Peace of mind

Those Burgundies I bought are sealed with Diam. . . Perhaps I should buy some more. . .

I know in theory I can claim a refund on a cork tainted wine. I also know that more often than not, I can't be bothered. Additionally I plan to cellar some of these wines for 10-20 years, which makes the exercise of seeking redress problematic. If I buy $1000 dollars of wine sealed with cork, I am mentally prepared, but annoyed at the possibility that I will lose $100. (Assuming the risk of taint is 10%).

Taking the analogy further; when you are offered a bond, which has a higher chance of default, you are rewarded with a higher yield. You are being warned and rewarded for taking a risk. The yield on Greek versus US bonds being demonstrative of this. Given the risk of default with a cork sealed wine, when will consumers be warned that the bottle is sealed with a closure prone to taint and when will they be offered a discount for taking the risk. . .

With that in mind, and with apologies to Moody's and S&P, here is my suggested rating for closures, based on my experience of their risk of failure.

• Diam AAA
• Screwcap AA+
• Vinoloc AA+
• Natural Cork BBB-

AAA The closure has an EXTREMELY STRONG capacity to meet its hermetic commitments without taint.

BBB- The closure has an ADEQUATE capacity to meet its hermetic commitments, but is prone to fail 5-10% of the time. The ability to seek redress depending on the motivation of both parties.

Bouchard Vigne de l'Enfant Jésus 2007

Beaune, Burgundy, France. Pinot noir. 13.5%. Diam.

I can still fondly recall the last Baby Jesus I tried. It had the most wonderful spine and structure. Something serious and unbowed. This half bottle shares that structure and tightness, that lovely long serpents spine, uncoiled, supple and yet sinewy. The scent is clean and fresh with spiced and stewed berries, earth and roots. The first sip is impressively stern and erect and it gives a sense of leanness and length. The finish is sappy, stalky and dry. As I suck the last drips from the bottle, it has more flesh and complexity, there's more spice to the midpalate and a subtle note of char. All seems as it should. Excellent. 94+. Now - 2021.

Chicken and sausage gumbo

I've no idea how a real gumbo should taste, but after tonight, I can imagine how it should make you feel. I've been reading two books (1,2) and after much borrowing and small amount of improvisation and adaptation the first gumbo I've cooked and tasted.

Ingredients:

• 6 chicken thighs
• 400g of uncured chorizo sausages - cut into 1-2 inch pieces
• 100g of guanciale or pancetta - diced
• 1 teaspoon of paprika
• 1 teaspoon of cayenne pepper
• salt and pepper
• 2 medium onions - finely diced
• 2 capsicums - a green and a yellow if you wish - seeded and finely diced
• 4 sticks of celery - finely diced
• 3-4 tablespoons of plain flour
• 6 cloves of garlic diced
• 3-4 medium sweet potatoes - peeled and cut into 2-3 inch pieces
• 6-8 sprigs of thyme
• 4 dried bay leaves
• 500ml of chicken stock - off the shelf and supposedly low salt
• 1 litre of water
• 1 large handful of fresh parsley - diced
• 3 spring onions - sliced

How?

Coat the chicken in cayenne, paprika, salt and pepper. Prepare the other meats and the Holy Trinity by dicing the onion, bell peppers and celery. Toss the guanciale or pancetta into a very large pot and render some of the fat. Now add the chicken pieces and then the chorizo. Brown the meat, turn, and after 10 minutes remove the all the meat, leaving behind a rich red stained layer of oil and fat. Add the diced vegetables and fry, stirring occasionally. After 5-10 minutes add the flour, mix, stir and watch. Let the Trinity and flour darken without burning. Stir every few minutes and in between prep the remaining ingredients. After 10-20 minutes, once you are happy with the colour add the garlic, sweet potatoes, thyme, bay leaves and all the previously browned meats. Now add the stock and water, mix well and bring this to a gentle simmer. After 30 minutes of cooking at the boil, turn off the heat and leave for 30-60 minutes. Remove all the meat from the pot and if needed reduce and concentrate the remaining liquid. Take the chicken meat off the bone and shred into the desired form. When the soup is at the right consistency and simmering away, return all of the meats (now minus any bones) and freshen by adding the parsley and spring onions.

Dry River Chardonnay 2008

Martinborough, New Zealand. Chardonnay. 13%. Cork.

Wonderful. Understated nose - mustard fruit, citrus which verges on lime, sap and flint. Excellent line and intensity, it explodes with vitality and yet it remains tight, focused and driven. Chalk and minerals, peach, lemon and butterscotch. Complexity and tension at once. 95. Now - 2016.

