Bordeaux and a sweet Chenin with the Last Tuesday of the Month Supper Club.

The Last Tuesday of the Month Supper Club met last night for I think its seventh dinner. Last night’s host with the most was Bill Lawrence, who, to go with the Bordeaux theme, prepared a delicious “steak house” dinner that started off with foie gras, shrimp cocktail, a fantastic Caesar salad, amazingly tender and juicy steaks with roasted multi-color potatoes, asparagus with morels and for dessert, a scrumptious apple pie with a cinnamon caramel sauce. Alas, I forgot my camera, but take my word for it; a great time was had by all!

• 1989 Château La Conseillante

  France, Bordeaux, Libournais, Pomerol

  Now this is not a bad way to start off a night. Just a gorgeous wine in every facet. It’s effusive on the nose with a Siren’s call of sweet cherry and strawberry fruit, earth and spicy cedar. Grace Kelly on the palate; elegant, regal, sexy and classy. There’s a wonderful harmony to this wine and it just caresses the mouth in silky luxury. Delicious sweetness to the red fruit, but it’s not jammy in the least. Drinking really well now, but given how nicely much older vintages have shown, there’s no harm at all in leaving it be for a few more decades. My wine of the night. A+/A.

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• 1990 Château Lynch-Bages

  France, Bordeaux, Médoc, Pauillac

  The La Conseillante was a tough act to follow and in comparison, this wine seemed quite a bit more reticent and clumsy. It was nowhere near as vibrant on the nose, only offering hints of black fruit and herb aromas. The palate, too, stood in sharp contrast. This wine was darker, with more of a cassis, graphite, herbal and tobacco leaf character to it. A little plump and unfocused, I’m thinking this wine could use more bottle age. A-.

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• 1990 Château Cos d'Estournel

  France, Bordeaux, Médoc, Saint-Estèphe

  Post ’82, I haven’t been a big fan of Cos. I find them a bit new worldy and, frankly, rather boring. That was the case with this wine, though everyone else seemed to like the wine more than I did. The nose shows aromas of spicy cedary oak, sweet red and black fruit, mushrooms and cocoa. Soft and a bit unfocused, there’s really too much bitter wood here for me to fully enjoy the wine. Black fruit with bitter dark chocolate with a touch of herb, the wine just doesn’t have much of a personality to me. Solid B+.

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• 1990 Château Angélus

  France, Bordeaux, Libournais, Saint-Émilion Grand Cru

  This is a nice contrast with the ’90 Cos because I find both a bit new world, but this wine does it much better. Perhaps my second favorite L’Angelus after the stunning ’89, this wine is always about, rich, decadent, sweet black fruit. It’s opulent, non-apologetic in its decadence and just really fun to drink. There’s definitely some oak influenced spice and chocolate/mocha flavors and aromas, but the wine handles it well. Low acid and puppy friendly, it’s a wine that’ll put a naughty grin on your face and there’s no shame in that. A.

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• 1982 Château Sociando-Mallet Flawed

  France, Bordeaux, Médoc, Haut-Médoc

  Heat damaged. Rats! NR.

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• 1986 Château Talbot

  France, Bordeaux, Médoc, Saint-Julien

  Classic, old school Bordeaux. Plenty of barnyardy Cordier funk on the nose, with cherry, earth and leather. It’s sprightly and crisp on the palate with plenty of acidity. The wine borders on lean, but there’s just enough fruit in there to stand up to the structure, though earth, leather and herb flavors rule the day. The tannins have softened a bit and I’d drink up as I believe the fruit is receding. Not a wine I’d really like by itself, but it was lovely with the steak. A-/B+.

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• 1996 Château Grand-Puy-Lacoste

  France, Bordeaux, Médoc, Pauillac

  This one is still pretty closed up and not showing much development. There’s some nice black fruit, herb and graphite, but there’s still formidable structure and it’s a bit one dimensional at this stage. Good raw materials, though. B+ now with Solid A- potential.

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• 2002 Domaine Jo Pithon Coteaux du Layon Saint-Lambert Les Bonnes Blanches

  France, Loire Valley, Anjou-Saumur, Coteaux du Layon Saint-Lambert

  A stray bottle I had in the cellar. It’s a surprisingly dark, coppery color. It’s an intense wine aromatically and on the palate with canned peach, quince paste, hints of cardamom and other exotic spices and candied orange rind flavors and aromas. It could use a little more acidity as there is a bit of a syrupy quality to it, but there’s just enough structure to prevent the wine from being cloying. It doesn’t have the acidic verve and brilliant minerality that a late harvest Vouvray has, but it’s definitely scratches the sweet Chenin itch. Solid A-.

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