Since having my knee surgery on 11/29, I have been dry. Crutches, no weight on one leg, and wine do not mix. I had a glass on Christmas Eve and one on Christmas Day. New Year’s Eve is coming up, and I might have a glass of champagne but this is the longest I have gone since one other time in my life. The Warden I live with keeps a pretty close watch on me and I have lost at least 20 lbs with my “new” diet and no imbibing.
I have been a wino since The Warden (my wife) brought back a bottle from one of her trips to see her brother in Kenwood, CA. For me, the most fun with wine is matching it with the correct food.
On one of our anniversary dinners, we went to this gourmet place in Lockport, IL. I think it was Tallgrass. Not sure if it’s there anymore or not. My wife had a foie gras lasagne with sauternes…it was magic.
Once, I got invited to take part in a wine tasting with Professor Roman Weil who is now deceased. He asked the group, “What’s the best wine in the world?” You can imagine the answers. Finally, he cut everyone off and said, “It is Chateau D’Yquem. In great years, no one that makes a sauternes in its region is statistically close, and in bad years, no one is statistically close to making better wine than them.” That’s based on subjective ratings of wine critics, but still. In any year, you might see a run-of-the-mill Bordeaux or Burgundy score as well as the very finest and most expensive. Never happens with Chateau D’Yquem.
Chateau D’Yquem also happened to be Thomas Jefferson’s favorite wine.
Sometimes you wonder, “How good is this wine really?” I realize that the distinguished professor had run statistics and discovered that, yes, based on subjective ratings of esteemed critics, Chateau D’Yquem is the best wine in the world relative to other sauternes. Would you rather have a 100-point Australian sauternes, or Yquem?
It’s not a contest. You’d rather drink the Yquem.
Back when I was trading in the pits, I had a losing streak going. There was a trader who stood in front of me who filled some orders and traded a system. He had recently been through the Alcoholics Anonymous program. For some people who just get out of the program, everyone looks like a drunk. Hammer meet nail.
I was bitching about my losing streak. Sucks to lose money day after day after day after day after day…..
He looked straight at me and declared “You are a fucking drunk and drank too much wine. That’s why you are losing money CR.” Hey, like I said, I imbibed. I had a wine cellar. I also have had a lot of friends “go through the program” so I have a pretty good idea of what’s what.
He said loudly, “I bet you $1000 you can't quit for three months.” Many who stood around us heard him in the boisterous trading pit. It was like a double dog dare at a frozen flagpole in the classic movie, “A Christmas Story”. People froze. Some started laughing. Others chimed in.
It was June. We were just getting into the summer and even if you didn’t drink wine in the summer there was always beer. One friend of mine says that the months between October and May are “brown season” and the rest of the months of the year are “clear season”. I had another trader buddy who used to quit drinking every single year from January until June 1. There was a reason his cutoff was June 1. You can regularly tee it up in Chicago then and a beer on the golf course is nice. Traders were known to be able to put a few away. If you have ever spent a Friday afternoon at Ceres in the CBOT or the old CME Club you know what I mean.
“Fuck you, your on.”, I said.
My local wine shop and I had a great relationship. I had been going there for a number of years and was pals with the owner. On Thursdays, he had a great thing going. A lot of loyal customers would meet and decide what theme it was for the late afternoon. We’d open 12-14 bottles of Cabernet, Bordeaux, or whatever flavor we were doing and taste from every bottle. Some bottles were expensive and some weren’t. It helped educate you about wine. Should you spend more or less and if so, what’s the difference? Sometimes distributors would show up and the education got deeper. In addition, if the distributors had some stub inventory in their warehouses, we could get them for a really good price.
The wine merchant had an encyclopedic memory of wine. It was truly remarkable so you could learn a lot.
The wine merchant got invited to all kinds of tastings for the trade only. Occasionally, I would get to go. Once I went to a champagne-only tasting. There were hundreds of them. I learned I was a Krug guy. For non-vintage, I love Bollinger and Pol Roger. Those tastings were fun and I got to know a lot of trade people there. Once I went around and tasted with restauranteur Jean Claude (RIP) of Le Bouchon. I learned how he looked at putting a wine list together.
I walked into my merchant’s place of business at the end of June. Even though I wasn’t drinking, I still was nosing around for good deals. This wasn’t forever. Plus, I didn’t want to drop of the face of the earth. I had a relationship with him and I enjoyed his company.
He held up a piece of paper. It was an invitation. He’d been invited to a very special tasting that he could not attend. It was in July just after the fourth. There was a special tasting at Brasserie Jo (now out of business). I looked at the list. It was all first-growth Bordeaux and Grand Cru Burgundy. I mean, it’s rare to taste one first growth let alone all of them at one tasting.
Of course, you know my slight problem. I had a 1G bet which wasn’t the worst of it. In the pits if you lose a bet like that you never hear the end of it, in perpetuity. Someday some argument or something like that would happen five years later and some jamoke would bring it up. Losing would be far worse than losing the grand.
The next morning I went into the pit, and told my buddy, "I got invited to this tasting. I’d like to go, but I am going to spit everything, so technically not drinking". He looked at the list and said, fine, but if I drank anything, bet is over.
He thought for sure he’d made a grand that day. I think he mentally spent it in the next five minutes.
In the pits, your word was your bond. So, I was on my honor but there was a lot at stake. I really couldn’t go to the tasting, drink everything, and then come back and lie to him. Plus, that’s just not my character anyway.
I went to the tasting. I spit everything. It was painful. Try and spit a now $800 a bottle swallow into a spit bucket. You could get a decent sense of the flavor of the wine by letting it roll around in your mouth. As I recall, I liked the Chateau Margaux the best. I got to the end.
Virtually every tasting I ever went to was full of spit buckets. The pros and chefs couldn’t afford to get hammered, so they spit. I could get in a cab, and get on a train.
At the end of the tasting, there was a small table set up in a remote corner of the room. It had a do-it-yourself pour with smaller glasses. It was Chateau D' Yquem, along with a couple of other sauternes, but who would drink those?! Unlike the other stations which only had french bread to cleanse your palate, this one had cubes of a duck liver páte, similar to a foie gras.
I had two full glasses with bites of páte and drank it all.
The pairing was magic! The wine was fantastic. I don’t recall the year, but any year of Chateau D’Yquem is going to be at a minimum, very good. Sweet, but not overly sickly sweet with just enough acid to cut through the fat of the liver. It is one of the best wine and food pairings known to mankind. Try it yourself sometime.
I walked into the pit the next day and my buddy was on me. "You couldn't do it could you". He started laughing. You could tell he was all set to really razz me and let me know where the next AA meeting was. I told him exactly what I wrote above. He said, "Yquem?" I nodded and said, "Two full glasses". He said, "Bets still on"
That's how good Yquem is.
Plus, I made money that day so the streak was over too.
Jeff friend of mine collects wine and writes articles on wine. He wrote an article on French Fantasy and it was about Chateau D'Yquem it was written in 2008 https://quintessentialbarrington.com/pdf/downcellar-nd08.pdf here is the link. He had one question for you what was the most expensive wine made or not made?
Oh that's a great story! And that guy in the pit was a true brother!