromas along with strong patisserie notes. Rich, creamy and textured in the mouth with some honey and butter. Very long and whilst developed there’s a lovely energy.
1996 Salon: There’s been a bit of bottle variation with this wine but this one was a ‘ripsnorter’. Piercing, precise, pure and persistent. Loaded with green apples, lemons and minerals. Great shape, finesse and drive in the mouth, just about perfect Champagne for mine.
Morton Bay bugs in a vanilla beurre blanc were plump, sweet and simply cried out for a bracket of Coche, fortunately Anthony had such a bracket in mind.
1999 Coche-Dury Meursault ‘Rougeots’: Slightly exotic on the nose with notes of paw paw, rockmelon and spiced pear. Dense, sappy, minerally and long. Extremely youthful and we all thought this was several years younger.
2000 Coche-Dury Meursault ‘Rougeots’: Complex aromas of white peach, rockmelon and minerals with a little honey development sneaking in. Great volume in the mouth with a solid mineral spine and dense chewy finish. In a very nice place right now.
2001 Coche-Dury Meursault ‘Rougeots’: Quite elegant and fine, emitting a whiff of smoky mineral and wet stones. It is long and linear, crammed with pure white peach and is dense and sappy. Still plenty left in the tank.
2007 Coche-Dury Meursault ‘Rougeots’: On a fast highway to premoxville. On the nose it has more nuts than the Port Adelaide cheer squad. It is rigid, dense and long in the mouth but very worrying based on how it looks and smells.
A most wondrous duck broth was laced with liquorice root and fresh abalone had been dropped in to poach lightly. It was brilliant with the first bracket of Musigny.
2005 Faiveley Musigny: Aromas of maraschino cherry, liquorice, menthol and purple flowers. Incredibly dense, sweet and long with outstanding balance. Whilst this is many decades from its eventual apogee it was a true joy to drink.
2004 Faiveley Musigny: All at the table pegged this as 04 from the vintage mirepoix marker on the nose. Anthony noted that its remarkable that even with such a tiny production and obvious utmost attention to detail this wine still showed its vintage character so prominently. It was quite delicious with an amalgam of red and black fruits and a nice thread of flora. There’s plenty of muscle and concentration for the vintage and it should be very good in 10 or so years.
2008 Faiveley Musigny: A little volatile acidity punches a sweet scent of blood plum and purple flowers into the nostrils. It is mouthfilling and dense and has wonderful poise and detail, finishing with great minerally cut.
2006 Faiveley Musigny: Don’t know if this makes sense but this wine just smells like it’s going to be velvety and it is. There are red and black fruits, a little soy and hoisin and some menthol. It has great perfume and density and has immaculate balance. Drinking very nicely now but plenty in reserve for long aging.
The Australian truffle industry is in its infancy but we are seeing some positive results. Kay shaved some fresh Western Australian black truffle over pan-seared pigeon. This was served with truffled risotto with wild asparagus and shaved truffles. It was a delicious dish and no matter how sweet and subtle wild asparagus tastes, it still makes your wee smell funny.
1999 Faiveley Musigny: Engaging perfume of decaying roses, sweet cedar, camphor and black cherries. Rich and heady in the mouth but light on its feet. Great presence and balance in the mouth, just hinting at its greatness but close to wine of the night for mine.
2000 Faiveley Musigny: Probably the weakest link in an outstanding bracket of wines. It is sweet, generous and forward with black cherry fruit and some baked earth. It is perhaps a little hollow in the mid-palate and quite chewy on the finish.
2001 Faiveley Musigny: Not giving much on the nose, restrained and a little demure. It’s sweet and minerally in the mouth with a lovely, rocky, cool fruit character. It’s beautifully proportioned without a hair out of place and should be a wine for the ages.
Roasted medallions of Hartdale venison with baby brussel sprouts, King valley lardoons and Victorian chestnuts worked very well with a trio of older wines.
1947 Faiveley Musigny (375ml): We opened two halves of this, one was quite oxidised (bloody premature oxidation, I’m sick of it), and the other was delightful, showing a fresh nose with notes of iodine, undergrowth and mineral. It really builds in the mouth with a sweet vinous heart and lacy texture. It is still very bright and energetic.
1969 Faiveley Musigny: The most complete wine of the line-up and probably wine of the night. There’s a gorgeous curry leaf spice along with notes of hoisin and soy. In the mouth it is full, sweet and round and quite sensual. There are no hard edges but it is a wine of good power and authority and still possessing a driving finish.
1966 Faiveley Chambolle-Musigny ‘Les Charmes’: Very fresh with aromas of pine needle sap, cedar, sweet earth and aniseed. It is rich and full in the mouth with solid underlying structure. It finishes with a structure that we generally associate with Faiveley and is quite a big wine with great vivacity although not the class of its Grand Cru siblings.
With a cheeky little sweetie, Kay’s Pineapple and ginger pudding with vanilla ice cream was perfect.
1996 L’Extravagant de Doisy-Daene: Very rich and sweet with plenty of toffee apple and pineapple notes. It’s full throttle in the mouth, invading every crevice with sensuous nectar and it cleans up really nicely on the back-end.
Comte, walnuts and muscatels…if you could request one wine to go with these it would be the…
1955 Taylors Vintage Port: Great V.P with the most gorgeous, floral spirit. Its clean and seamless yet titillates with all sorts of ethereal perfumes. There’s a little teak, some raisons and chocolate. It has wonderful presence and finishes fine and long.
It was a fabulous dinner and proved to us that Faiveley Musigny is truly one of the great wines of Burgundy. We were perhaps a little apprehensive prior to the event, thinking that the rare factor and our high expectations may have led to wines that may have disappointed. I think to a man we were enthralled with the wines, marvelling at their power and balance and how precise and direct they were. They were not too oaky and certainly as engaging set of reds that I have seen.
Thanks Anthony for a brilliant evening, I’m sending you some new cd’s.
Cheers
Jeremy
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