A romp through the Rhone Valley

Two exciting things happened at Lincoln’s Inn yesterday. The first was the shooting of the BBC’s new production of Sense and Sensibility. But even more exciting was that fact that we inhabitants moved our dining room table out into the middle of Old Buildings and conducted a tasting of Rhone Valley wines from about 4pm til we couldn’t stand up any more.

We started with a bracket of whites, each surprisingly different in style. A Condrieu or Chateau-Grillet was out of the question price-wise so we began with a 2004 Jean-Luc Colombo Cotes du Rhone ‘Les Figuières’ (70% Viognier, 30% Roussanne) which portrayed its varietal composition didactically. The wine has a heady nose of apricots and almonds. The palate follows: viscous, sweaty, with a nutty, agreeably bitter finish. Not a complex wine, but a well-made, more-ish one.

Alongside it was the 2004 Stephan Chaboud St Peray (80% Marsanne, 20% Roussanne). An intense nose with PVC glue, orange, varnish and spicy oak, if a little bit ‘woodchippy’. The palate is full bodied, with nutty almond characters and a fine acid finish. The wine can appear aggressive, and I would not recommend it without food, which should help to keep the chemically elements of this wine in abeyance. Sainsbury’s Local on High Holborn was selling free range chooks for £2.99 earlier in the day, so I shoved one in the oven at about 7pm, and served it an hour or so later with new potatoes in parsley butter. The St Peray was a great match – so much so that it makes me wonder if there is any point in Chardonnay any more. Poor Chardonnay, useless as an aperitif, outshone by so many other varieties in most food matching, at least it and roast chicken would stay friends for ever. Well, not so, apparently. It now has at least one serious competitor in that department.

The whites finished with a 2005 Domaine de Cassan Cotes du Rhone (30% each of Roussanne, Grenache Blanc and Clairette, 10% Viognier), which really split the punters. I liked it, maybe not as much as the other two though. A fresh nose of minerals, lime, apples, orange sherbet and mandarin peel. It’s like a vinous version of Fanta. The palate shows light, expressive, fruity flavours of apricot and peach. Perhaps a little bitter on the finish. What I like about it is how much it proves there is variety in Rhone Valley whites. They’re not all viscous, nutty, and many-chinned. This wine exhibited a zing to it more common in a young Riesling.

The reds began with a 2004 Jean-Luc Colombo St Joseph ‘Le Prieuré’. It was purple, with black pepper and sour cherries on the nose, and, after time, a disagreeable element of smoke and car exhaust. The mid-weight palate is driven by straight forward cherry fruit, ending with bright acid and a hint of bitterness. I probably wouldn’t complain if someone served me this wine, but at £13-odd it tested my patience. Beside it, I served a 2004 Chapoutier Crozes Hermitage ‘Les Meysonnières’, which I reviewed last week, and which went to show that the Northern Rhone really did have stuff going for it.

Here is where you should be reading a review of 2000 René Balthazar Cornas and a 2003 Domaine du Joncier Lirac, but they didn’t arrive in time, thanks to the incompetence of certain merchants who I won’t name, because I otherwise like their work.

Instead, you can read about the far less interesting 2004 Santa Duc Vin de Pays de Vaucluse, and 2004 Les Aphillanthes Cotes du Rhone, bought at the last minute. The Vin de Pays was purple with a spicy, oaky nose. Forward fruit was the idea behind the palate, with blackberries and spicy oak, which, if I didn’t know better, I might allege to be American. The Cotes du Rhone was mid-red. The nose showed forward, fruity red cherries and liquorice characters. The palate follows with soft, slightly confected red fruits and a hint of spice on the finish. Some nice grip in the tannin department. Altogether two rather decent work-horse wines, that I might serve at a wedding where nobody is really paying attention to the wine, but far too prepared to complain if it’s crap.

We then interluded with a 2004 Domaine du Père Caboche Chateauneuf du Pape – one of the few domaines to use all 13 permitted grape varieties in its blend. And can’t you tell! Translucent mid red, the nose is highly fragrant, showing violets, red fruits and soft chocolate tones. The palate is very supple, slightly vegetal, with fragrant flowery notes on the finish and even a hint of apricot. A beautifully balanced wine.

The tasting came to an end with two of my favourites for the afternoon, a 2004 La Bastide Saint Vincent ‘Pavane’ Vacqueyras (70% Syrah, 15% Mourvèdre, 15% Carignan) and a 2000 Domaine la Bouissiere Gigondas (70% Grenache, 30% Syrah). The Vacqueyras was dark purple, with spicy coffee and caramel on the nose, as well as plum jam. The palate was round and fruity, with fresh acid and a prominent tannin finish. In a way though, it was overshadowed by the Gigondas, which was really the wine of the afternoon in my view. Beginning to move from purple to a brickish red in colour, the densely layered nose shows brandy, cinnamon, liquorice, jam, caramel and lavender. The palate is full and complex, driven by black-pepper, with intense dried fruits, finishing very dry with lingering, gripping tannins. It really was an injustice to drink it this young – no doubt the wine will be very fine indeed when the wine will move from being like a game of ‘spotto’ with primary flavours, into a more complex, elusive amalgam of developed bouquet and palate. But still, a privilege to drink at any time.