Valentine's Day dilemmas

Once over the age of about sixteen, it seems, a handmade card will no longer suffice to show our devotion to the object of our affections. No, now it has come to mean handing over something along with the card – a gift seems to be in order.

What to get your Valentine?

Handbag? As my husband is doubtless painfully aware, even I can’t find the perfect handbag for myself, despite putting years (and pounds) into the search. What, seriously, are the chances of you doing it, just like that? However, if you are confident that this is where your strengths lie, go right ahead – and please, get in touch with me, as I would love to glean some of your handbaggy wisdom.

Underwear? Fraught with dangers, this. It must strike the right balance between sexiness, sluttiness and wearability. Get it wrong and you could be facing the cold shoulder. And if you get the size wrong (and there are so many ways it can be wrong) – well, all sorts of troubles await. Best avoided in my opinion.

Jewellery? Can be a good solution, but potentially spendy if you want to avoid anything too High Street.

Eat out? The most painfully, quietly strained atmosphere prevails across restaurants on the night of the 14^th  February, as couples face each other across tables, over a variety of pink-themed plates of food, wondering why on earth they’re shelling out a small fortune for the privilege. I think you can see where I stand on this one.

Fancy box of chocs? Who doesn’t like to get a nice box of chocolates? This is a no brainer – tick.

Nice bottle of wine? Has to be the easy option doesn’t it? Any thoughts of Dry January are thankfully long past, it’s bound to be welcome, it can demonstrate your thoughtfulness - and you get to share it. Perfect, no?

Champagne

This is always going to be a classy choice and you will never be short of options that transmit the message you’re trying to send.

Charles Heidsieck Brut Réserve NV, around £36-£42, is something of a wine trade secret. This full-flavoured but elegant Champagne can see you through from aperitif to main course. What it says: “I’ve been around long enough to know what’s what. You’re in good hands.”

Gosset Grande Réserve, around £50 has delicacy but depth of flavour and is always delicious; a good choice if you’re heading out afterwards, or will be a delight with lighter, seafoody dishes. What it says: “I’m serious about having fun.”

There is one luxury Champagne cuvée that is practically made for Valentine’s Day – Perrier-Jouët Belle Eqpoque, with its Art Nouveau inspired decorative bottle. At £130 for the 2006 vintage from Waitrose it’s not something to knock back casually, but such a beautiful object is surely worth keeping as a reminder of your romantic largesse (no sniggering at the back), so it shouldn’t be consigned to the recycling bin within days either. What it says: “I’m a hopeless (and now skint) romantic.”

Pink fizz

Drinking pink for Valentine’s Day may not count as startlingly original. But then Valentine’s Day itself is nothing if not a cliché, so now is not the time to worry about making a well-worn wine choice. Just go with the flow.

Rosé Champagne, by any objective measure, cannot justify its premium price tag, as it is in most cases just the regular cuvée with a little red wine blended into it. However, objectivity be damned, Champagne says special occasion, ergo pink Champagne says it, with knobs on.

I’m a fan of Bollinger Grande Année Rosé – 2004 is the current vintage and you can expect to pay in excess of £85 for a bottle, but check out www.wine-searcher.com for the best deals. What it says: “Purrrrr.”

Jacquart Brut Mosaïque Rosé NV, usually £30 from Sainsbury’s but down to £25 for Valentine’s, is a canny choice: a pretty pink and good quality fizz made by a switched-on co-operative with a dynamic winemaker. What it says: “I know a good thing when I see it.”

Nyetimber Rosé NV, £45 from Waitrose and elsewhere, is one of English wine’s brightest stars. Any self-respecting English rose or red-blooded Englishman would be charmed by it. What it says: “Ding dong!” (in best Leslie Phillips voice).

San Leo Rosato NV, on offer at £6.99 at Waitrose, is a fun and frothy Italian that puts a smile on the face of the cash-strapped and lovestruck. What it says: “I’m cheap but cheerful.”

Turning wine into Champagne

“Pay no attention to the man behind the curtain!”

This is what the Wizard of Oz cries in desperation as he is unmasked as a mere mortal, issuing instructions to the inhabitants of the Emerald City from behind a curtain, his “magic” and might no more than a loudspeaker. 

Champagne houses have traditionally been keen to keep the curtain raised between us and them, keen to preserve the mystery surrounding the process of turning the very ordinary still wines the region produces, into the sparkling nectar of the Gods that is Champagne.  Maybe they thought if we knew the prosaic truth, if we glimpsed the man behind the curtain, then the magic would be gone and Champagne’s image would suffer.

 

Jacquart's new Oenothèque

Personally I find the truth much more fascinating and think Champagne producers impress more when they share the details of the skill, hard slog and dedication needed to make their sparkling wines.  Tasting vins clairs (the still base wines which will be blended together in order to make the final cuvée) with Floriane Eznack of Champagne Jacquart this week, I was reminded just what a skilful job blending of wines for Champagne really is.

