Dinner with Jerming

Jerming was back to Singapore bearing a unique bottle of old Hunter Cabernet. We had a lovely catch-up with Chern Wern and E at Asia Grand before decamping to our place for a nice Burgundy.

• 1977 Lake's Folly Cabernet Sauvignon 91 Points

  Australia, New South Wales, Hunter Valley

  This might have been better a few years ago, but it was still beautiful on the night. It had such a lush, attractive nose, lots of black cherries and cassis, sweet spices and tobacco, dusty earth, smoked meats, a touch of dried flowers and wood herbs. Lovely, complex stuff. The palate was surprisingly light-weighted, Pinot-like in density, with absolutely silky tannins and a lovely dancing freshness to it. This was just upon the cusp of starting to thin out, but was still beautiful drinkable - while little seams balsam wood starting to show up, it still had a lovely amount of Cabernet fruit, with elegant flavours of cassis and black cherries underscored by ever so slightly bittersweet notes of smoke and tar, tobacco and dried earth. It finally drifted away in a nice touch of dried flowers and malted honey. Really nice. Weakening, but still delicious. It really flattened out after half an hour, showing some iodine notes sticking out from thinning fruit. Still though, it was really charming when it lasted. A treat.

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• 1998 Domaine Dujac Gevrey-Chambertin 1er Cru Aux Combottes 93 Points

  France, Burgundy, Côte de Nuits, Gevrey-Chambertin 1er Cru

  Excellent - from a 375ml, this was really starting to come into its own. A lot more open and giving than the last bottle, it had a beautiful nose, with perfumy wafts of blueberries, cherries and raspberries wed to enticing little notes of woody spice, sous bois, game meat and leather. With time, some lovely floral notes and a twist of orange peel emerged as well - such a pretty nose, masculine in some ways, elegant and feminine in others. The same could be said of the palate. Beautifully integrated by now, and quite seamlessly flowing from the nose, it still had a firm grip on it, but had also mellowed into a really drinkable package, with fine tannins and lovely acidity, juicy, almost mouthwatering, as it wove its way through beautifully clear, almost transparent expression of dark cherries and blueberries on the attack and then a broad-shouldered, savoury, almost muscular base of meat and spice and earth on the midpalate. Lots of umami there. Really strong on the backpalate too, with an almost chewy, crunchy mouthful of dark cherries, haw flakes and orange peel, all seasoned with a final dash of spice as the wine pulled away far into the distance. What a finish! It shut down after an hour in the glass unfortunately, but such a brilliant wine while it lasted, and just barely entering into its drinking window too. In a 750ml format, I would easily give this another decade before peak.

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