Dan Kravitz of Hand Picked Selections was swinging through Seattle on business, and it was my honor put together a small gathering of Seattleites for a dinner at Le Pichet. Myself, Michael Gordon, Scott Gruner, Steve Saxon, Adam Noble and Jeff Twersky joined Dan for dinner at Le Pichet. Given that Dan is the primary importer for Pegau we couldn’t help but to skew heavily to Chateauneuf du Pape.
Dan started by pouring us a wine from a vineyard he purchased. Darned good value for sure!
2008 Domaine Cabirau Côtes du Roussillon Malgré Les Fonctionnaires- France, Languedoc Roussillon, Roussillon, Côtes du Roussillon
A bit hot on the nose moving to a very ripe palate. Tasted blind this screamed of 2007, warm, ripe, verging on OTT yet alluring. The palate was fantastic though, peppery, pure, screaming of Grenache. A warm, easy and delicious wine with a sense of place. At $20/bottle this is silly good.
At this point all of the wines were on the table, but I chose to go after them in this order. Heck of a flight to start, and I could have gone home before the food arrived and just a few sips and been pretty happy. Seriously, SERIOUSLY nice wines.
1989 Domaine du Pégaü Châteauneuf-du-Pape Cuvée Réservée- France, Rhône, Southern Rhône, Châteauneuf-du-Pape
This was my bottle, and at first I was worried. It was a firm but messy cork with no shortage of dried wine on top. It started as a bit of a slow burn, but pretty quickly it was clear this was quite sound, very mature, and very pretty. Totally resolved, as soft and supple as I have ever seen in a Pegau, faintly Burgundian in profile but with a warmth to the personality, spike cake and macerated cherries, supple, tender, really very pretty and sumptuous.
1990 Domaine du Pégaü Châteauneuf-du-Pape Cuvée Réservée- France, Rhône, Southern Rhône, Châteauneuf-du-Pape
This is a wine I have had a dozen or more times, and I think this was the fourth or fifth time I have had this as a side by side with the 1990 Laurence. While was a solid bottle of the 1990 Reservee, this was the first time I have ever preferred the 1990 Laurence to the Reservee. Nonetheless, this was pure, bloody, slightly sweet and primary, just a deliciously roasted bit of Chateauneuf. This was a touch more feminine and understated than I am used to, delicious, but just not as brash and wild as this can be at times.
1990 Domaine du Pégaü Châteauneuf-du-Pape Cuvée Laurence- France, Rhône, Southern Rhône, Châteauneuf-du-Pape
This is my eighth note on this wine, and this was clearly, easily and obviously the best bottle I have ever had. It helps when the bottle comes from the primary importer’s cellar. A crazy, CRAZY nose, leather, funky, whips and chains, definite Chateaneuf Dominatrix territory, this moves to a palate that is dark, brooding, loaded with soy and blood and pepper. While I usually find this wine a bit dry, this one was fresh, pure and juicy with a singing and screaming cherry element. One of my easy favorites of the evening. Thanks Dan!
Next I moved into the “rest”, and these were awfully delicious as well.
1990 Château de Beaucastel Châteauneuf-du-Pape- France, Rhône, Southern Rhône, Châteauneuf-du-Pape
This is my “goto” wine on the entire planet, and this was a great albeit very gamey bottle. Warm, and easy, roasted and ripe, screaming of leather and and saddle and tilled manure, if you can tolerate the farmyard I don’t know how you can not swoon over this wine. No one was apparently going crazy over this one, but somehow the bottle was completely drained in a matter of mere minutes. I would have loved another pour, as I thought this was just screamingly good.
1989 Les Cailloux (Lucien et André Brunel) Châteauneuf-du-Pape- France, Rhône, Southern Rhône, Châteauneuf-du-Pape
I tend to love this giant killer of a wine, and it started in a very promising way with deep, intense color on first pour. The palate offered less than I hoped for, nicely peppery and loaded with sweet cherries and bramble, this seemed to break up rather quickly. As it sat in the glass it seemed to lose color and was clearly quite cloudy. On any other night I think this one have been one to savour, but in this lineup it ended up a bit lost. Still a terrific pour.
1988 Clos du Mont-Olivet Châteauneuf-du-Pape- France, Rhône, Southern Rhône, Châteauneuf-du-Pape
Dark soy, roasted tomato, clearly cracking up and moving towards a cooked wine. Bad luck. NR (flawed)
1994 Domaine du Pégaü Châteauneuf-du-Pape Cuvée Réservée- France, Rhône, Southern Rhône, Châteauneuf-du-Pape
Mmm, a youngster! No shortage of deliciousness here though, and it’s fun to feel something with a bit more grip and vigor. I can tell why this one one of Dan’s favorite vintages, and this one is screaming of blood and pepper and freshly killed deer. Especially bloody, pure and intense. I circled back to this one 3 or 4 times, and while it’s not a huge vintage of Pegau it is gloriously satisfying.
Finally as some cheese arrived we had some bubbles.
