SPECTATOR WINE CLUB
Budgeting for Christmas
Auberon Waugh
Athe Budget was being announced even as this offer was going to press, I agreed with Lay & Wheeler that prices in it would be unaffected. If duty is to be increased - I cannot believe Clarke would dare - Lay & Wheeler will lose. If duty is to be reduced - what will the wretched man do for money? - we will not benefit. But as all the prices have already been reduced significantly, some spectacularly, I will not complain.
As people will observe, we are offering two entirely different cases in this last offer of the year. The second(11), consisting of six bottles only, and averaging £12.18 the bot- tle, is fine, grand, expensive wine for Christmas Day. The other case of 12, aver- aging £5.20 the bottle(10), is good fare for the Christmas season.
First, a wonderfully fruity and strong-tast- ing South African sauvignon at £4.25(1). No gooseberry, but huge peach and some cur- rant leaves. Must be well chilled or it will overpower you. Some might think of this inexpensive nectar as a summer's treat, but central heating has the same effect on mouth-chemistry, and even as I write I find myself raring to open a bottle of this Stellen- bosch sauvignon, as Barry Mackenzie used to yearn for a tube of ice-cold Fosters.
Leflaive's 1993 Macon Villages Blanc(2) is less exciting, perhaps, but the price of £5.60 is fair and the wine well-mannered and pleas- ant. Slightly subdued at first, it develops a bit of honey and shows no faults.
I was more excited by Grossot's Chablis(3), and not just because the price had come down to £7.49 from a list price of £8.95. This is proper, full Chablis from a good year. Nothing thin or mean or 'crisp' which, applied to Chablis, generally means over-acidic.
Finally, among the whites, the first of the Christmas 'specials' leaves me more excited than is healthy at my age, despite its £14.95 the bottle. Boisson-Vadot Meursault les Grands Charrons 1992(a) has come down from £16.50 for a lovely, dense white Bur- gundy, good oak, touch of zest, for drinking any time in the next two years. It is an intense wine, ending quite abruptly (for the price). I suppose some people must be pre- pared to pay these prices for white Bur- gundy or they wouldn't go on asking them, but I would have to think very hard before spending £16.50 on what is only slightly bet- ter than a Leuwin estate chardonnay from Margaret River in Western Australia. Don't blame Lay & Wheeler. This is a good price. Blame our leaders whose idiotic poli- cy of low interest rates will soon produce the 6-franc pound. At least our red cheapie(s) is a real cork- er. At £3.35 delivered, this cabernet sauvi- gnon from the Aude is not only one of the cheapest, but one of the easiest to drink I have ever offered. At a respectable 12 degrees it is an adult's tipple and a boy's tipple, rather than a teenager's tipple. Nothing sweet, a decent, recognisable cabernet taste, totally proper, clean, and you will drink a bottle before you notice. I often exclaim against the rat's-tail taste of young merlot as produced in right-bank blends, but here) is a fine, fruity young merlot which boasts of time spent in oak (although I would not have guessed it) at the Domaine la Fadeze. For those who pre- fer the merlot taste to the more austere cabernet variations, this is a meaty, sub" stantial wine and a bit of a discovery in its way at £4.80 (reduced from £5.25). The year 1990 produced many miracles from the petit-châteaux of Bordeaux. This one') comes from the very east of the region, near Bergerac: nice cabernet taste at the herbaceous end of the spectrum and good rich smell. The Verriere won against intense competition from other clarets the 1989-90 vintages, and is warmly recom- mended at £5.70 (down from £6.25). Finally, two more luxury wines to complete the Christmas Special half-case. The Chateauneuf du Pape, Domaine la Roque 1992(8) at £9.10 (down from £9.95) is a WO" derfully thick wine, full of spice and cloves, which may be drunk with great pleasure now but will certainly go on improving for anoth- er 10 or 12 years. It already tastes much more expensive than it is. But it is a bueca: neer's drink compared to the St Emilion: 1 had never heard of la Clusiere(s) and suspect I may never hear of it again, but the 199015 3 true miracle of elegance and delight. Some may remember last year's 1990 Pauillac' which was the third wine of Château Latour. I still have a few bottles and still adore it, tat! this St Etnilion at £12.50 (down from £13.95) is twice as good.
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