Wine and steak

WINE TALK
1

Our regular hangout in high school was Outback Steakhouse. Hey, it’s not like there are a whole lot of options when the main drag is Route 18. We were way more awesome than the kids that hung out at the Denny’s, trust me. Well, I got a hankering for a petite madeleine moment and decided to see if I could replicate the Outback steak at home. This recipe purports to be the Outback steak rub - http://www.recipezaar.com/Outback-Steakhouse-Style-Steak-52366" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;. Based on my intimate familiarity with the Outback steak I knew the other main secret ingredient was BUTTER so I dredged the steak in a butter/olive oil mix (to guard against burning) before applying the rub. The lucky piece of meat was a Florence Meat Market ribeye, seared on cast iron. The result was pretty tasty, not a dead ringer of the old Outback Special or Rockhampton Ribeye but pleasantly reminiscent.

Instead of Foster’s or Cokes with free refills in frosty beer mugs, though, I ended up drinking with it Chateau Margaux 1983. Still a somewhat backwards wine and not as pleasurable to my taste at this moment as, say, the '81 - it took a few hours in the decanter before the coarse tannin turned into something elegant and it definitely needed the steak fat to get there. Unfortunately the aromatic expressiveness was at its best right out of the gate, filling the air with scents of mesquite and cigar smoke as I decanted it. By the time the palate was at its best, the aroma had kind of shut down, but you got a backdraft of the same stuff on the finish. Especially the cigars. Chateau Margaux has always been a tough-to-grok wine for me - Margaux the commune is supposed to tend towards the feminine but the Chateau itself is sometimes brutishly masculine, and this one definitely fits in that category, at least for the first glass or two. The end of the bottle is a big improvement in finesse over the beginning but I’d still prefer to give this wine another decade or so to let the tannins melt away and give it more transparency.

2

Hi Keith,

I guess wine and steak is better than . . . never mind. [berserker.gif]

I had the 83 Margaux last week: TN: First Growth Bordeaux Tasting - WINE TALK - WineBerserkers" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false; I guess was fortunate that my bottle showed better than it sounds like yours did. I would agree with your questioning of masculine vs. feminine in Margaux. I suppose that makes it a wine for our times.

By Rt. 18, do you mean East Brunswick? I’ve spent a fair amount of time around there during 1973-1997. My first wife was from there.

3

Does Outback do corkage?

4

Keith; I would try Outback if they actually had any meat even resembling the quality of Florence!! [rofl.gif]

In my opinion, Margaux is one of the few chateaus that actually made a bigger and better wine in '83 than '82…


Cheers!
Marshall [cheers.gif]

5

E.B. indeed. Have you experienced the greatness of Brothers’ Pizza?

6

I think that was true for a while, but I think, side by side, today, 1982 is better.

Now 1983 Palmer DESTROYS 1982 Palmer, in a landslide.

7

Absolutely agree about the Palmer…still feel the same way about the Margaux.


Cheers!
Marshall [cheers.gif]

8

Agreed. I, too, prefer the 83.

JD