Connecting Australian Wines With Shakespeare
by Julian Schultz
julian@oxfordwineroom.com
Jim Nicas, Castle's sommelier/maitre d' must possess a divining rod: Only it is Jim's, palate that is his divining rod as he seeks the presence of prestige wines and uses his tasting expertise when he finds and selects them for his monthly Sunday tastings. (A divining rod - sometimes called a dowser -- is a forked rod believed to indicate the presence of water or minerals by dipping down into the earth.)
So it was prestige wines for 28 enthusiastic oenophiles as Jim inaugurated this year's monthly tastings in January with rare, obscure, mostly expensive…and magnificent Australian wines.
We sampled, sniffed, sipped, gurgled, swallowed, lip-smacked, hummed and buzzed with 16 wines of world-class pedigree and integrity; unfamiliar names such as Ivan Limb, Leasingham, Bookpurnong Hill, Lockwood, Henschke, Torbreck, Giaconda, Yarra Burn, others, for two euphoric hours.
I have been privileged to taste the great Australian wines of Grange Hermitage and Magill and was ecstatic with the experience. That sensation was repeated, especially when I sipped the 150/100 price-valued wines. There were other delicious wines, really extraordinary, with full fruit and perfect balance, but I price-valued them either 100/100 or at less than 100/100 only because of high price, much to Yoric's disagreement.
Yorick? Who was this stranger - grizzled, silver-sable-bearded, long-haired, bespectacled on nose tip, sloppy-slacked -- who arrived after the first wine, the Henschke Pinot Gris 2000, $32, had been poured? He sighted, sniffed, sipped, swallowed quickly, thought slowly, then announced with thespian flair and intonation: "A cavalier wine of reticent nose, with swashbuckling fleshy fruit flavors, courtly elegance and classic breeding, exquisitely ballet balanced, reluctant in sad farewell."
I said that I agreed with his evaluation, except that I wouldn't describe it so poetically, and introduced myself. I complimented him on a colorful palate, saying that I also found citrus and vanilla in it and noted that it was crisp and clean.
"I am Alec Yoric," he said, as we shook hands.
I couldn't resist: "Alas, poor Yorick! I knew him, Horatio: a fellow of infinite jest, of most excellent fancy (personality, expression, admiration for, respect for, good taste, love prone - in Shakespeare's language)."
Quick came his rejoinder: "Oh, talk not to me of a name great in story; the days of our youth are the days of our glory; and the myrtle and ivy of sweet two-and-twenty are worth all his laurels, though ever so plenty."
"Lord Byron," I said triumphantly.
"And yours is from Hamlet," he said, "Act 5, Scene 1, graveyard rendezvous - skull…dug…gery, ha, ha -- get it?"
"Indeed I do," I said. "How come you know all this stuff?" I was in awe.
He replied, "I was professor of literature at North Dakota Agricultural State College." In response to my asking what he was doing here, he answered: "I resigned from the institution, couldn't cope anymore with obstreperous youth, with trying to force culture and the humanities into minds addicted to cyberspace and sex, with unruly students attempting to assert peer dominance. So I am here at Clark University, doing research for the biography I'm writing: "Shakespeare or de Vere, Bumpkin or Genius, Is He Is Or Is He Ain't!"
I said that was a startling title for his book and that his North Dakota college and his writing about Shakespeare made me recall two rather significant events in my life: I had been to Officer Candidate School, Adjutant General's Division, at that college in the winter of 1942-1943; and some years later I had antagonized a Shakespeare travel tour guide when I repeated that Edward de Vere, a contemporary of Shakespeare, wrote the plays and sonnets attributed to Shakespeare.
Yorick nodded, suggested we start tasting and that we discuss the college and Shakespeare later.
We started again with the first wine, the excellent Pinot Gris, already discussed, to which I gave a 90/100 price value…at $32. Yoric protested my "under valued" rating, saying, "The wine's the thing, the wine! wherein we'll catch the conscience of the true connoisseur; price value is irrelevant to the pleasure he derives from wine."
Chardonnay 2001, $22, by Nurihannam, followed. My notes: "closed nose, wine too cold for it to open; vanilla, oak, butterscotch on the palate; reminiscent of a Burgundy; assertive, balanced, lingering. Nice wine, 100/100." Yoric nodded, adding that he discerned additionally roasted almonds and some unctuousness.
Nantua Les Deux, Giaconda, 2002, $50, blend of 85 percent Chardonnay/15 Roussane, was sensational! Cold as it was, notwithstanding it exploded in the nose with full flavors, continuing on the palate with layered tastes of apples, butterscotch, sweet-edged grass, vanilla, hint of smoke, toast and nuts. I rated it 150/100, drawing a "not nearly enough" demur from Yoric."
