TNs: Dinner with Sauzet, Dujac, Chevillon, Yquem

A few weeks ago I posted a review of the food at the new Portland restaurant Noisette in the far less travelled Epicurean Expoits forum. This place is an absolute destination restaurant and we dragged a few friends along last night for some birthday week celebration and drank a couple bottles of interesting wine.

2006 Sauzet Puligny-Montrachet Les Folatieres: Had a little cocktail and a glass of the 2008 Frederic Gueguen L’Homme Mort Chabis 1er while this came up to temp and while we cleared through an appetizer to get to the lobster salad. This wine is just spot on Puligny. It has the richness of the vintage but is impeccably balanced with bright acidity cutting through the fabric of the rich texture of the wine. I, of course, enjoy wine and food pairings but there are few combos I come across where the pairing is utterly sublime. This was one. The perfectly cooked pieces of unadorned lobster sat on a bed of organic gold beets, crushed hazelnuts, Asian pears, tarragon and extra virgin olive oil and the way the rich, briny character of the lobster combined with the salad and how the wine combined with both was simply incredible. Just a fantastic dish and a wonderful wine working in conjunction to lift both of them up. Wow.

2004 Domaine Dujac Clos St. Denis: This will divide the 2004 haters and the 2004 non-haters. Can’t say I love the nose. Pine needles, etc. with all the other identifying characteristics of the vintage. Too me it’s not a “baby out with the bath water” thing but I can see how others would take it that way. The flavors were more pure with piercing red fruit, some underlying minerality and a touch of meatiness supported by very bright acidity. I would hesitate to guess where this is going and knowing the fracas that this vintage can cause here I’ll just leave it at that. I enjoyed it but it is clearly a wine that would be controversial. This is a hard match, had it with a few bites of the SOs impossibly perfectly cooked Magret duck breast.

1999 Chevillon Nuits St. Georges Les Cailles: The word Prodigious comes to mind. In every way shape and form. The wine is black/purple in color showing little to no signs of color degredation at age 12, the aromatics are still wild, primary and nearly thick in nature easily casting off notes of blackberries, aged balsamic, hoisin, black currant, loam and charcoal (not in a barrel way but like a fresh cube of it). The wine, likewise, is youthful and powerful with punchy flavors of pomegranate, kirsch and beef bouillon. As one might expect with a '99 there is plenty of acidity and tannin here but the fruit is so massive and primary that this was an easy, easy wine to knock back (especially since it came from someone else’s cellar). I can see this wine coasting through the next 20 years easily. That being said the utterly amazing short rib/dry-aged NY steak plate they do was a very nice pairing.

2002 Yquem: No, this is not the greatest vintage of Yquem, not by a long shot. Still, it’s Yquem and its pretty damn good. The nose, to me, is where the largest stumbling block is. The over-riding sense I got was carmalized butterscotch, honeyed pineapple and (for a little while) a touch of VA. This smoothed out over time but the butterscotchy thing stayed with me giving the impression of a more candied character than I think one would expect from Yquem. Still the texture is beguiling and the length is pretty impressive given the clear shortcomings in the wine. You could do way worse than drinking this. It also matched with 3 different desserts one of which was an impossibly puffy Grand Marnier souffle, another was an apple sort of pastry (not doing it justice) and the last a perfectly, perfectly seared slab of foie atop housemade brioche with fig butter and a sauternes sauce. That was also a very, very cool food and wine pairing.

Good times, very good wine and a wonderful new restaurant that will only stretch and grow with time and the seasons.

Thanks for the notes Jim.

I have a few Dujac 04 Grand Crus in the cellar and will probably bury them for a good few years yet.

Best Regards
Jeremy

Thanks for posting Jim. I see that you are eating and drinking well… The Sauzet PM Folatieres sounds wonderful. I have the 06 Referets and Perrieres in the cellar that we might sample when you come down next month. Also, can’t wait to try Noisette…sounds great!

Noisette is quite the place. It would be great if there was some way to know what direction these 04s are going to go as the years roll by. I, too, have several Dujacs as well as Mugneret-Gibourgs from 04 and while I am not adverse to the issues as others are I am not blind to the fact that there are issues and how they do or don’t resolve themselves will ultimately decide whether what we have in our cellars are curiosities or wines that ultimately, at a bare minimum, merit the designations on the labels.

Having a Michelot Les Cailles for the third night in a row- your 99 is certainly more structured, but you nail the nose in your note. “Wild” is an apt descriptor. Someday I’d love to get back to Portland and offline with you guys. My kids make it hard though.

To me, the Cailles chez Chevillon is the most exotic/Rhone like wine that I know in Burgundy (red)…maybe that’s the “wild” you describe…maybe not. It took me a long time to become an admirer, but I am, though I prefer the LSG and Vaucrains, but…

I have no experience with the '99s there yet, though. I am convinced that '99, like '95 and '96 is a vintage that requires a minimum of 20 years to touch its peak. (Wish I had known this when I was younger…that many vintages in red Burgs are really that way…as I have lots to look forward to in my dotage, if I get there in shape.)

Cailles is an interesting NSG cru for sure. I am not aware of anyone beyond Chevillon, Bouchard and Michelot that make it and I have only had the Bouchard and Chevillon versions. I had some '02 Bouchard and it was so good we just drank it up. I have a couple of vintages of Chevillon and after tasting that '99 I am definitely putting any plans for opening them on ice. I am going to try and sniff out some older versions though and see what they look like.

FWIW, a couple notes on the Chevillon 1990 version. Patrice Rion also made an excellent example through 2004, FWIW.

6/30/07: hot smoked copper river salmon; octopus salad… This wine is beautiful; reddish fruits deep complex, just getting mature and round…wonderful spicy perfume…and finesse witht the power. . no hurry

10/11: I opened and enjoyed the '90 Chevillon Cailles last night. What a wine! (And, I’ve never loved their Cailles as much as the LSG or Vaucrains, but this one makes me re-think). A wine of beautiful crimson color and heavenly aromas of red fruits of all kinds: mature but still very vibrant. With a grand cru density and a sappy/deliciously sweet red fruit sirop on the palate that goes a very long time. That Rhone-like spiciness (thyme, white pepper) that I always find in young Cailles. Just the right amount of structure that you have to look for, to hold things wonderfully together. Served blind, given its density and complexity, I might think it was a grand cru, though not sure from where. A wow with the beef ribs and epoisses and other cheeses.