A generous selection
Graeme Bateman puts the 400-bin wine list high on his agenda at Ashdown Park, East Sussex. He is a hands-on general manager with lots on his hands, but he has time to talk at length about the importance of wine in the development of the one-year-old hotel.
Joined by the deputy manager Terry Welsh, we chat about the list in the context of the hotel's objectives. Welsh has just been promoted from food and beverage manager, but he retains F&B responsibilities, and the wine list is his baby.
Transforming Ashdown Park into a luxury 95-bedroomed hotel from its former life as a Barclays Bank management centre has not been easy.
Before Barclays, the sprawling Victorian gothic mansion was home to an order of nuns. The chapel needed to be deconsecrated before being converted to its present use - a conference centre. It is now on two levels with a banqueting floor upstairs and a "theatre" area downstairs.
The hotel's business is drawn from a successful mixture of conference, function, short-break and holiday guests. The size of the building and its sprawling layout allows the two types of business to exist independently of one another, meeting only to sample the comforts of the hotel and its restaurant.
The wine list is a big attraction. It complements the food and the style of the hotel. The restaurant, in the west wing of the house, is spacious and relaxed with great views of the lake and Ashdown Forest beyond. A contemporary, eclectic menu is offered by head chef John McManus. The emphasis is on seasonal ingredients with Mediterranean and Pacific rim flavours surfacing from time to time. But English dishes, such as West Country fish stew, supreme of turbot with mustard glaze and poached pear with honey ice-cream, dominate.
Welsh is passionate about the wine list and boasts they have tasted all the wines on offer. "Not quite all," corrects Bateman. "Not the Petrus '55 or the Latour." Welsh agrees, but the point is made.
Ashdown Park has four principal suppliers: T&W Wines, Paragon Vintners, Michael Morgan and David Burns Vintners. Though they help cashflow by holding stock for the hotel until it is required, the list still represents a stockholding investment of £45,000 at any one time.
Bateman and Welsh both agree it is important to choose wines that appeal to the clientele rather than their personal taste. The list is on a word processor so it may be updated at any time - no need for unsightly blobs when a wine is out of stock. There is also no need to list wines of successive vintages in the event of the supply of one running out. "Split vintages on wine lists are a cardinal sin," says Welsh.
In selecting wines, he bears in mind that customers are now more educated on the subject. But he believes that they still need advice and explanation. A long list of wines and vintages without guidance is not enough. "We don't want to intimidate people," says Welsh.
There is no house red and white. Instead, the opening page of the list consists of eight "house recommendations". These are: a Champagne - Canard-Duchàne at £32.95; three whites - an Err zuriz Estate Sauvignon Blanc from Chile at £12.50, a Chardonnay, Vin de Pays de l'Aude at £12.50 and Fumé Blanc from California at £14.50; three reds - a Merlot, Vin de Pays de l'Aude at £12.50, an Err zuriz Estate Cabernet Sauvignon '92 at £12.50 and a California Zinfandel '89 at £17; and one rosé, a Cabernet Sauvignon Vin de Pays de l'Aude '92 at £12.50.
"We deliberately look for brother and sister reds and whites from the same source," says Welsh. "But it is not easy to find the quality we are looking for."
The important thing about the "house recommendations" is that they are not, as with most house wines, the cheapest wines on the list. Rather, they are all-purpose wines which go well with food, are good value and those which Welsh and Bateman feel they can recommend with confidence to customers who are not experts.
All the recommended wines are sold by the glass. Among salient features of the list is its generous choice of half-bottles and magnums.
"We want customers to be able to sample different wines with each course, and magnums always go down well with large parties," says Welsh.
Ten half-bottles of red Bordeaux are listed, for example, including a Mouton '84 at £77.75 and a Petrus '55 at £495. "People ask: ‘How can you sell a half of Petrus at that price?' Such a wine is hard to find. And we do have customers who will splash out for something rare and special," says Welsh.
Another important feature is the list's balance. Appropriate to an up-market restaurant of this style, there is a well-chosen selection of the classic regions of France and a fair sprinkling of great vintages. Though '61 is conspicuous by its absence, there is a half-bottle of Gruaud Larose '47 at £250 and a magnum of '62 Côte Rôtie Les Jumelles from Paul Jaboulet Ainé at £350.
Balance is paramount in price as well. With that in mind, says Welsh, "I try to look for the second wines of great châteaux, for example Le Fort de Latour as well as Latour."
Burgundy, like Bordeaux, gets a good innings, despite its high price. At the top of the scale is a Le Montrachet '87 from Louis Jadot at £149 and a Bâtard Montrachet of the same year from Olivier Leflaive at £109. Then there are wines from the Mâconnais at between £15.50 and £32.50. Burgundy reds are as exciting as the whites with a Richebourg '82 at £160, and a magnum of Gevrey Chambertin.
The listed prices are given the usual two-and-a-half times mark-up, though wines appearing on the list over £100 get only 50% slapped on.
Balance also means other regions of France, including Alsace and the Loire, both of which are represented with a careful selection. There is a half-bottle of Vendage Tardive '85 from Hugel at £39.50 and a full bottle of Tokay D'Alsace Reserve 1990 from Trimbach at £17.25. From the Loire, a 1991 Sancerre at £13.50 demonstrates the range of prices in the list.
Discrimination is also in evidence in the selection from Spain, Italy and the new world. From California at one end of the spectrum there is a Beringer Zinfandel '89 for £14.95 and at the other an Opus One '88 - the joint effort of Robert Mondavi and Baron Philippe de Rothschild - at £75. Australia is represented by a '92 Cabernet Merlot from Cape Mentelle at £17 in the lower price range, and the famous Penfolds Grange Hermitage '83 at £66.75 at the other.
From New Zealand there is a good selection, including a '92 Cloudy Bay Chardonnay at £25, a '92 Te Mata Sauvignon Blanc at £24.50 and a '93 Sauvignon Blanc at £12.95. Unusually, there are six reds from New Zealand, including a '91 Villa Maria Cabernet Sauvignon at £16.50.
Our discussion ended, appropriately, with pudding wines. These are another of Welsh's great enthusiasms. Most are in half bottles. Welsh's pride and joy are a '91 English Noble Bacchus from Chiltern Valley at £23 - "one of the most interesting wines from England we have ever seen" - and Willi Opitz, '89 Weissburgunder Trockenbeerenauslese at £64.25 - a legendary wine from a legendary grower. Welsh describes it as "toffee, caramel and butterscotch, soft yet with superb acidity."
If you were drinking your way through this exciting list, what a way to end! It is a list which demonstrates that expensive wines can be good value, and can both attract new customers and persuade old ones to return.