Floriane Eznack of Champagne Jacquart

Floriane has a more complex job than many in Champagne, perhaps, as she is responsible for a brand that draws on wines made by three different wineries, which work together under the Alliance Champagne Co-operative.  In total, Floriane and her three cellar-master colleagues have 1,200 different wines to taste from October to December following the harvest each year.

2 out of the 1,200 possible blending components

And what wines.  These are the vins clairs, still wines made from just ripe grapes whose main characteristic is their screamingly high acidity.  Tasting them could not be described as any kind of pleasure.  And yet she and her team must evaluate each one with an eye to how it will marry with the many other elements of the blend, including reserve wines from previous vintages – as well as the small matter of envisaging how the whole shebang will taste once it emerges from the “prise de mousse”, the process of being made to sparkle. 

Wot no bubbles?

 After four months of work deciding on the blend, the wines will be bottled with yeast and sugar and put into the cellars for their second fermentation, which will result in the all-important sparkle.  Floriane still has years to wait, though, before she – and we – can judge whether her hard work has paid off.  The wines rest on their sediment, or lees, for a minimum of 3 years following fermentation before the removal of the sediment and the emergence of the final wine takes place.  Even then, though, more patience is required:  the wine understandably goes through a period of shock following the process of disgorgement needed to remove the sediment and needs time to recover and taste as it should.  For the cellarmaster, nerves of steel as well as skill are required.

 

Tools of the trade

If the wines I tasted this week go on to form part of Jacquart’s main blend, fittingly called Mosaïque Brut, they will not emerge in their final form until 2017 or 2018.  In the meantime, Floriane and team will have gone on to taste and blend three or more releases.  Everyone involved has to have a high level of confidence that they are getting it right – it will be too late to go back!

Interestingly, Floriane told us that creating the newly-released Cuvée Alpha prestige blend took only a couple of hours, compared to four months for the Mosaïque.  A wine produced in small quantities, made from the best of the best, I suppose, tends to make itself.  It does make me wonder, though, what Richard Geoffroy of Dom Pérignon does for the other 364 ½ days of the year.

The current Jacquart range is available from Great Western Wine and online at www.greatwesternwine.co.uk.

Jacquart Mosaïque Brut NV - £25 from Great Western Wine

The current blend is based on the 2008 vintage, so has had plenty of time ageing on its lees and in bottle.  It has a classic bready, brioche nose with notes of apple and apple skin.  The long ageing has given it depth of flavour combined with clean linearity and well integrated acidity.     

Jacquart Blanc de Blancs 2006 - £39.50 from Great Western Wine

You might also see the 2005 in this country, which I have greatly enjoyed in the past.  The 2006 gives a sense of ripeness from the vintage.  Creamy apple blossom aromas lead onto a fairly broad palate with a definite spice and a lingering finish.  Blanc de Blancs is sometimes viewed as the ultimate aperitif Champagne but, as Floriane says of this wine, “a second glass of it needs food”. 

Jacquart Mosaïque Rosé NV - £32.50 from Great Western Wine (though on offer at £27.50 until 30 June)

Like most pink Champagne, this is made by blending in a small amount of red wine (made from Pinot Noir) into the regular white cuvée.  It’s a pale salmon pink and has nicely tart redcurrant fruit and a dry finish with notes of pink peppercorn and juniper berry – all this suggests an affinity with food, rather than being glugged on its own.

Jacquart Cuvée Alpha 2005 – £75 from Great Western Wine

Brand spanking new to the Jacquart range is this prestige cuvée, with just enough bling on the bottle so that people will know you’ve ordered something special if they see this on your restaurant table.  This inaugural vintage is a blend of 50% Chardonnay and 50% Pinot Noir that has spent seven years on its lees; it has delicacy in the form of hawthorn blossom, alongside more savoury bready-spicy notes and a structure to last.

Christmas is coming...

So you’ve ordered the turkey and can look forward to queuing patiently in the cold to pick it up at the butcher’s this weekend. 

What?  You haven’t ordered one?  Man, are you in trouble.  If you’re reading this over breakfast you’d better chuck your coat on over your pyjamas, high tail it to your local supermarket and trample the old and infirm underfoot as you fight your way to the freezer section in the hope of wrenching the last frozen turkey in the county from the hands of a little old lady.

And if you’re unsuccessful, then it’s going to be a question of brazening it out with “Oh we thought we’d give turkey a miss this year and try something new.  We’re having festive shepherd’s pie instead – so much less work for the cook, too.”

I well remember the year my parents opted to have roast beef instead of a bird for Christmas dinner.  What, no stuffing?  The memories are still painful.

