Early Thanksgiving Dinner In London

[Comte Flaneur]

Last Friday 12 gathered at the Portland restaurant in London's west end to taste a somewhat esoteric selection of Californian Chardonnays and pinot noirs. 

We had some good wines, some excellent ones, some outstanding ones and one or two magnificent wines. Nothing shabby apart from an oxidised 1996 Ferrari-Carano Chardonnay, which was drinkable on the palate. 

My notes were cursory at best, and soon deteriorated into incoherent and illegible scrawl.

Flight one:

ABC Wild Boy Chardonnay 2012 - honeyed nose, generous, luscious, text book/ generic Cali Chardonnay - good
Varner Bee Block Chardonnay 2012 - more interesting, with beeswax (some one wittily noted) and waspish (another wit noted). Much more esoteric and interesting - excellent
Rhys Alpine Chardonnay 2012 - simply magnificent and wine of the flight

Flight two

Ridge Monte Bello Chardonnay 2008 - fabulous, outstanding
Mondavi Reserve Chardonnay 1995 - very much alive and vibrant - excellent
Hansell Alyce Walter Hansell 2006 Chardonnay - A replacement bottle for the Ferrari - really lovely, outstanding

Flight three 

ABC Knox pinot noir 2006 - generic like the wild boy - good
Cobb Coastlands pinot noir 2006 - off piste, interesting saline notes, restraint, chewiness - very good
Rhys Alesia pinot noir 2006 - restrained and refined, a little underwhelming but good. Think this is declassified Family Farm. Normally the Alesia is made from imported grapes. 

Flight four 

Ceritas Escarpa pinot noir 2009 - delicate, very refined, classy, still coming out of its shell - outstanding
Rhys Horseshoe pinot noir 2010 - rich, refined, very fruity, but fabulous - magnificent 
Wind Gap pinot noir 2011 - a lighter style, but very pleasant for it - very good

Flight five 

Drew Family Morning Dew pinot noir 2012 - notes illegible - very good
Domaine De La Cote pinot noir 2012 - a vortex of pleasure (that's what I wrote, and I wasn't spitting) - outstanding 
Poe Manchester Ridge pinot noir 2013 - polished, refined, shows great promise - excellent
Rhys Alpine pinot noir 2012 - spectacular, magnificent

It was a thoroughly enjoyable evening with a superb array of high class and really interesting Californian wines, which really restores one's faith in the region(s). 

[Claret]

Glad Rhys showed well, I am a fan.

[DavidG]

Very nice. Is it difficult to find these wines over there?

[Comte Flaneur]

There are some specialist retailers David, generally speaking you can get most things in London, but California never ever caught on here. This tasting was a timely reminder of how good they can be. Among the group were two importers and I have been trying to get them re-engage with Ceritas, my favourite producer, with a view to I porting the wines here. As far as I know Ceritas has never been imported here. From a personal point of view importing them is too much hassle, you are taxed (raped) every which way by the authorities on both sides of the pond.

[AKR]

I agree that self importing is crazy.

Call me provincial/parochial but I like CA Chardonnay better than its forefathers, white Burgundy.

But it looks like the spectrum you enjoyed was some of the best.

I remember the few times I was looking at CA wines in the UK/EZ and was staggered by the prices.

Stuff that was solid supermarket stuff here, for maybe $17, had somehow become 30 GBP over there.

Things like Mondavi Napa.

That price might have made sense for 20-30 years of aging, but not for current releases.

Anyways with the USD so strong, these are the times for US consumers to be loading up for the next 10-15 years on Old World wines.

It's like the 2002 time frame, when good vintages and strong greenback, allowed one to bulge out their cellars, and get through those dark years when circumstances were broadly reversed like the 2006-2009 time periods.