These are the notes from the Big Bottle Mouton dinner at Gavroche in Vancouver, celebrating its 25th anniversary, as well as its recent reopening after almost a year's down-time as a result of a fire in an adjacent part of the building.
While waiting around for the kick-off (cork-off?), as I had arrived early to beat traffic and obtain a parking spot, we had a glass of:
2001 Chateau de Nages Vieilles Vignes (Costieres de Nimes ) - a blend of grenache blanc and Roussanne, this wine was a little on the cold sidee, but showed an enticing nose of mostly floral elements and maybe a touch of lanolin, and lots of character in the mouth. Clean crisp and great summer sipping.The opening salvo in this big bore event was a champers:
1975 Bollinger Grande Annee RD - 'The name is Bond - James Bond" Our hero started out his career with '55 Dom Perignon, went to Taittinger Blanc de Blanc in From Russia with Love, and ended up with Bollie in recent flicks. It is my understanding that Champagne is aged in nothing larger than magnum format and that the larger bottles are filled from single or magnum size. The actual sizes are always a bit confusing, as for reasons known best to the French, the names for bottle sizes for still wines don't match those for Champagne. This one was a Methusaleh, which in Champagne means 8 bottles but anywhere else is called an Imperial. The same size bottles were used throughout the dinner. As for the wine, it was amazingly sprightly. It seemed to be quite young, and had excellent mousse, having lost none of its effervescence - something older (non- RD, for I believe they give the RD a bit of a 'stiffener' in terms of bubble) bubblies have a tendency to do, until with the very old they become almost still wines, with only an errant bubble or two to indicate previous glories (IMO they should be drunk long before they get to this state of advanced debilitation, but the English, who apparently like their girls young and their Champers old, would disagree). The most fascinating thing about this wine was the nose, which had a complex nutty quality to it, perhaps from extended contact on the lees. It was fresh, clean and slightly soft.The Bollinger bottle had good company - they set it up, once empty, beside a bottle form a previous event - a 1982 Gosset Brut in Nebuchadnezzar (15 litres) size.
2002 Graves Blanc Rothschild - this is the white Bordeaux normally sold in regular bottles. Our host prevailed on Mouton to specially bottle it in an Imperial just for this dinner. It is normally about equal parts of Semillon, and Sauvignon Blanc and a dash of Muscadelle. It showed interestingly enough, more as a Semillon in the nose, with none of the green SB character and more 'fat' than normal, yet more like SB in the mouth, clean and with pretty good length. Served with a Dungeness crab terrine with sauce vierge.1976 Ch. Mouton Rothschild - I have enjoyed this wine from single bottles many times over the years. I have always considered it to be far better than the rather poor 1978, and I made a prediction here that it would be the wine of the evening. This was met with disbelief but I was vindicated once all had been tasted. From this large format, the wine showed a cigarbox, cedar nose with mature ripe plum and a hint of spice. In the mouth it was marvellously youthful, with significant, though soft tannins and excellent length. Very enjoyable with stuffed rabbit loin with chanterelle sauce (we now have our first chanterelles coming in here, smaller and later than normal due to the long hot summer we had, but with lots of flavour).
1975 Ch. Mouton Rothschild - I am a big fan of this vintage, a big-boned and in youth a raw tannic vintage, with the fruit peeking out past the hard tannin, making you wonder if an when they wines would ever come into balance. Some haven't, and never will, but the Mouton has shown rather well over the last 10 years or so, though the large format gave me cause for concern, as the last thing you'd need with this 75 is a bigger, younger version of the single bottle experience! The nose of this wine was much more subdued than the 76, and had more spice and cocoa, but less fruit. The wine was thankfully not excessively tannic, but was quite high in acidity, and was clearly inferior to the 76 in every way. I have had considerably better bottles of 75, but I don't think I've ever had a better bottle of the 76, so it wasn't quite a fair contest. Served with a venison chop (rare) with wild game sauce.1990 Ch. Mouton Rothschild - another dark wine, this time with a nose that was quite ripe and full, again with cedar as the predominant component, along with a troubling hint of volatile acidity. The wine is better integrated than it was the last time I tasted it, but the tannins are still a bit angular and the finish a bit tart, with lots of stuffing in between. If the wine ever comes into 'focus', it may be quite good. Served with Brie cut in half horizontally, layered with shaved black truffles, and reassembled and allowed to 'steep' for
3 days. Zowie!1997 Ch. Coutet - keeping in the Bordeaux theme, this Barsac was pretty young, and was showing a simple citrus nose and a slightly green aspect to the flavour profile. The wine isn't integrated yet but had good balance and reasonable length, and probably just needs some time. With mango tart.