Life's little surprises

It's funny how life works sometimes. Take, for instance, my week just gone, where I gave my first large-ish wine talk, which was of course promptly followed two days later by a company training course in giving successful presentations and running wine tastings. (The talk, on the subject of 'Great Value Wines for Everyday Folk' was given to eighty or so of the lovely folk at the Droitwich Spa U3A, details found here: http://u3asites.org.uk/code/u3asite.php?site=487). It was at said course where, as well as learning about ways to deliver a confident and effective presentation, we had the pleasure of trying a few company reserves, as part of the food and wine matching section. We poured out three whites and three reds, and it was only halfway through the section when the course leader - announcing that we were also to be trying Champagne - brought out a bottle of Moët & Chandon Grand Vintage 2002.

I don't know about any of you, but I certainly don't need to be asked twice. Although I'm not the world's greatest Moët fan (I think their non vintage 'Impérial' offering manages the implausible task of being both mouth-puckeringly tart whilst retaining a relatively high dosage of 9g sugar per litre), I did enjoy their younger 2006 Grand Vintage when I tasted it last year. Calling it 'elegant, reticent and austere', I appreciated its poise and faithfulness to the Moët house style, as well as predicting a bright future ahead. With the tasting of the 2002, I was lucky enough to gain a little glimpse into that promised world.

To look at, the 2002 is immediately and quite obviously more aged, with a deepish honeyed lemon colour and gentler, lazier bubbles. On the nose, it is an intriguing and beguiling sort of wine: shy initially, but then as you both become more acquainted, it reveals notes and flavours of browning apple, warm lemon, caramel, nuts, cereal and oatmeal. On the palate, the initial mouthfeel is pétillant and fizzy in a sherbert sort of way, which then undertakes a lovely evolution into more honey, porridge and cereal characteristics on the mid-palate. I found the structure of the wine to be delightful: refreshing, balanced and plush, thereby avoiding the usual Moët sins of overpowering acidity and fruit meanness. The wine finishes long and tingling, with the freshness of lemon juice tantalising the tongue into another sip. The 2002 evolves well in glass too: I found that as I returned to it periodically, aromas of warm lemon pie had begun to waft out of the glass, as the wine gradually reached room temperature. In short, the Champagne was a total sensory experience and one of those moments of utter vinous delight.

Standing out from the competition

This short piece isn't about the minutiae of Moët's excellent Champagne. I didn't write this with the intention of quoting the Chef de Cave's words extolling the 2002's virtues (he says it's 'ripe, balanced and clean' by the way); nor did I pen this because I felt the desire to compare two of Champagne's recent great vintages in 2002 and 2006 (the latter being better known for its fruit and freshness; the former for its warmth and generosity). I didn't even write it to drum home my point about Moët's acidity/sugar balance issue (only 5.5g/l in the 2002, see you can do it guys!). I simply typed these words into my keyboard purely to express my delight at having had the pleasure of tasting such a phenomenal wine, because sometimes that is all that's called for. When life gives you lemons, you make lemonade. When you go on a training skills course on presentations two days after giving the largest one in your career to date, you laugh it off. But when life gives you Moët & Chandon Grand Vintage 2002, you'd better damn well drink up and savour it.