But you’ve laid in all the wines, right?  No?  Okaaay….then you’d better spend the next few minutes casting your eye over this column, then just tear it out and take it with you on your supermarket sweep.

Ordering deadlines for online deliveries are past, so you are going to be either fighting it out with the crowds in the supermarket aisles, or you could enjoy a more civilised experience at your local independent wine merchant.

To assist you, here’s the shopping list:

• Fizz
• Cheap and cheerful crowd-pleasing wines – red and white
• Wines for turkey (or indeed shepherd’s pie) – red and white
• Versatile wines for “cold meat and pickles”, family games or Doctor Who watching

I’m recommending particular wines but, as time is tight, feel free to take them as inspiration rather than gospel (if that isn’t too blasphemous).

Fizz

Champagne Jacquart – on offer at Majestic for £18 a bottle

This is an easy-drinking Champagne, made by no-nonsense and gifted winemaker Floriane Ezniack for one of the region’s co-operatives.  A blend of the 3 Champagne varieties, Pinots Noir and Meunier plus Chardonnay, this has plenty of lively, appley-marzipan fruit, as well as a Silver medal from this year’s Decanter World Wine Awards.

Crowd pleasers

Waitrose’s El Guia wines – white, rosé and red, £3.99 a bottle

This could be your “two birds with one stone” wine.  Cheap and cheerful (and believe me, there are plenty of cheep and woeful ones out there), Spanish wines with excellent gluggability.  Keep these on hand for any festive parties, or just to offer drop-in guests.

Sainsbury’s House Côtes du Rhône - £3.99

When I’m pushed for time and faced with the wall of wine in a supermarket, I home in on the Rhône for reliable and good value reds.  This one is at the simple end of the spectrum (don’t go expecting Châteauneuf complexity at this price), but is well made and has some depth of flavour.

Sainsbury’s Vinho Verde - £3.98

Featherlight, gently perfumed, zippy and zesty and off-dry.  A perfect Christmas pick-me-up for jaded imbibers – and at just 9% alcohol it’s practically a health tonic.

Wines for turkey

This is rather misleading, as I am not talking about matching wine to the turkey itself, which is what could be politely described as delicately flavoured.  Rather I’m thinking about matching a wine to the occasion and to stand up to all the flavours that we pile on to our Christmas dinner plates.

Martinborough Vineyard “Te Tera” Pinot Noir 2011 - £17.49 but currently £13.99 when you buy 2 bottles at Majestic

My favoured tipple for the festive bird is a Pinot Noir.  If you have a treasured mature bottle of red Burgundy, then by all means uncork that, but older wines do carry with them the threat of spoilage – so always have something else as a back-up.

I love the pure, expressive fruit of New Zealand Pinots, and those from Martinborough, at the southern tip of the North Island, combine ripeness with depth and structure in a most food-friendly way.

It’s always a good idea to have both white and red on offer for Christmas dinner, to please all tastes.  Chablis often makes an appearance at Christmas, but its lean minerality makes for too weedy a wine for the occasion.  Ditto most Sancerre and Pouilly Fumé. 

Domaine Bégude Terroir Chardonnay 2001 - £8.99 from Waitrose

From the surprisingly cool area of Limoux, north of Corbières, comes this great value classy Chardonnay.  Some of it was fermented in barrel, giving it texture and a subtle gunflint character.

Versatile wines

These are easy-going and adaptable wines that can do more than one thing: pep up a meal of essentially leftovers, accompany a family game of Monotony (sorry Monopoly), or soothe you as you relax on the sofa in front of the telly.

Domaine Zind Humbrecht Gewurztraminer 2011 - £14.99, down to £11.99 when you buy 2 at Majestic

I’d never be without a bottle of Alsace white in the house at Christmas (or any time of year, come to think of it).  If you’ve never experienced the Turkish Delight and pink peppercorn charms of Gewurz before, then let this rich but dry version from Olivier Humbrecht, Master of Wine and PhD, seduce you.

Chénas 2011, Jean-François Trichard - £10.99, down to £8.99 when you buy 2 at Majestic

Beaujolais is such a wonderfully accommodating style of wine – drink on its own or down it with a plate of cold food.  The ripe, perfumed and tangy raspberry/cranberry fruit makes for a juicy palate cleanser.

You could also serve up Pinot Noir here – or indeed have the Beaujolais with Christmas dinner.

I covered sweet wines (and other sweet drinks) last time, so have a look on my blog if you’d like to remind yourself of my sage words on the subject:  http://yourliquidassets.blogspot.co.uk/2012/12/dew-drops-on-roses-and-whiskers-on.html

But for supermarket shoppers in a hurry looking for something to go with Christmas pudding, keep your eyes peeled for Moscatel de Valencia.  At around £4 a bottle, its sweet orange peel flavours are a billy bargain match.