Wine Groupies, my wine club, met at my place last night. Our theme: Bargain Bordeaux.

I don’t want to give away too much because I have a column forthcoming on the subject. But I will tell you that the winning wine out of a blind tasting of seven was a 2003 Chateau Faure-Beausejour.  My friend and co-worker Shirley and her boyfriend Wouter picked it up for $12 at Arlequin Wine Merchant in SF, where they are wine club members.

I doubt it’s something you’d find on the shelf, though. Scoring a bottle like this  gorgeous red from a tiny estate in the heart of Fronsac — a century ago, these wines were more coveted than neighboring Pomerol and St-Emilion’s — is a perk of belonging to such a club.

It was the cheapest of the seven bottles and the vintage was right in the middle. We had a 2000 and a 2006. The point of the tasting was to get the group’s largely New World perspective (a few of us drink Old World wines regularly) up to speed. More on that later.

What I can tell you is that I made several appetizers using a wedge of Point Reyes Original Blue Cheese — and they were quite a hit! I stuffed the cheese in dried figs from Trader Joe’s and wrapped it with their equally yummy and affordable prosciutto. I also spread it on toasted baguettes and topped them with thin slices of roast beef and an olive-red pepper and thyme tapenade. The latter came from a lovely little cookbook centered around the cheese. I’ve got all the info and recipes at home so will post tomorrow.

I just got this email from my friend Shirley, and I’m drooling. Just had to share:

“Last weekend, my boyfriend got his green card and promptly celebrated by walking straight to the wine shop in our ‘hood, Arlequin Wine Merchants (Hayes Valley).

He ended up buying a bottle of 1999 Chateau L’Evangile Bordeaux, a small part of LaFite Rothschild kingdom with grapes grown across a dirt road from Petrus in Pomerol. Ka-ching!

At first I kind of harbored regrets about drinking it right away. (I recently read a quote from a French sommelier who said, “You don’t drink Bordeaux. You store it.”) But since we don’t have a cellar or one of those humidity controlled storage units, we popped the cork (after dinner at CAV, of course! More on that later.)

The wine was pretty insane. Even at such a young age the complexity was so stunning, and so antithetical to New World or California wines as I think the general public knows them (insert comment on overly jammy zin here). It was at turns smoky, smooth, but backed by a distinct mineral flavor, which I would of course more plainly describe as “dirt.”

We drank the wine slowly over two days, and never with food (though it had quite enough tannins to cut through any rich dish). The truth is, we didn’t want to dilute the flavor of the wine. I know some might find that ridiculous, but frankly, I’m not sure when I’ll have a bottle like
that again, considering it probably cost 20 bucks a tablespoon.

We did share a tiny smidge of it with one of my best friends and her husband. She hates red wine, but she took a small swig from a port glass just for kicks.

She said if all red wine tasted that way, she’d drink it all the time. I think that pretty much sums it up.

PS: So the dinner at CAV: right now on the menu is this amazing seafood sampler that includes delicate smoked sturgeon, tender squid with chopped onion and home-cured lox served with cucumber salad and dill cream. We followed with a raclette-based fondue that was passable, but not our favorite. But throw in some vinho verde and Pouilly-Fume and you
have yourself a good time.

So the Judgment will not die, as several people have asked me for a full lists of the young wines. Here’s the list below, complete with prices. Cheers. Oh, and salut. Don’t forget to note the broad price differences, even within varietals.

Chardonnay:

Talley Rosemary’s Vineyard 2002, $45; Patz & Hall Hyde Vineyard 2004, $50; Ramey Hyde Vineyard 2002, $56; Mount Eden 2002, $35; Chateau Montelena 2003, $38; Peter Michael Point Rouge, $175.

Cabernet Sauvingnon:

Clos du Val Reserve 2000, $95; Shafer Hillside Select 2001, $175; Stag’s Leap Wine Cellars Cask 23 2001, $160; Joseph Phelps Insignia 2002, $175; Ridge Monte Bello 2000, $120; Staglin Family Vineyard 2001, $170.

