Château Grand-Puy-Lacoste Dinner

Well, we had quite a line-up for the Puy-Lacoste dinner that started with Robin egging me on to bid for the wines during the Montgomery County SPCA Wine Tasting Fund raiser. Unfortunately for us we got in a bidding war with on woman and had to guard our position. Lucky for us she was bidding on another wine. All for a good cause in the end.

Attendees: Robin, Susan, Tara, Roger, Lori, John and myself.

Line-up included:
Chateau Les Vergines White Bordeaux 2001
Pine Ridge Chenin Blanc-Viognier California 2002
Trinitas Chardonnay Russian River Valley 2005
Chateau Grand-Puy-Lacoste Pauillac 1982
Chateau Grand-Puy-Lacoste Pauillac 2001
Chateau Grand-Puy-Lacoste Pauillac 2003
Chateau Canon La Gaffelierre St. Emillion 1989
Rene Renow Bonnezeaux Tir de Vendanges 1998



Appetizers provided by Susan:
Savory Shortbread
Olive Spread with Roasted Red Pepper
Dried Sausage with herbs and pepper
Dinner:
Beef Tenderloin with Port and Shallot Gravy
Harlot Verts with Shallots and Fennel
Roasted Fingerline Potatoes

Dessert: Napoleons with Orange Creme and Cranberry Sauce


As far as the wine drinking, it didn't get off to a good start with the older whites that John brought - never entrust a red wine guy with bringing the white to start. Then again, he forgot about the three loafs of bread he brought but I digress. Tara was disappointed that she missed two wines while parking the car - no you didn't miss much. Good thing I had the Trinitas chilled as opposed to a dinner many years ago where Tara said that the dinner would go well with a nice white and I didn't have any white in the house! I thought the Trinitas was a fine example of chardonnay from the Russian River.

As for the reds, Tony, would have been most disappointed because we voted on decanting and decanting won - the thought of using a thumb and shaking in was strongly discouraged by all around the table. Why decant, well, Roger had printed a bunch of reviews of the wines and learned that many of the reviews including those for the 1982 strongly urged decanting which we all thought was odd for a wine that old. We later realized that over the course of the evening that wines really did change. The 2003 started out as a fruit bomb and went tannic as the 82 before coming back around again. I do think the 89 Gaffelierre was my overall favorite of the evening and the 82 as a close second. Out of the reds there wasn't a dud in the bunch. Pretty much this was what Bordeaux was all about. Nothing better than a piece of beef and a sip of Bordeaux.