Chassagne-Montrachet, Henri de Villamont, 2000, Burgundy, France

30th Mar 2012

The smell of this wine is intoxicating with ripe bananas, blackcurrant leaves, crystallised ginger and a hint of marzipan. Its palate is a touch more subtle, with softer ripe fruit starting with grapefruit and melon developing into lemon curd and ginger and finishes very gently with ripe blackcurrants and cardamom. This wine is now 11 years old, and when we first opened it this was a hint of oxidisation. This quickly blew off, thank God as this is could be quite an expensive wine, expect to pay about £28-£30 per bottle for one of these in a good wine merchants. One of the benefits of having restaurants for the past 11 years is the ability to accumulate some exceptional wines. Luckily, we also have some good storage so I can keep it in perfect condition. It pays off when we can still drink white wines like this. It simply screams of old Burgundy and won’t be to everyone’s liking, but I loved it and Steve, who isn’t the biggest fan of Chardonnay thought it was amazing. Great with food, we cooked some steamed rice with chicken cooked with lemon, thyme paprika and soya and this white wine. The depth of the wine was well balanced against both the soya and the paprika and a great wine turned a quick mid-week meal into a real delight.