by Julian Schultz
julian@oxfordwineroom.com
My brain churning
concentration on the dry Trefethen Double “T” Red Wine 2001, $25, was
interrupted. I was deep into the throes of trying to ascertain its compatibility
with a delicious salad of sweet candied figs, vegetable oyster plant (salsify)
and warm black truffle cheese.
Sobbing, Lachrymose Lena plunked herself beside me at the
November International Wine & Food Society dinner at The Oyster Cabin in
Uxbridge: “Billy Bumpkin from bucolic Bolton (pointing) over there, where I am
sitting, suggested I sit beside you. He says you claim to know everything…he
says you claim to know even what you don’t know. And I need help over there.
After my last wine dinner at the Webster House I departed feeling belittled,
bothered and bewildered with a monumental headache, and I’m afraid it will be
the same over here.”
My being ever chivalrous
– and anyway she was well figured, well proportioned above and – err --
behind, and attractive – I smoothed my hair, tweaked my mustache and
sympathetically asked her to explain.
Lena sobbing, “At my
last wine dinner, everyone was sniffing and sipping a Greek wine and each person
described it differently. How can that be? And I’m fearful that it may be
repeated here, so I need to know.”
“Well, specifically,
what happened there that you hope won’t be repeated here?”
“One
person said it smelled and tasted like musty paper, like pages of an old
tome…like chewing on papyrus of ancient scrolls. How could that be?”
“Well,” I said,
“he probably is a lawyer and his nose is among old law books. He brought his
experience to his evaluations.”
Still sobbing: “Then,
I heard Dr. Ignatz Somnolence announce triumphantly to everyone that he smelled
ether and starched white uniforms but wouldn’t sip it for fear he might fall
asleep.” Sobbing, wiping her eyes, “Oh,
dear me, I’ll never learn. So what about him?”
“Oh,
him! He’s a famous anesthesiologist. He puts people to sleep fast on the
operating table and even faster with his comments about wine.”
Lena,
wiped her eyes, blew her nose – sounded like Joshua’s trumpet: “Well, how
about the guy who was sniffing with his nose submerged below the rim of his wine
glass; coming up for air, sipping, gurgling and grunting like a guy in a
dentist’s chair; concentrating so hard that smoke signals seemed to be coming
out of his ears? After he waved the wine glass across his nose, seven times
left, and seven times right, he said the wine reminded him of ink, pencils,
pens, erasers…
(Brightly)
“Hey, do you suppose he’s a college professor – ink, pencils, pens,
erasers? Yeah, that’s it. I’m sure!” Lena was becoming loquacious: “I
know two professors – one from Clark, the other from Assumption. When
they’re sniffing and sipping so hard…agonizing, moaning and groaning with
such concentration …even if the sky fell in and smacked them over the head,
they wouldn’t stop.”
“Ah, you’re catching
on, but no cigar, Lena.” Nevertheless, I congratulated her. “From how you
describe his behavior, he may be my accountant. His life consists of ink,
pencils, pens, erasers, groaning and moaning clients at tax time and his wife in
that order.
“But
how about you, Lena? What about this Trefethen Double “T” Red Wine
you’re sniffing and sipping now? What do you smell and taste?”
Promptly and with
confidence, “Nuts! I smell and taste nuts…yes, and spicy dried fruits! I
make fruitcakes for our monthly meetings of our Ladies Society for Controlling
Winds, Tides and Motion of Planets.”
From around the table
came enthusiastic agreement: “Nuts! Now that you say it, we taste
nutty/fruity, too, and with some tarry tannic tea and the good earth!”
“Well, if you all
agree with my descriptor of this wine, then you remind me of fruitcakes.” Lena
snickered at her snide aside to the tasters at our table. “I’ll be attending
a private wine dinner with Chilean wines at the Castle Restaurant on December
12, and I will fearlessly describe the wines; I will fearlessly deliver the
aromas and flavors I find in my – err -- worldly profession– (she whispered
to me, ‘like the nut cakes I’m listening to here’)…Well, toodle-loo,
I’m off, back to my own tablemates.”
I was totally baffled by
Lena’s change from lachrymose to loquacious. I hoped I had seen the last- and
the – err -- back of her in that skintight skimpy dress.
The dinner: Every
course, I mean, every course, was innovative, imaginative and delicious, but…
MY funky palate was bothered by the incompatibility of some food and wine
combinations.
Hors d’oeuvre: ravioli
stuffed with shiitake mushrooms, Fontina cheese and white truffle. Excitingly
original with complex tasty flavors, the ravioli kept coming and coming and
coming hot from the oven by waitstaff of hostess/co-owner Kristine Phaneuf,
Darlene Devlin and Donna White.
