Facing up to a classic dilemma
By Joe Hyam
Jordan Estate in Alexander Valley, California, has been making fine red and white wine for 30 years. Château d'Angludet has been making red wine in Margaux, Bordeaux, in its present classic style for 300 years.
Both wines compete in the middle to upper price bracket. One is representative of the refined style of what the Californians call ultra premium wines; the other of the great, traditional style known as claret. Both can be bought from Michael Morgan, the London-based wine merchant which specialises in supplying hotels and restaurants.
In California, the style has moved away from big, tannic blockbusters to softer, more readily approachable wines. In Bordeaux, it is the local characters of soil and climate that still leave an indelible series of contrasting impressions - severe in Pauillac, for example, softer and more feminine in Margaux.
The styles of the New and Old Worlds were brought together in a seminar held last month during a Michael Morgan Portfolio tasting in London. At the seminar, Peter Sichel of Château d'Angludet and Jean Arnold of Jordan Vineyards spoke from their different points of views about the UK market for their wines.
Participants consisted almost entirely of restaurateurs and sommeliers responsible for building restaurant wine lists. The underlying question was: What are restaurateurs to do about the profusion of ultra premium wines from the classic regions of France, California and Australia - to say nothing of the super Tuscans, the more traditional noble wines of Italy and the icons of Spanish wine such as Vega Sicilia, Marqués de Murrieta in Rioja and the single estate wines of Torres in Penedés?
Thirty years ago, most restaurateurs could get away with listing Bordeaux, Burgundy and Rhône under table wine. The profusion of choice today is all the more challenging now that wines in competition with the classic regions are better known to a wider and more sophisticated body of wine drinkers than ever.
To make matters more difficult, though "terroir" continues to define the ultimate differences between wines of the same grape variety, approaches to wine-making are growing closer. While the Bordelaise, for example, may talk about "terroir", you will find the Californians coining the phrase "site-specific farming" to describe what grows best where.
For a practical comparison of wines from the two styles, contrast the excellent Château d'Angludet, 1988 at a trade price of £178.50 from Michael Morgan (0171-407 3466) with the equally outstanding Jordan's 1990 Cabernet Sauvignon at £189 from the same merchant.
You may agree there is room for both styles on a modern wine list. If not, you have a choice to make. And if you make a choice, you must ask yourself: is it a marketing choice or a quality choice?
Ale and hearty
Courage cottons on to the fast growing premium bottled beer market with the launch of Directors Live Ale, a bottle-conditioned variant of its flagship premium cask-conditioned ale, Directors Bitter.
At 4.8% abv, the ale is brewed at Courage's Bristol brewery to the original recipe before yeast and sugar are added to enable secondary fermentation to take place in the bottle. This develops and matures the flavours, producing a bottled product that is as close as possible to the hand-pulled version.
A cool couple
A wine cooler from Screwpull by Le Creuset holds two bottles of wine, bringing each of them to the correct temperature independently of each other. This means a white wine can be chilled while a red wine is kept at room temperature.
The second advantage is that its ergonomic shape enables different sized and shaped bottles to sit comfortably with each other. Made from clear plastic, it has an insulated double-wall construction, where two plastic inserts (filled with water and frozen in advance) are used to control temperatures.
The cooler comes with a wine thermometer and vintage chart, and has a retail price of about £45.95. Call 01264 353912 for more details.
