Vintage

I walked a couple of miles along the Thames last Thursday night to meet an old friend visiting from Sydney.  It was a very hot Earth scorched evening and I took a bottle of Muga Rioja Prado Enea Gran Reserva’87.  I’d been saving this last bottle of the case for a while and the promise of a steak and salad barbecue with my Spanish friends seemed an ample time to liberate it. 

 

To compound good fortune Richard had brought with him from Aus, a bottle of Lindemans Coonawara Pyrus‘’87 Vintage that had a very Bordeaux-esque blend of grapes and said so too on the bottle.  After allowing a little time for the wines to aerate we tucked in with glee.  Also with us were our good ladies Mel and Charlie, as well as Ricardo, relative to Richard and host (previously mentioned on this blog when we visited the Veneto ).

The first impression was that the Coonawara had bags more fruit.  The Muga was drier and more tannic and seemed a little over the hill to start with.  The former was certainly more of a hit with Charlie in her quest for fruitiness!

Funnily enough as the food was served and we tucked in heartily, we all but one made an unconscious shift to preferring the Muga.  I’m not sure if it opened up a bit more or was better paired with the meal but it certainly had more depth and was adept at clearing the palate for the next mouthful.  The Coonawara seemed a little too sweet in comparison and not such a good food wine. 

It seems to be a well-known fact that in Australia good wine is consumed bad wine is exported to us.  I was very pleased for once to be on the receiving end of much better stuff smuggled out for the benefit of our supper.  Altogether the fine steak and fine wine made up a lovely evening chewing the fat and shooting the breeze!