Paired wines with all
courses, were from Trefethen Vineyards, Napa, California.
The
ravioli was nicely accompanied by Chardonnay 2001, $27. The chard’s steely,
stony, crisp, clean, green apples flavor was assertive enough to meet the
challenge of the ravioli’s pronounced flavors; its nose and taste, reluctant
initially, opened after time in the glass; to my awakened nose and palate it
disclosed slight accents of vanilla and butterscotch. I summarized the
Chardonnay, saying it needed a few more years of bottle aging to show to its
best advantage.
First
course: The already discussed salad with the Double “T” Red Wine 2001, $25,
a Bordeaux blend of five wines, was an enigma: The wine was much too young with
its reckless rough robustness. Despite its mouthful of plums, berries, oak and
tannin, the imposing delightful sweet fig sauce assailed the Bordeaux character
of the wine, imparting to it a slight metallic and tannic emphasis -- but not
fatal. As with the Chardonnay, the Double “T” needs time…and more
time…at which time it will be a superb showcase wine for Trefethen. I’d like
to be around five years from now to exult over it then and to compare with one
of the five classified Bordeaux growths.
Second course: Seared “big eye” tuna (yellowtail tuna from Hawaii)
with shredded carrots and flavor-enhancing clove, the latter imparting a superb
and unique flavor to the thickly portioned…and tender – oh, so tender!
…tuna. (I recently had a considerably thinner portioned tuna that was as tough
as shoe leather…but no not here!)
The consorting Chardonnay “Library” Selection 1997, $33, had some members applauding its “uncommon complexity”; for others – well, let’s put it this way, poetically: My palate ventured into the woodlands the secret of oak to learn; by and by it returned to me and said, “If you love the embrace of buttery oak, then to this wine you must return.” Another poet put it this a’way: “I ventured my palate among giant oaks to dwell; after sniffing, sniffing them well, it returned to me and said, ‘either its taste will be glorious heaven, or will be just plain hell.’ ”
Many members accepted the Chardonnay comparison to a Burgundy wine and gave voice to their enthusiasm. This eccentric palate of mine didn’t exactly accept it as Burgundian. My notes on the wine: “arresting complexity, exceptionally good – albeit noticeable wood – green ripe Granny Smith apples, vanilla, buttery, crisp, clean, dry, zesty, lively, balanced, smooth finish, lingering aftertaste.” I appreciated its smack of vanilla and butterscotch from its extended aging in oak barrels.
Third course: Peppered lamb loin with potato dumpling, wild baby mushrooms and foie gras (goose liver) in broth. My lamb dish was just the way I prefer it: rare to medium rare. Great presentation, great taste, exquisitely tender. And because all prior courses were not over-portioned, surfeit had not set in, which enhanced my pleasure with the lamb.
With the accompanying Merlot 1999, $33, the dinner reached its apex; this
was world class gourmet dining, no argument. The Merlot, blended with 13 percent
cabernet sauvignon, delivered big flavors of plums, anise, tar, berries and was
perfectly balanced with black pepper, fruit acids, restrained oak and soft
tannin. One of my charming
tablemates, Friendly Liquors’ Patty Giannopoulos, she of the dancing baby
browns and flashing pearly whites, described it succinctly: “full flavored
with finesse, complexity, seductive fruitiness.”
This superb wine with
its superb food partner had some of us asking for owner/chef Chris Phaneuf to
appear and take a deserved bow.
Before our table was
served its dessert, other tables were sipping their Dry Riesling 2001, $18, with
the sweet, delectable warm honey and quince tart and cranberry/cinnamon ice
cream. I noted not a few grimaces from some table members who were eating the
sweet dessert and then tasting the bone-dry wine.
Oh, oh! Returned Lachrymose Lena,
sobbing again: “I just had to bolt from that table when that ditsy-doodle
English Medieval History professor argued with the professor of chemistry that
tannin is like a ‘chastity belt’…protects fine red wines from the hostile
penetration of aged time and preserves their purity longer. That did it for me!
As…any…fool…can…plainly…see, I am in the full bloom of my still
youthful attractiveness and seductive desirability.”
For emphasis, followed a few shoulder shakes and buttocks bumps.
“Yes,
yes, I see, I see, I plainly see.” I hurriedly agreed.
Lena
made a sour “face”: “I shudder at the thought of – ugh! – a chastity
belt. Who needs to think about that?!”
“Well, what did you say
about the wines? Chastity belts were never a concern of mine…in my salad days
of youth and vigor.”
