A friend gave me a bottle of 1997 Petrus as a gift. I intend to open it with him in the next month or so. He is not well, so waiting a few years for it to get older is not in the cards. I have never had Petrus. Your assignment, should you decide to accept it, is to design the best possible situation in which to serve it, including everything from decant time to what food to pair it with to what wine to use as a starter to what dessert wine to serve after it is done. The only limitations are that it will be served at my house in White Plains, I will do most or all of the cooking, there will be from 4 to 7 people present, my friend has a strong preference for roasted meat, I have lots of wine glasses but only 4 Zalto universals, and no one likes offal.
Curiously enough Rudy Kurniawan came to a BWE dinner a lifetime ago, bearing the same wine - a 97 Petrus. It was the first time I’d ever tasted it too, charitably assuming it might even have been real. Little recollection of the wine, but Rudy must have left disappointed, given that there wasn’t a plethora of the (bad) Jef Levy style marks there.
The only thing I can suggest would be to consider putting grease pencil marks on the glasses where ever the (measured) pour size you think is reasonable.
Pour the Petrus, make some steaks, drink the Petrus.
Exactly.
Shape it around what he loves. Besides roasted meat, what are his favorite dishes? Favorite deserts? Favorite restaurants? Favorite wines? Besides wine, does he love Scotch, Bourbon, Armagnac, grappa, etc?
Decant? For how long?
This plus invite me to join you.
2 hours in the decanter will see it right
Blind.
I love this, it’s the KISS theory, which is me like 99% of the time.
KISS.
Roast a prime rib.
Pop and Pour.
Celebrate your friend.
Dan Kravitz
Main: Roast tenderloin, some mushrooms etc. Almost beef Wellington MINUS THE PASTRY.
As for the rest my main thought is let your guests enjoy the evolution of the wine. So not quite pop n pour but don’t decant too early. Give them a little taste at the start, and then again with the main event. Which may mean something else as a companion with the main given the size of your party. Which depends on what’s in your cellar.
And Champagne for intermezzo.
Be sure to toast for best wishes to the friend.
A lesser and early maturing vintage of Petrus at age 24- I think an hour in the decanter is fine and any additional evolution should happen fairly quickly in glass when you sit down to dinner.
I second the vote for a good steak- Petrus is a great wine in many respects, but I do not find it particularly complex compared to other top Bordeaux. It is more of a power play, and 1997 is a vintage where in general I have found Bordeaux to be more fruity and less complex than usual. And so, steak and potatoes will do just fine.
I do not buy Petrus often for the reason stated above, but it is a genuinely great wine and might possibly even outclass Latour when it comes to yielding a great wine in a lesser vintage. I have a few TNs for Petrus from dreadful vintages in the 50s and 60s, and they all had something in their favor. And the 1992 outclassed all of the first growths IMHO. So I think, and hope, you are in for a very nice experience here.
Stand it up for at least a few days before the tasting.
I would give it some air, at least a double decant one or the other hour before consumption.
Serve it in Conterno Sensory glasses (Zalto come close but Conterno outshines every other glass).
Don’t expect a blow-out magic miracle 101 pts experience, after all it’s an off vintage. Otherwise you will be disappointed.
After decanting, return it to the cleaned bottle for service at the dinner table.
This is important. Expectations should be set low, as I am sure you have had better wines than this. It would be far too easy to dwell on the price tag, and then be disappointed. Instead with low expectations, you can then focus on what is great about the wine.
It should be even beneficial to taste it against other 97s to get context. On CT, Petrus is the #1 1997 (but) with an average rating of 93.1 (only Lafite has a 93pts rating too).
I’m not sure why you are asking - is your profile picture not the perfect way to consume it? ![[wink.gif]](/uploads/db3686/original/2X/0/04707e6a7bbb03e0153e349d8a9270d30e1e9525.gif "wink"){kind=small}
I am not asking for myself. I am asking how I should serve it to a friend and his wife. AND by the way I finally drilled a hole in the back of that bottle and I will be converting it into a lamp in the next few days.