Red Bordeaux:

Chateau Montrose 2000, $150; Chateau Latour 2000, $600; Chateau Haut-Brion 2000, $600; Chateau Leoville-las-Cases 2001, $90; Chateau Margaux 2000, $600; Chateau Rauzan Segla 2000, $95.

White Burgundy:

Puligny-Montrachet Premier Cru Les Pucelles 2002 Domain Leflaive, $160; Mersault Premier Cru Charmes 2002 Domaine Roulot, $250; Beaune Premier Cru Clos des Mouches 2002 Domaine Drouhin, $70; Batard Montrachet Premier Cru Les Caillerets 2002 Louis Jadot, $65; Corotn-Charlemagne Grand Cru 2003 Donaime Bonneau du Martay, $95.

I’ll no doubt be thinking and talking about the Judgment of Paris rematch for a long time to come. It was a surreal day, and I was in the company of the world’s great master sommeliers. It was a pretty tense atmosphere, and it made me sad that wine has become such big business that people couldn’t just sit back and enjoy the world’s best spirits. Ironic. Cool moment: I was asked to be an honorary taster in a blind tasting of the young vintage whites and reds from Bordeaux, Burgundy and California. I took my seat and to my surprise, there was Margrit Mondavi on my right and Tony Terlato, owner Sanford Winery, on my left. We swirled and sipped and compared notes, especially on the nose (beautiful jalapeno) of what turned out to be Clos Du Val’s Reserve 2000 Cabernet Sauvignon. At one point, Mrs. Mondavi pulled out a small, old diary that had a sticker on it: 1976. She opened it up to May 25, 1976 and read about her reaction to the original Judgment announcement that fateful day. She, her husband, and their Napa contingency were on a tour of Bordeaux chateaux with Jim Barrett when he got the call. "We were jumping up and down and hugging each other," she told me, looking far away. "But I don’t think it really hit us until much later."

Her story gave me goosebumps and made me think of the cultural signifance of wine and food, and it’s role in shaping the way we view ourselves.

This whole Judgement of Paris rematch on May 24 has got me thinking — why just France and Napa? Why not the Judgement of Australia, and the Judgement of Germany? If the historic 1976 blind tasting did anything, it opened up competition and notoriety of world class winemaking to regions outside of France, so why, each decade, do we keep rehashing the competition?

For those of you who haven’t heard, 30 years ago this month a monumental thing happened in the industry. In a blind tasting, nine French judges voted a Stag’s Leap Wine Cellars cabernet and a Chateau Montelena Chardonnay (both Napa wines) superior to a blessed Bordeaux and a French white Burgundy. Back then, saying a California wine was better than a French one was simply heresy. Things have clearly changed.

Folks at Copia, along with people across the Atlantic, are staging simultaneous reenactments. The event is so huge that some wineries have declined invitations to pour, fearing bad press, or worst, the fate of the French in 1976. I’ll be covering the American side of things and it’ll be interesting to see how our wines have aged (they’ll be tasting the 1973 wines) and also how the younger ones stand up to their French counterparts. I just hope no one faints. Stay tuned.

Bev Mo Cellarmaster and wine whiz Wilfred Wong was kind enough to shoot me an email on his way to France, where he will spend weeks sampling new vintages. I’ll post his correspondences here. If you have any questions for him, send them my way and I’ll pass them on to him.

(Thursday, March 30, 2006, over the Atlantic Ocean)
Hi Jessica,

I should be sleeping now while on this jumbo 747 with over
400 people on it as we fly over the Atlantic. Embarking on another journey to Bordeaux to taste the new wines out of barrel (this year marks my 11th consecutive year). The plan is to taste over 400 wines from the highly touted 2005 Bordeaux vintage. The wine world has already been buzzing for months on how well all the red grapes ripened in the entire region.
Only a day away from tasting what could be the vintage of a
lifetime.
Cheers,
Wilfred