“Wait, wait. First let me tell you
about my tablemates: One is a chemistry professor; there are a delicatessen
storeowner and his wife, then the lady anesthesiologist, and the ditsy-doodle
college professor of Medieval English History.
“The boring chemistry prof went on
and on – yawn and yawn-- about rhodenol and linalol and O.H.’s until I told
him I had flunked chemistry in high school. The doctor almost put me to sleep
with her incomprehensible medical vocabulary in wine assessment. The
delicatessen storeowner and wife argued fiercely over whether the Merlot
reminded them of salami or pastrami. And you already know about Chastity Belt
Charlie.”
“But tell me, Lena, what did you
– what did you -- say about the wines?” I was becoming
impatient with her.
“I said, ‘Nuts!’ except for
the bone dry Dry Riesling – and I do mean, ‘bone’ dry, so dry it could
curl your tongue. I said, for the red wines I tasted – imagined – they were
reminiscent of different nuts and various spicy fruits. And no one disagreed.
The chemistry bore even said that he agreed with me, using eyes-rolling,
eyes-glazing chemistry terms that, I think, were even putting him to sleep.
“I didn’t have much to say about
the Chardonnays except to observe that I saw less typical West Coast wimpy sweet
fruit and perhaps more – err – firm apple-y fruit and sturdy butterscotch-y
oak, which were good. The Chardonnays didn’t taste like sweet Seven-Up, a
welcome change.”
I congratulated Lena, who no longer
was sobbing but was on a loquacious verbose roll: “ya-da, ya-da, ya-da.” I
had to stop her by saying the men’s lavatory needed my attention. When I
returned, I noted that she was seated at a different table from the one she had
occupied.
The dessert. I’ll never win with
Chris Phaneuf, it seems. I’m like Shakespeare’s old King Lear howling in the
wilderness: “Don’t serve a delicious sweet dessert with a dry wine. The
sweet dessert makes the wine taste even drier and, worse yet, metallic.” With
a delicious cheese variety, both wine and cheese would have given dimension to
each other. With the dessert, each diminished the other. Choice: Pair a wine
with cheese or permit a sweet dessert to occupy center stage in solitary single
glory!
A note on the Dry Riseling, such as
I was able to discern withal under the adverse conditions tasted: “very dry,
so dry I couldn’t taste fruit and flavor; later, lemon and lemon/lime crept
cautiously up the glass. Probably a better wine when tasted in a compatible
context.”
On leaving The Oyster Cabin, Lena
offered her gratitude for my forbearance and patience with her – as she
admitted – “trying demeanor,” adding, “This Oyster Cabin is one classy
restaurant, and were you aware of the two sizes of Riedel glasses at each place
setting? Real class, I mean, r-e-a-l class, man.”
I agreed. If you haven’t dined
there, go there. And if you have dined there, go again! It’s worth the easy
ride to route 146A, Uxbridge. Enjoy chef-ing is at its best.
Kudos to an excellent chef staff,
led by owner/chef Chris Phaneuf, with Vince Benchino, Brad Arpin, Tommy Craig,
and Matthew Heron. Also to Jeff Davis and wife-y dear Karen Robert for selecting
the restaurant and organizing the dinner.
Wine Pick: Louis M. Martini Cabernet
Sauvignon, Napa Valley 2000, $24. Blended with 80 percent Merlot and 1 each of
Cabernet Franc and Petit Verdot for balance, structure, depth and flavor
variety. Nose: deep briarwood, berries, plums, with cigar box nuance; palate:
incorporates nose aromas with added flavors of sweet herbs, red currants and
soft tannins; smooth slightly smoky finish and lingering aftertaste. Drink now;
better with additional aging.
Wine Pick: Victor Hugo Viognier
2000, $19, tasted again at recent wine dinner with the aforementioned two
professors and wives. Better now than when first tasted 18 months ago. Viognier
is Rhone Valley’s famous and coveted grape, now grown here. Delicious with
loads of spicy, lush, rich aromatic fruit; surprisingly complex for so young a
white wine; smooth, velvety swallow and gentle lingering aftertaste. If you
haven’t tasted this Victor Hugo gem, take my advice: hurry to your favorite
wine shop.
Wine Pick: Dry Creek DCV3 Fumé
Blanc 2002, $18. A personal cellar favorite, I always enjoy its bright, crisp
aromas of grapefruit and lemongrass interspersed with fresh flowers; palate: a mélange
of layered tastes reminiscent of lemon, green grapes, pineapple, pear, melon and
given complexity with hint of tarragon. Exquisitely balanced and lively with
fruited dryness, it’s a classy wine that merits purchase.
Email Comments to Julian at:
julian@oxfordwineroom.com