Who (in their right mind) would spend $50 or more - retail - for one bottle of wine? Maybe you would. I know I have. And I don't know where it will end.
By Nancy Ross Ryan
Photo by Laurie Proffitt
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Luxury Wines
Who (in their right mind) would spend $50 or more - retail - for one bottle of wine? Maybe you would. I know I have. And I don't know where it will end.
By Nancy Ross Ryan |
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O.K. Let's lay the cards on the table: Our house wines cost between $8 and $15 retail, and we drink our way around the globe, consulting our friendly wine merchant about good values, interesting grapes, and well-made wines that fit our favorite-flavors profile. True, sometimes he stretches our budget and our palate. But he has never suggested we move up to a $50 bottle of wine. So why did I find myself, one karmic day, standing in the Italian aisle at my favorite wine shop eyeing a $40 bottle of 1995 Castello Banfi Excelsus from Tuscany? Because we had been invited to dinner by the most elegant host we know, who not only cooks superbly but who selects sublime wines to compliment his food, and (here's the rub) brings the same quality wines to our house when he is a guest. I bought the Excelsus (it went wonderfully with the lamb), and that started me down the Primrose Path to purchasing luxury wines for special occasions. And I have no idea how far this is leading and where it will end. Why? Life is short, and great wine can enhance precious moments. A luxury wine purchased retail costs one-half to one-third what a restaurant charges (depending on the mark-up), and an outstanding bottle of wine makes a major statement: "I care enough about you to bring (or serve) this." "You're worth this." "I'm worth this." "I knew you'd appreciate this." So, given that great wines purchased retail are, relatively speaking, a great bargain, why ever order them at a restaurant? In the first place many restaurants list wines that are produced in limited quantities and allocated. They seldom if ever reach the retail stores, and if they do the quantity is so small that regular customers snap them up before they even reach the shelves. For example, Tru restaurant in Chicago (the recently opened fine-dining restaurant of husband-and-wife Chefs Rick Tramonto and Gale Gand) lists no fewer than 38 white Burgundy wines that range in price from $38 to $550 per bottle. Chances are that Tru is one of the few chances you will ever have to sample some of these great wines. Ditto for Absinthe restaurant in San Francisco and 71 American red wines not to mention 50 French that start at an economical $20 and climb to $155 per bottle. In addition, many restaurants (again Tru and Absinthe) offer more affordable half (375 ml.) bottles of fine wines. And, for a really affordable way to taste fine wines, says Margaret Shakespeare, a Manhattan-based wine writer, "Many restaurants often have the wines by the glass paired up with the food, and it's a great way to sample wines you would hesitate ordering by the bottle, not to mention having the food match - that you might be reluctant to make - made for you." Shakespeare also recommends restaurants as "A very good source of information. If you like the wine list, talk to their sommelier or wine buyer." Because, believe me, when I started scouting premium wines in the upper end of my spending spectrum, I found literally hundreds of wines that I could not afford. So what makes some wines great and are they always worth often astronomical prices? One answer comes from Eric Vreede, general manager, Absinthe restaurant in San Francisco. "It's all relative," he says. "It's important to know what you feel comfortable spending, but trying great wines is important to establish a benchmark with which to compare future wines." "Are they worth it? Usually but not always," says Shakespeare. "But when they are exceptional it is for a variety of reasons: Weather - it can affect the entire crop negatively or positively or only one vineyard or only part of one vineyard. Sometimes you don't even know in August about the harvest coming up in September - what the yields will be, the quality of the fruit. And then there is the winemaker's whim - his or her taste, palate, and what he or she projects. This is true especially of blends - how much of each variety to add." Although she says the wine makers are trained, even they can make mistakes. And there are other decisions that affect the final wine: The kind of oak used (new or old, French or American), how much it should be toasted. "Some of these wines are truly handmade productions. You can put juice into big vats and bingo! wine in six to eight months," she says, "But some wines are tested and tasted every day, in temperature- and humidity-controlled environments, often with superduper laboratories to back them up. And then," she says with a sigh, "There are certain vineyards that are simply exceptional. Year in and year out they produce exceptional fruit. Why? Ask god." Shakespeare claims that wine makers know where these vineyards are, "and they covet them." Shakespeare says that great wines are by no means limited to France, Italy and California but are made the world over. And she has her personal favorites: "I first loved the red wines and now the whites being produced by De Lille Cellars in eastern Washington. Ditto for Oregon pinot noirs - the really good ones at the upper end such as Rex Hill, Sokol Blosser and Eyrie. And in California the big reds made by Niebaum-Coppola such as Rubicon, and of course Opus One by Mondavi. I've been tasting those since they were babies and yes, there have been some off years, but it's really not fair to taste a wine when it's made and not meant to be drunk yet. And don't forget Dominus in Napa Valley." Sheridan also recommends buying premium wines that may be harder to find but are not only worth the effort but are great values because demand has not yet overtaken supply. "Portugal is the sixth largest wine producing country in the world," she says, "and although the wines are harder to find there are some great ones." Chris Dumont, sommelier at Caliterra Cal-Ital bar & Grille in Chicago has a special fondness for the red wines of Spain. "You get the most bang for your bucks in great reds out of Spain," he says, "because the average barrel age is considerably longer than most other countries. Try gran reservas from the Ribera del Duero district. These wines have a lot more structure." Vreede says that there is a lot of quality coming out of Australia and France's Languedoc region in the $25 to $50 range. But his heart belongs to a white wine from Burgundy: 1996 Domaine Leflaive Chevalier Montrachet, which retails for $260 a bottle. "You can drink it now, but that would be infanticide." He says the wine will live for at least 15 years and that it has everything: "yeastiness, great fruit, nice acidity - it's sexy." So if you, like I, are a relative newcomer to the land of luxury wines, how and where do you begin. "Find a wine professional whom you can trust," says Vreede. How can you judge? "First of all, someone who is knowledgeable and who doesn't try and wring every last sous from customers - someone who is listening to what you really want instead of what they want to sell you to make quotas, " says Dumont. And how do you tell them what you want? "Give them an assigned price range, a region you want to explore, and the kinds of wines you like - full or light, red or white - and give an example. If he or she knows their stuff, they can nail your palate," promises Dumont. So, armed with that information I recently went back to my favorite wine shop and I said quite simply, "$50 or below, Italy, dry red wines with some structure." Beginners luck? One of the staff members came from Southern Italy, t his father owned a vineyard there, and he assured me that the best wines of those regions are second to none, not to mention great values. He recommended a Patriglione Taurino 1993 that, once opened, exceeded our wildest dreams and certainly the $34 we spent. Sublime wines exert a certain fascination, like following a siren's call. Listed below are some of my favorite ports of call, many of which were sampled by the glass as part of food-and-wine dinners or at special wine-tastings. And then, just for fun, see How High? a list of some top-priced wines from Burgundy, Bordeaux and other ports of call.
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Reds From California:
From Oregon:
From France:
From Italy:
From Spain:
From Portugal:
From Austria:
From Australia:
From New Zealand:
Petrus Pomerol 1995 $1,200.00 |
LIQUID ASSETS - April 2000