I have been collecting wine for my entire 35 year career, literally putting my money where my mouth is. Currently I have around 800 bottles with a few vintages going back as far as 1990. Much like the plumber with leaky pipes I do not have a good idea what I have in the cellar, although there are some wines that I do make sure to put away with each yearly release. I rarely have disappointments when I open older bottles but when I do they are almost always Southern Rhône wines, particularly from Châteauneuf-du-Pape, but that will be another post. This post is about a particularly gratifying experience that confirms you do not have to buy expensive wines to go into the cellar to age. The subject is a 2015 Chateau Rolland le Garde Cotes de Blaye, which we sold for $20 when I put it away six or seven years ago. (Again, I don’t keep records…)
The occasion to open this wine was a dinner at my brother and sister-in-laws where they were serving steak au poivre. He is an excellent cook and when we received the invitation a week earlier I was excited at the opportunity to break out something nice. Coincidentally I had been to another excellent dinner two nights prior where we drank a lot of wine, and a wedding the night before where the wine selection left something to be desired but the gin and tonics where flowing. Consequently, I was not in a drinking mood for this dinner but the dish demands a good bottle anyway. Enter this perfect, 10 year old bottle of Bordeaux that was custom built for steak au poivre.
Normally I would decant the wine for a few minutes before serving but since I was not on home turf I skipped this step. When I poured the first glasses I was struck by how deep the color still was and the initial bouquet, although a touch overripe, was a wonderful mix of dried plums, red currant preserves, caramel, soy sauce and cocoa powder. Where this wine excelled was the palate, with the rich fruit balanced with soft, almost transparent tannins that faded by the second glass. Overall the wine was a star, perfect with the medium rare filet and rich, green peppercorn sauce.
The lesson is that you do not need to fill your cellar with expensive wines to enjoy in the years ahead. Talk to us, or another trusted wine merchant, and they will guide you to a world of very age worthy Rioja, Chianti Classico, Bordeaux and many other regions where you can spend less than $30 and enjoy them a decade or more down in the future. By the way, we still sell the 2018 of Chateau Rolland le Garde for $25, a great value.