Cider butt chicken

If you search the web for beer butt chicken you will find no end of undignified and unbecoming image; birds with various cans shoved up their rear end, it looks unappealing and unnatural. Which of course is why I chose to use a can of cider. . .

The first thing is to make sure your oven or BBQ can handle the length of your standing fowl. Next is to find a suitable can. I think a 500ml can works best in terms of stability, though they are not nearly as abundant as the standard 330-375ml size.

At 200 degrees C, the actual cooking takes 60-80 minutes. Rub the chicken, inside and out, with a spice rub. I used a teaspoon each of fennel seed and cumin (both pounded in a mortar), a teaspoon of paprika, a teaspoon of salt, half a teaspoon of cayenne pepper and a liberal dose of black pepper. This was mixed with 2-3 tablespoons of olive oil. Once coated, place a few springs of thyme in the cavity and then insert the can. Once balanced on a baking tray place on the floor of the oven. I started with both top and bottom cooking elements on, but after 20 minutes, used only bottom heat.

The most notable thing, besides the ungainly presentation, is the moisture and succulence of the meat.

Sunday fried chicken

When you crave home cooked fried chicken and you lack a deep fryer and high temperature cooking thermometer, you have to adjust and compromise. I use a small sauce pan and heat no more than 2 -3 inches of vegetable oil till what ever I drop in bubbles. I de-bone the chicken and cut it into smaller pieces to speed up the cooking process. This works fine for four thighs and four people. . .

Ingredients:

• Four chicken thighs, skin on, bones removed and then cut in half
• 2 cups of butter milk
• 1 red chili - deseeded and finely chopped
• half a tablespoon of dried thyme
• half a tablespoon of dried oregano
• 2 cloves of garlic - finely chopped
• Salt and pepper
• 1 lemon - juiced
• 400g of plain flower
• 1 tablespoon of paprika
• 1 teaspoon of Cayenne pepper

How?

Toss the chicken thighs in the chili, thyme, oregano, garlic, salt, pepper and lemon juice. Now add 1 cup of the butter milk and mix and then cover and set aside (refrigerate) for a anything from 1 - 12 hours.
Prepare the flour mixture for dusting by mixing the flour with the cayenne, paprika and additional salt and pepper. Remove the chicken from the butter milk solution and pour the remaining marinade into a bowl and top up with the last cup of butter milk. Now take each piece of chicken and coat in flour, before dipping in the butter milk solution and finally dusting with a second coat of flour. Fry in batches (2-3 pieces at a time) in the suitably hot vegetable oil. Each batch will take about about 5 minutes. Serve with salads and aïoli.

Related recipes - 1, 2

Wine - whilst not a perfect match, I opted for a dry and very primary Riesling. Rieslingfreak No. 3 from the Clare Valley (12%, screwcap, approx $A20) is wonderfully named and very true to its place and peers. Lemon and lime, smooth river stones and surprisingly a fleeting suggestion of saffron in the mouth. Simple, but likable.

Related review - AG.

A post coital embrace

A beautiful winter's day and the perimeter of Lake Monger was teaming with bodies in motion. The dragonflies in particular were at their aerial best; hovering, darting, copulating. It's a extraordinary feat being able to mate, contort and fly in unison. The insecure and jealous male, keen to pass his genes to the next generation clamps onto the head of the female in a peculiar post coital embrace. Furiously beating his wings, he holds the mostly still female, suspended above water while she lays her eggs.

William Downie Mornington 2010

the Imagination.

We are just now seeing, amidst the fads and distractions, the strange fact that what has been most modern in our time was what was most archaic, and that the impulse to recover beginnings and primal energies grew out of a feeling that man in his alienation was drifting tragically away from what he had first made as poetry and design and as an understanding of the world.

TN: Direct, slightly hard and certainly tart. Nervous and rushed, but all the same quite layered and complex. Though usually a fan of skinny, tight wines I found the larger, fleshier Gippsland more appealing.

Nocturnal impressions

A night of blind tasting and a collection of vaguer than normal tasting notes.

Washed carpet, wet wool and flint; while in the mouth something citric, tight and lean; greenbeans and not for the first time a Chablis I've called a Sancerre. 2007 Simonnet Febvre Millesime.

Medium in colour and muted in nose, it's sappy, spiced and grainy. A pinot in gamay's clothes. 2007 Dupont Tisserandot Ladoix.

A brighter crimson than the last but still without scent. Sour edged and pippy, the night's squeakiest wine. 2008 Louis Latour Bourgogne.

