As the first flight I decided to open a bunch of Champagne with all but one of them being Blanc de Blancs. Four were Growers Champagnes (Egly-Ouriet, Bereche, Agrapart and Larmandie Bernier) and one produced by a big Champagne house (Taittinger). All were tasted blind...I just informed my guests that there are two ringer bottles in the flight. One because of the grape variety (Egly-Ouriet Vignes de Vrginy being 100% Pinot Meunier) and one because it was not a Growers Champagne (Taittinger CdC 2002).

The line-up was amazing, while the CdC 2002 was easily noticable (higher dosage) the Growers Champagnes were all amazing with each one of them having their distinct character. My favorite and one of my all time best Champagnes was the Agrapart Minéral 2006. This is just amazing stuff!

To accompany the bubbles, some Foie Gras appetizers were served.

Then we moved to the red wines. This flight was selected as the first one due to the fact that the Right Bank wines are all a bit lighter in 1996. To make it a bit more fun I decided to put the 1996 Rauzan Segla in as a ringer bottle. Initially I have prepared the 1996 Domaine de Chevalier, but then my friend Thomas showed up with a 1996 Angelus. So it did not take me more than 10 seconds to change resp. upgrade this flight.

The 1996 Clinet was also a donation from a great friend ... Thanks Goce for adding this bottle to this fun flight.

Looking at the time it took to empty the bottles, the verdict of this flight was #1 Angelus and #2 Rauzan Segla.... the two Clinets remained 1/3 Full, which confirmed the mediocre quality of the 1996 Pomerols (though I have had Eglise Clinet with 94 pts before).

To match this flight, my wife prepared a wonderful Quiche Laurainne with Mixed Greens.

Now with the main course 'Grilled Veal-Chop with Oven-Baked Ratatouille' I decided to move to more meaty wines... this obviously called for the wines of the Left Bank.... St. Julien, Pauillac and St. Estephe.

This was a bit of a difficult flight, Montrose and Léoville Barton having great potential but being a few years too young. Those two bottles were not really fun to drink, hence also remainde half-full. GPL and surprisingly Gruaud Larose showed very well. While the GPL has the power of a typical Pauillac the G-L was more on the leathery-elegant side. Both of them being very nice, but the GPL a hint better than G-L!

Now to match the richness of the warm 'Chocolate Tartlette with Redwine Cherries and Cherry Ice cream' I decided to go for more full-bodied reds. Unfortunately the PiCoLa corked, which needed to be replaced by the 1996 Sociando Mallet. Surprisingly the Sociando showed very well in this flight of great wines. Then I had two ringer bottles in the flight, one on purpose from my other favorite destination Napa Valley from one of my favority winery, and the other one by mistake because I pulled the wrong bottle out of the shelf (2008 instead of 1996 Pichon Baron).

The Heitz Martha's was amazing, having had the 1996 Martha's a few times in difficult stages...this bottle showed extremely well. My WOTN. The other amazing wine was the 2008 Pichon Baron, extremely exotic with hints of Coconut and dark chocolate. Amazing stuff. Cos and Sociando were fun and wonderful classical clarets, but at this stage just not at the level of the Heitz and the Pichon Baron. Wonderful stuff to finish the red wines of the evening ....

...and then my friend Marcello mentioned that he was surprised not to see any JJ Prüms (my favorite Riesling producer). He was so right but I simply must have forgotten. As the majority of my wines are stored in an external cellar I quickly went to my wine fridge which holds the essentials and I checked what I have ... nothing mature... but at least I found a JJ and a rare Riesling from Gantenbein to fade out this wonderful evening...