I said to Yoric that I had never even heard of this wine and would gladly pay $50 for it but doubted that I could find it. I sighed adding, "Well, I'll comfort myself by fantasizing about it in my leisure moments with wine.
Came Yoric's observation, which sounded like a quotation…that I didn't need: "Fantasies are Quixotic. We live in a world of grim reality, and daydreaming with fantasies affords us only temporary escape."
Tasting white wines ended with Viognier (60 percent), Marsanne (20), Roussanne (20) 2002, $36, Torbreck, a superb wine of immense citrus fruit and freshly picked apples; beautifully balanced, firm, crisp, clean and persistent. I rated it 100/100 at $36, drawing a huffy "not enough" from Yoric.
We tasted 11 red wines and one tawny port. I will describe the four 150/100 priced-valued red wines first, followed by the two 100/00 and completed with the three excellent under 100/100; the 150/100 tawny port will conclude the discussion of the wines.
Yarra Burn Pinot Noir 2000, $23, opened with an assertive raspberry nose that transferred to the palate with more intense sweet-edged raspberry flavors, subtleties of raisins, toast, dried leaves; nicely balancing fruit acids, soft tannin, firm texture; 150/100.
Petit Verdot 2000, $20, Ellen Landing - my first experience in 51 years of tasting was sipping a 100 percent varietal of this wine that is usually a minor blend in most Bordeaux wines. Soft nose led to mouth filling flavors of blackberries and raspberries with balancing crisp acidity and firm tannins. Yoric chimed in: "A symphony of fruits with added cherries, raisins, currants, augmented with black pepper and some cedar; 150/100, and don't you dare say less…or perish!" I didn't say less, so I am still alive.
Stonegarden 2000, $19, comprising Grenache (70 percent) and Shiraz (30) offered an interesting vinous nose; palate flavors of spice, fruit jam, currants, black pepper, some tobacco and smoke. As with all the wines, fruit and balance were the first attributes noted.
Meritage (40 percent Cabernet Sauvignon, 30 Petit Verdot, 20 Marsanne, 10 Shiraz) by Bookpurnong Hill 1999, $32, delivered an immense smoky complex nose with lush flavors of blackberries, cherries, mint, black pepper, with nuances of chocolate and cedar; properly balanced, smooth swallow, lingering aftertaste. Some tasters applauded Jim Nicas when they sniffed and sipped, including Yoric.
Hot hors d'oeuvres were brought from the kitchen: spinach/cheese pitas, chicken kabobs wrapped in won ton, crabmeat rangoons and baguettes; these were added to the blue cheese, Muenster and Cheddar, the four varieties of fresh fruit and the crackers and toasted rounds that were on the table when we arrived.
Yoric and I sat together, eating and enjoying the food between sips of our wines. He asked me about OCS and - as he put it - "The maligned Bard of Avon": What was the college like over 60 years ago? What about Shakespeare, de Vere and the tour guide? I described first my 90 days at the college. This is some of what I told him:
At OCS we head been domiciled in the cold cement cellar of the main building with a minimum of heat; up a 5 every morning, drilling in the freezing dawn against the cold winter's wind and on the snow covered prairie. We were apprehensive over the constant monitoring of our leadership qualities. Some candidates panicked over that emphasis and thought they could best demonstrate leadership by throwing their weight around, by incessantly "ahub-ahub, ahubbing" and mouthing off in loud voice. Our section of 19 candidates had four such obnoxious would-be leaders.
During the second month, we were asked to name six candidates whom we would confidently follow into battle and six we wouldn't, and to give brief comments about each. Two weeks later our four would-be leaders and 15 others from other sections flunked out.
We were burdened with the demanding, unrelenting, physical and academic workload. The Adjutant General's OCS School standards were very high, as was its washout rate. The written material covering Administration, Classification and Personnel was so formidable that we were warned 25 percent of us likely wouldn't graduate.
Yoric chuckled and nodded knowingly when I spoke of the cold winter's wind and the snow covered prairie, adding that in spring, summer and fall one needed to be careful not to step into a gopher hole and break a leg. He asked about Shakespeare. This is how I innocently provoked the hostility of our tour guide at Shakespeare's tiny birthplace:
I said that many Shakespeare scholars contend that Edward de Vere, 17th Earl of Oxford, wrote the sonnets and plays, that Shakespeare was a country bumpkin of meager education; was married at 18, a father at 19, a family deserter to London, a simple stagehand and a minor actor.