Sarsaparilla, geosmin and beets, words as redundant as my old leather boots. Mellow and stooped, it seems unrepentant for one so close to the end. 2004 Domaine Vacheron Sancerre.

Clean, unclean, TCA or A OK, perhaps, perhaps not. . . Disappointing for sure. Another wine buggered by cork. 1995 Ch. Lascombes.

Fragrant and clean, the earth has been washed out, leaving something confected and cute. 2009 Mas de Mas Corbieres & 2007 Borie de Maurel Minervois.

A faint pink curtain made of sugar and silk, scented with musk and cigars. 2000 Domaine Schlumberger Pinot gris Vendanges tardives.

Nail polish and wool, the more acute might find marzipan and beauty. Redemption and layered complexity in the mouth. 2007 Ch. de Myrat Sauternes.

Paella with mushroom

Like caramel, winter days turn dark all too quickly. . . I finished cooking this mushroom paella just in time for a photo. . .

Ingredients (for four):

• 2 large tomatoes - skinned, seeded and finely diced
• 250g of assorted fresh mushrooms - I used Swiss Brown, Pine bolete, oyster and enokitake
• 1 small handful of dried porcini mushrooms - soaked for 5-10 minutes in hot water
• 2 cloves of garlic - finely sliced
• 1 tablespoon of fresh thyme leaves
• 1 tablespoon of butter
• half a teaspoon of paprika
• 1 pinch saffron
• 3-4 cups of chicken stock
• 350g of Bomba rice
• Parsley to garnish

How?

In a separate pan fry the larger mushrooms (which have been cut to an appropriate size), the soaked porcini, thyme and garlic, till the the fungi have softened. When almost finished, melt in a tablespoon of butter and remove the pan from the heat.

Now heat the paella pan, add a splash of olive oil and fry the finely diced tomatoes; the extra liquid will evaporate and the tomatoes will coalesce and darken. After 5-10 minutes add the paprika and saffron to the pan and incorporate, before adding all of the stock. Bring this to the boil and then add the rice and then arrange the cooked mushrooms on top of the rice, adding any residual juices from the pan. Now scatter the previously uncooked enoki mushrooms on top, and wait. After 10 minutes turn the heat from high to medium, add extra water and stock if the pan looks like it is drying too quickly and cook for another 8-10 minutes.

Lignier-Michelot Chambolle-Musigny Vieilles Vignes 2007

Burgundy, France. Pinot noir. 13%. Cork. Approx $A90.

'Shit, blood, piss, mucus . . . That's what disgusts us because they scream at us that we are beasts, living, shitting, dying, but tears, Max, tears are human, there's no disgust in tears. Don't you see? We're the only ones who cry.'

It's a few days since I closed the pictured paperback, but the story and characters linger, phrases and images keep repeating and I remain unsettled and slightly disturbed.

In contrast, there is nothing unsettling or unexpected about the wine. It is perfect and unsurprising. Perfumed and effusive, there is a transient flush of rubber and reduction, but overwhelmingly it is all seduction and rose petals, earth, stems and animal. Bright, spiced and rakish, it is many things all at once. Minerality for the purists, wonderful form and shape for the aesthetes, while there is enough sappiness and pace for those seeking only refreshment. 93. Now - 2016+

Red cooked chicken

The master stock I used is almost three years old and had spent the best past of a year dormant and suspended in my freezer. The first step was the reheat and taste the stock (I could taste the pork ribs I had last cooked), skimming away some impurities before augmenting the flavours with new aromatics (ginger, coriander root, star anise and spring onion), rice wine and some dark soy for sweetness. Flavours now balanced and correct, I submerged two chicken halves in the liquid and brought this to a gentle boil for 10 minutes, before turning off the heat and letting the residual warmth finish the cooking. Three hours later. . .

Dandelion Vineyards "Legacy of the Barossa" PX

Barossa, South Australia. Pedro Ximenez. 19%. Cork. Approx $A25 for a half bottle.

It's easy to forget that Australia once had thousands of hectares of PX.

An olive green meniscus and orange core. Compared to the my control, this smells more of butterscotch and treacle than raisins. With minimal agitation it becomes more lifted and acetone scented; hard and woody. Powerful, thick and long. . . perhaps I need to choose my words more carefully. . . the persistence of flavours is wonderful, and long after the last swallow I can taste burnt toffee; and unfortunately a suggestion of char, which along with the fractionally hot (even for a fortified) palate detracts from the whole.

Image: Artwork by a maven friend. Thanks Grant.

