Wine of the Week
EPERNAY
But Moet and Chandon mollified him, and by the time he had been driven in a little electric train round some of their seventeen miles of cellars, the most extensive in Champagne, .t.his face, if not exactly wreathed in smiles—there's rather a lot of face for that—was giving off little twinkles of good humour.
Count Robert-Jean de Vogue, head of the firm, elicited some of them by quoting old Russian proverbs (which I suspect him of having made up himself) in the speech in which he offered Mr. Khrushchev a glass, of Modt and Chandon 1893, bottled in 1894, the year of Mr. Khrushchev's birth, and was tactful enough not to point out that the reason for choosing a wine made in the year of his conception was that the year of his birth wasn't all that good. Tact, indeed, abounded among the French; if not in their guest, who said proudly that they grew a wine in the Caucasus that they called 'champagne,' and wasn't that a tribute to the great produce of France? The proud families that had made such a fuss about Spanish 'champagne' didn't bat an eyelid.
Moved, as always, by my duty to my readers, I also essayed a glass of the 1893 and can report it a remarkable wine, rather full and soft now, but still superbly drinkable, and full of bubble. But as you are unlikely to come across any, let me make my wine of the week the Moet and Chandon 'Dom Perignon' 1952, a case of which was presented to Mr. Khrushchev for consump- tion off the premises, along with a dozen other dozens from the great houses of Champagne. According to M. de Vogue, the 1952s are now coming into their own, a little later than the 1953s —the 'Dom Perignon' is Moet's special reserve, made from about 80 per cent. white grapes to 20 per cent. black, a reversal of the usual cham- pagne proportion, and with great lightness and delicacy, therefore. There isn't much made, but I gather that an enterprising wine-merchant could get some for you, at a couple of guineas a bottle, if you want to tipple like the top people.
What I can't guarantee is that as you carry it away, a salute will be fired of the corks from three hundred magnums of the best champagnes, as was arranged for the by-now-beaming Mr. Khrushchev. To say nothing of a crowd of cham- penois outside, waving little red flags and shout- ing `KHRU-SHCHEV ! KHRU-SHCHEV!' to his car ('We once very nearly had a Communist mayor in Epernay,' a member of the firm told me), the while La Fanfare des Tonneliers, in blue smocks, peaked ouvriers' caps and white pina- fores, tootled away at `Aupres de ma blonde.' I like to think that at this stage in the proceedings, in the back of his car, Mr. Khrushchev was beat- ing time with a bottle of the best.
CYRIL RAY
corked
Previous page
