SPECTATOR WINE CLUB
Grape expectations
Auberon Waugh
FOR the first time in history, Avery's Grand Christmas offer features as many wines from Chile as from France - in fact, four from each, with one Italian and one Australian making up the ten. The simple truth is that the Chileans are making better wine at more reasonable prices - both white and red - than anyone else. One hears much of the strong pound causing problems in the north of England, but the French do not seem to have heard of it. Whereas in past years I have been able to include a few classed clarets and burgundies of sound vintage, the price of any classic French wine is now so hideous and absurd that I have decided not to insult Spectator readers with them - even the better placed, whom we used to call plu- tocrats. I am quite proud of No. 10, the Remoissenet 1989 burgundy for £10 a bottle, but ashamed not to be able to show the tra- ditional and excellent Avery's champagne at less than £12.99. It is much better than the cheap champagnes you buy at take-aways, but the joy was always getting it so cheap, and I would have thought that £11.15 was quite enough to pay. So now let us gallop through.
The Domaine Ste Madelaine's tenet/ chardonnay(1) is probably so cheap because no one has ever heard of the tenet, a local grape. Nor can I find it in any reference book. But it produced a very pleasant, full- flavoured wine. At £3.90 delivered, reduced from £4.40 list price, it has nothing flabby about it and is recommended. Alcohol only 12 per cent.
Of the two white Echeverrias from Moli- na, Chile, the sauvignon(2) at £4.50 (reduced from £5.05) excited great enthusiasm as a possible aperitif. Good, fresh, clean smell, untypical sauvignon taste - I found it slightly nutty - but everyone liked it. The chardonnay reserva(3) at £5.75 (down from £6.45) was very different, a rich, grand taste which several members of the panel raved about. Nothing oily, full of fruit and deli- cious.
Taltarni's sauvignon(4) from Victoria, Aus- tralia is not cheap, even at the reduced price of £7.50 (down from £8.10) but it is an abso- lutely first-class wine: full, well-mannered, rounded, it would make anyone proud to be a plutocrat (or better-placed as we must now say). The two white Chileans above weighed in at 13.5 per cent by vol., Taltarni is back to a more civilised 12.5 per cent.
Avery's(5) excellent champagne needs no introduction. It has the quality which is rare in non-vintage champagnes of improving in bottle. We must just grit our teeth over the price of £12.99.
I found our red cheapie - the Beau Chene, grenache(6) at its magnificent price of £3.20 (down from £4.05) - a charming, simple wine: nice light colour, good smell, not a tremendous amount of taste, but prop- er and pleasant. So did everyone else except for one member of the panel who said it burned her tongue. I can't explain that.
Next an Italian red(7) with a silly name and an ugly label at £5.35 (reduced from £5.99). Striking, spicy smell; full, jammy taste. Port- like, perhaps: at any rate, seeming older and richer than it is. Better than OK.
Echeverria's cabernet sauvignon 1996(8) is like a good, strong 1990 bourgeois claret, but Francisco de Aguirre's Tierras Altas(9) cabernet sauvignon, from Chile's Coquim- bo region, is even better than this. For an extra 15 pence you have a truly excellent cabernet, of seductive smell and taste, with a bit of bite at the end but inoffensive in every department - a highly sophisticated wine which should not be missed.
I was happy and proud to secure some of Remoissenet's own 1989 burgundy(10) at only £10 the bottle. Full, old-style, mature vin- tage burgundy is not only impossibly exp- ensive but also very hard to find unless you happen to have several cellars stuffed with it. This is quite different - the very best of the new style burgundy: clear, bright colour, exactly the right smell, clean, pure beautiful taste. A fulgent wine in every sense of the word, and a lovely drinking experience.
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