Dry River Pinot gris 2009

Martinborough, New Zealand. Pinot gris. 14%. Cork. Approx $A85

Bottle 3404 - My first Dry River wine.

This seems quite separate from all the new world Pinot gris I've tasted. It seems closer to Alsace and in particular a Domaine Ostertag I tried a few years ago. The nose is nuanced and complex, I thought there was a note of botrytis. Pear and orange oil, wax, nutmeg and transiently a whiff of saffron and later still truffle. A juxtaposition of delicacy and luscious power; sweetness and crystalline clarity; bright crunch and soft flesh. Imprecise words for something quite exceptional. 93. Now - 2015.

Cheap wine glasses

There are many signs of vinous insanity, for instance:

• Has at least 12 different sets of wine glasses.
• Through misadventure none of aforementioned sets are complete or in the their original state.

Which makes these cheap ($A3.95 each), well shaped, thin lipped wine tumblers from Ikea very pleasing. . .

Leeuwin Art Series Chardonnay 2008

Margaret River, Western Australia. Chardonnay. 13.5%. Screwcap. Approx $A95

For much of last year, I had decided that I would stop buying this iconic Australian wine. Of course it is well regarded and it bristles and is long lived, but it seemed so boringly consistent and so predictably over the top. In a world full of choice why would you stick with something that has become so known - perhaps because it is so good.

In the end what made me pick up a few bottles was the alcohol; with the allowed imprecision, the stated alcohol is 1% less than the previous vintages (2002-2007); suggesting some departure from the established formula (earlier picking, new maker). It certainly feels more svelte, focused and mineral than older vintages without loosing its curves and bustle. Almond meal and grilled peach, flint and perhaps a subliminal suggestion of sweet bacon. The intense and nervy acidity is clear from the outset, and though the acidity has always been a feature of the marque, it seems more mineral and brisk on this occasion. Delicious and complete. 95. Now - 2020+

Light

After a week of darkness and occasionally heavy rain, a day of brilliant blue and light. I think more than anything else, in mid winter, I crave warmth and sun light.

Thankfully the good weather coincided with day free of work and the company of my daughter. We spent much of day in and around the State Theatre. It's a pleasing, though modest space, the courtyard with it's over looking balconies reminds me of the New Fortune theatre, which in it self is based on the Globe. We watched, from close range, a performance of the Gruffalo. . .

The olfactory component of the day was supplied by the neighbouring Kakulus Bros. On a weekday morning it's relatively quiet and so you have more time to sniff and examine all manner of spices and grains. The floor is populated by enormous 50kg sacks of produce and the air is heavy with coffee and spice. It's a welcome juxtaposition to all the other sanitised, prepackaged and mostly deserted retail outlets in the City.

Brunch at the newly opened Bivouac canteen. The doors only open at 10am, so it seems appropriate that they should offer booze (Bloody Mary, Bubbles or lager) with your eggs or toast. . . It seems like quite a stark and empty place during the day, but I can see the potential and things I'd like to try on the lunch and nibbles menu.

Post script: Friday August 5 - Another beautiful Winter's day, but this time accompanied by a sell off on world equity markets (down 4 - 5%) and not for the first time, I'm thankful to have work and distraction. I tried a 2007 Tyrrell's Vat 47 Chardonnay. I think this is the first Vat 47 I've tasted under screwcap. Wonderful acidity and brightness, it is still quite sappy and searing. Very good - excellent. The second wine was the 2001 Penfolds St Henri. I last tried this a few winters ago, and it seems to have changed little. Still quite brutish and slightly porty. The finish is muscular and parching. A blue wine.

Domaine Christian Moreau Chablis 2009

Burgundy, France. Chardonnay. 12.5%. Diam. Approx $A45

Even with a failing nose and what is hopefully no more than a mild dose of Rhinovirus I can tell that this is quite different from the preceding vintage. Where the 08 was vibrant and sappy this is more textured and fleshy. The DNA of rolling stones and mineral is obvious in both, the accompanying players providing the contrast. Crunch and grape skin, flesh which fleetingly resembles a Rhone white, before the wine seems to harden and tighten, becoming more edged and white pepper to finish. 91+. 2013 - 2017.

Also sipped was a fully mature and somewhat unraveled 1998 Tim Adams Aberfeldy Shiraz (Clare Valley, South Australia. Cork. 14% alcohol). Tasted blind, there was some initial and unresolved question in my mind about whether this was brett affected. Ginger spice and leather, this is soft and padded with vanilla and cream. I can't see this getting any better. 89. Now.