N.V. Pierre Boniface Vin de Savoie Les Rocailles Brut de Savoie- France, Savoie, Vin de Savoie
20% Chardonnay; 20% Altesse, 60% Jacquère. Dan needs to end an evening with bubbles and/or acid, and this most certainly fit the bill. A bit bracing but hyper-clean with limestone and chalk and frothy and vigorous mousse. On the fresh and clean scale this gets high marks, utterly pure and refreshing albeit pretty simple and linear.
Yum that was lots of fun, thanks everyone! Posted from CellarTracker
Awesome notes Eric. Thanks for sharing. Love all those wines especially that '89 Pegau which brings back great memories. I’ll have to see about getting my hands on some '90s.
1989 Domaine du Pégaü Châteauneuf-du-Pape Cuvée Réservée- France, Rhône, Southern Rhône, Châteauneuf-du-Pape (12/13/2006) Spanish Inquisition at Brad England’s House: Conceived of by Brad as a sort of intermezzo due to the need to decant the 1990 Haut Brion, this was popped and poured. Stunning. It reminded me of the 1983 Pegau Reserve we bought at Pegau last summer and drank that evening at Chateau Talaud. I really have trouble believing how well these age. This was a beautiful red/black color with ruby hints. On the nose this gives dark fruit, horse, flowers (lilac and lavendar), a dark subdued garrigue, candied fruit, and mineral. Silky smooth on the palate giving dark fruit, pepper and barnyard. Balanced. Mild tannin. Extremely long finish. This is amazingly youthful. Awesome. Lay down more Pegau. (97 pts.)
I have one bottle of a 1981 Pegau that I am hoping ends up like these. I thought about popping it last night, but I am thinking a smaller group and smaller setting at home.
I can’t argue too much with the descriptors- just some of the rankings.
Loved the 90 Beau- not a clean wine by any stretch- tons of game and manure- but just such a complete wine- seemless and long on the palate with tons of complexity. Like the side of frites, went to the other side of the table and came back empty.
The 89 Pegau was very pretty and given her all. Can’t ask for a better representative.
I went back and forth on the 90- Reservee and Laurence… Initially liked the Laurence better, but it dried up rather fast and the Reservee kept opening up.
I have had very different 89 Cailloux’s- a bit of a jeckyl and hyde for me. some so young and fresh you would think they were 10 years younger- some very very mature. This one was a but muddy and on the mature side, but still a nice wine.
The 94 is drinking very well, but still has a good life ahead. Color seemed much younger than the actual 4/5 years beind its brethren.
As usual great food and company at Le Pichet- Best dang chicken around.
Thanks for posting the notes Eric, there’s not much I would change regarding the wines except for the 90 Beau which I found to funky for my taste. It was a pleasure meeting Dan and hope to see him again next summer…We have a wonderful crew to dine with and Le Pichet is a killer place to eat.
Side note: I’ve been thinking about this all day…as nice as the wines were, IMO there was not one WOW wine like I get with Bordeaux and Northern Rhones. The wines last night represented great wines from great vintages but IMO not one was worthy of 95+ score and most were low to mid 90’s…maybe I was expecting too much or maybe I just prefer bdx.
Yea the 90 Laurence was my one 95 point, the 89 Pegau was a point or 2 behind and like I said…the Beau just didn’t do a thing for me. Lets do Bordeaux for lunch next week.
My grateful thanks to Eric and the rest of the crew for organizing this excellent tasting and dinner. Le Pichet is an unassuming restaurant with profoundly classic French food at a very high level.
I won’t comment on the Pegau wines of course.
The '89 Le Cailloux was excellent. I didn’t notice cloudiness or fade (I wasn’t looking for cloudiness). My two pours were consumed pretty quickly. I found this on the fruit side of Chateauneuf, less meaty than many, fairly light in body at 21 years but balanced, tender, very slightly spicy in a restrained way and thoroughly enjoyable.
I am not a big Beaucastel fan. This '90 was a good bottle. The brett wasn’t over the top, just a little more than I like. The classic minerality was all there, there was good density and balance, there were still some tannins I found a little grainy, but it was a serious mouthful of very tasty wine.
I’ve only had Clos du Mont-Olivet a few times. This was a bad wine, whether from mishandling, bad cork, bad luck or just not being very good I can’t say, but it was undrinkable.
Again my thanks to the crew for an easy, informal evening of great wine and fine food.
Well Dan, thanks for giving us the excuse! And while you are a good egg not to comment on the Pegau, I am very glad to have been sitting next to you to hear your opinions. This is one case where actual beats virtual.
(And BTW, policies here at Berserkers are FAR less draconian than at eBob, so I am sure the mods would actually have zero issues with you commenting on the Pegau wines since you have already clearly disclosed your importing connection.)
Why not comment? It’s not like you are selling the vintages currently. This would be like me saying I can’t talk about any pre-2000 BDX because I have sold the 2006 in the past.
Comment away, your insight would be greatly appreciated as you have such a great palate history with the wines.
Thanks to Eric and Chris for encouraging me to post on Pegau, but I just do not want to post tasting notes on any wine board about wines that I sell. I know myself too well and ‘slippery slope’ is too weak a term, greased slide would be more like it.
I have no problem in responding to questions about current or future drinkability, life-span, point in ageing curve for anything I sell. Comments on quality or scores are out of bounds for me.
There will be a new project for me at the end of the year that I will post on.
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