Wine
This month former Wine magazine editor Chris Losh looks at ideas for the roast and different white wines for your list.
Food and wine matching With St George's Day approaching apace, this is a good time to take a look at what matches the great English classic roast beef - with or without a great steaming Yorkshire Pud. As one of the chunkiest meats around, beef needs good solid red wine. If it's a good joint, simply roasted, then the best bet is to go for a classic match. A Bordeaux is the traditional solution, and for a good reason: namely, it works. Cheap, weedy clarets will be knocked over by a big joint, but a decent quality Bordeaux with a rare side of beef is still one of the world's most harmonious food and wine matches.
Otherwise, Cabernet Sauvignons, Merlots and Syrah/Shirazes all go well, while the more adventurous might want to try an Argie Malbec or a big chunky monster from the Douro. The key here, though, is that whatever you choose, the wine must have a bit of structure. A soft and fruity specimen will just be too insubstantial. You need those tannins - and a bit of savouriness, too, if you can get it.
VIÑA LA ROSA DON RECA MERLOT 2002, Rapel Valley, ChileThis wine picked up a trophy at the recentlyheld wine challenge in Santiago and it's easy to see why. It's a winningly silky Merlot, with big, sweet, soft fruit flavours and super-ripe tannins that hold the whole thing together effortlessly. Ludicrous value for money, too. £71/case + VAT @ HwCg (01279-873500).NB, the minimum order is 10 cases, but HwCg should refer you to wholesalers in your area for smaller orders.
RUBICON 1999, Meerlust Estate, South Africa Reputed to be South Africa's first Bordeaux Blend (hence the trailblazing name) this was something of a gamble when it was first launched in 1986. Single varietals sold, blends, as a rule, didn't. But the gamble has paid off. It's supple and ripe, with heady, perfumey fruit but still has an attractive Bordeaux-like tension, and is starting to develop some complex secondary flavours. A serious wine with depth. £133/case + VAT @ Maisons Marques et Domaines (020 8332 2223)
CHATEAU HAUT-BATAILLEY 2000, 5ème cru, Pauillac, Bordeaux Pauillac is, for most Bordeaux lovers, the holiest of holies - home to probably more great wine estates than anywhere else in the world. This is a fifth growth, which makes it a few leagues below the likes of Latour and Mouton-Rothschild, but in a cracking year like 2000 you pretty much get first-growth quality anyway. At around £20 a bottle, this isn't cheap, but it makes a good addition to the top end of your wine list. Good dark Cabernet fruits are backed up with liquorice which merges into a delicate gaminess on the palate. Silky smooth, this is a fine, ripe-tannined wine with leavening acidity and a lengthy violet finish. Needless to say, it will age beautifully, but it's drinking pretty well now for a young claret. Classy stuff. £217/case + VAT @ Berry Bros and Rudd
DOMAINE DE BEAURENARD, Rasteau Cotes du Rhone Villages, 2001 This small estate has been run by the same family for seven generations, and they've created a definite style of their own, probably best defined by the word "approachable". Even though this Rasteau wine has all the tough trademarks of that Village region - savoury, with a big structure - it's still got enough tautly-focused red-fruit flavour from the Grenache/Syrah combo to make it a good bet. Spicy, earthy and tobaccoey, it is a shoo-in for big beef joints. £93/case + VAT @ Berkmann wine cellars (020 7609 4711)
DOMAINE ST GAYAN, Gigondas 2000No apologies for choosing another Rhône wine. The region had a run of cracking vintages around the millennium so there's plenty of good stuff to be had for a good price, especially at Village level. This Gigondas has bewitching liquorice, and herb notes overlaying some sumptuous fruit, and it is an A1 match with beef. If you can bear to leave it in your cellar, it will get better with time, too. £111/case + VAT @ Yapp Bros
BurgundyBurgundy is probably the most complicated and frustrating wine region in the world - yet when it gets it right, nowhere can match what it is capable of. Partly, this is down to the region's marginal climate that gives grapes a long, slow growing season in good years but can leave them thin and lacking ripeness in less sunny vintages. And partly it's down to the region's extraordinary "terroir" - its miriad soils and microclimates that all go to affect the taste. For reds, we're talking Pinot Noir - the most fickle of all red varieties, yet for many people the most beautiful; the Mozart to Cabernet's Beethoven. In Burgundy they've been working with it for so long that they've managed to pick out the top (Grand Cru) sites for it.
The best wines are from the Côte de Nuits, north of Beaune and include the world-famous villages of Gevrey-Chambertin, Chambolle-Musigny, Vosne-Romanée and Nuits-St-George. The best whites tend to come from the limestone slopes south of Beaune (the Côte de Beaune) and are, pretty much without question, the finest expressions of Chardonnay anywhere in the world. Places like Puligny-Montrachet, Bâtard-Montrachet and Meursault have justifiably passed into legend. But Burgundy's biggest problem is that the vast majority of it comes nowhere near these quality levels. The areas south of the Côte de Beaune - the Côte Chalonnais and the Mâconnais, towards Beaujolais - knock out gallons of bog-standard Chardonnay every year. Some of it is quite good value, a lot of it, however, isn't.
Hearteningly there are some good recent vintages to choose from. The 2002 whites are riper and more fruit-forward than usual, with bright, pure Chardonnay fruit flavours. The 2002 reds are equally ripe and vibrant, with unusually chunky tannins. The 2001s are more classical - ripe, but not so fruit-driven. Burgundy is the sort of place where it pays to know your vintage, your area and, most important of all, your grower. Stock up as far as you can from these vintages. The 2003 vintage was only twothirds the usual size and prices next year will rocket. Worth buying big now if you can.
The A-listEach month PubChef will be looking at what some of the best wine pubs in the country are doing to make their wine sales work. This month we look at the Yew Tree Inn, Clifford's Mesne, near Newent, Glos. With a past that includes stints as both a chef and as a wine buyer, it's perhaps no surprise that Paul Hackett's first venture into the pub world should have seen him create an establishment that is more restaurant than it is boozer. Hackett took over the Yew Tree in Gloucestershire four years ago and says it was a "down-at -heel drinking pub".
After an £80,000 refurb, it is now a gastro establishment attracting discerning palates from metropolitan centres like Cardiff and Bath. And one thing is clear, these people are not driving all that way for a pint of real ale. "It all revolves around our wine sales," says Hackett. "Beer is a tiny percentage of the turnover." The Yew Tree has 250 wines on its list, starting at £14 for the house red and white and going up to £500 for top-end Bordeaux and Burgundy. Not that the list is Old World heavy - Hackett's own interest in the New World means a wide-ranging selection of wine styles. "'We've all got our part to play in educating people's palates - giving them the chance to drink around," says Hackett. "If you give them a real treat at a real discount, you're promoting yourself and your wines."
One of the ways the Yew Tree encourages trial is through its gourmet nights. There are five or six a year, where Hackett picks a selection of wines and uses his chef background to create dishes to accompany each bottle. There's also an extensive selection of 30 wines by the glass, kept fresh with an expensive vacuum-pumping