I repeated that some literary historians assert de Vere, conversely, was brilliant, having earned two Master's degrees by age 17; was knowledgeable of law, and history, of Italy, Greece, Spain and France, of Latin and Greek, of royalty's deportment, of palace intrigues. They said, I continued, that he was a world traveler, that many of his adventures appear in Shakespeare's plays and that his own extra marital affairs and the peccadilloes of close associate - not privy to Shakespeare - are satirized in his plays.
Scholar submit, I added, that de Vere wrote under the name of William Shakespeare, of necessity: Playwriting was beneath the dignity of nobility, and the writings we know as Shakespeare's are similar to de Vere's in style and erudition.
Fanny, tour guide, became angry; her smiling face hardened to stone when I asked, "How could a semi-literate like Shakespeare possibly have detailed so specifically the customs and history of faraway places? He was never there."
Fanny said she was "sick to death hearing that Bacon, Johnson and/or Marlowe wrote Shakespeare, and now de Vere!" She angrily walked away.
Lillian spoke with her at lunch later, apologized for me, said that I didn't mean to challenge Shakespeare's authenticity. Fanny accepted Lillian's invitation to join us, said she was sorry for her "choler," but that we couldn't imagine the number of visitor "smarty pants and panties" that attribute Shakespeare's writing to others. Should that belief "catch fire," she added in jest, "I would be on the dole!"
Yoric nodded understandingly during my recitation and said that WGBH - channels 2 and 44 - will have four, one hour, discussions on Shakespeare, from 8 to 9 p.m., beginning Wed., February 4 and continuing Wednesdays on the 11th, 18th and 25th. Each week a different aspect of Shakespeare's life and times will be explored. Perhaps, after that, both my and his opinions may change, he said. He didn't tell me his opinion, nor did I ask.
Well sated with food, we returned to the tasting.
I rated five wines 100/100 with some disagreement from Yoric - "not enough": Nurihannam Chardonnay 2001,$22; Torbreck Meritage (white) 2002, $36; Merlot, Eden Valley 1998, $24; Meritage (red), Torbreck 2001, $19; Shiraz, Jim Barry 2000, $36.
In retrospect, perhaps these wines were worthy of at least a 115/100 price value rating. All were generous with raspberry/blackberry flavors, were balanced with black pepper, fruit acids and firm tannin. With the exception of the smoky fruit aroma in the Torbreck Meritage (red), the aromas of the other four wines were non-existent. I thought $36 for the Jim Barry Shiraz was too high for a better rating, eliciting a snort of derision from Yoric, although it is a fine wine.
Yoric shook his head and stomped away from me in disgust when I rated less than 100/100 Ivan Limb's Meritage (Mourvedre 50 percent, Cabernet Sauvignon 27, 23 Shiraz) 2001, $39…90/100; Leasingham's Cabernet Sauvignon 1998, $42…90/100; Ivan Limb's Shiraz 2001, $45 - really a superb wine, and in second thought maybe deserving of a 115/100…anyway, I rated it 95/100.
Barwang Vineyard's 10-year-old Tawny Port, $24, 150/100, to be trite, was "mind-boggling," mouth filling with big luscious flavors of fermented raisins, caramel and stone fruit varieties; grape varieties used were the same as those used in Portugal. I'm a Vintage Port enthusiast almost exclusively, but I will make a most happy exception when I sip away on Barwang's Tawny.
Jim Nicas announced that Classic Wines are distributors for all wines tasted this afternoon. Haunt your favorite wine shop - perhaps buy multiple cases and split the wines with kindred wine connoisseurs. You'll get full case discounts, which will lower the prices reported here.
Next month Jim and the Castle will present the great, but not so well known, wines of New Zealand, Sunday, 3 to 5 p.m., February 22. Hope to see you there.
Next month Chris Liazos and the Webster House will present a special Valentine Chocolate and Wine Lover's dinner, Wednesday, 6 p.m., February 18. Hope to see you there.
Wine Pick: From the noble wine cellars of Stephen Ross, Monte Rosso Zinfandel 2000, $26.39 (discounted price from $32.99). Fifteen months barrel aging. A classic zinfandel with flavors of raspberry, briarwood, black pepper, balanced with fruit acids and tannin; long smooth swallow. A top of the line zinfandel.
Wine Pick: Bien Nacido Vineyard Chardonnay from Stephen Ross 2000, $23.19 (discounted from $28.99). Variety of fruit aromas flood the nose, which transfer to the palate and integrate with mineral complexity from 15 months of sur-lees aging. A chard that keeps one lingering over. Nice wine, nice price.
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julian@oxfordwineroom.com