Saturday, July 22, 2006

More Claret than a cockney gangster movie

Im having a cracking week on the old claret sales, I have to keep pinching myself to make sure Im not dreaming. The only problem is that Im starting to run out of bottles left right and centre. So far this week, Ive deleted over twenty bins, and with a full house tomorrow, Ive got a feeling that Im looking at the wrong side of another ten tomorrow. By the end of the week I reckon that I will have exhausted nearly forty bins. But the good news is that I means I will get to go shopping!!!! This also means we will be able to move over to our new model of purchasing, by buying small parcels of mature stock from Broking lists, and making the list more dynamic. I love doing this.

Tonight we've sold a bottle of 1917 Climens. The wine was a light golden brown colour when the bottle was opened (miraculously the cork came out intact!!) but I'd swear it actually got darker as I decanted it. With hindsight Im not too sure that was the wisest of moves, but there was quite a lot of sediment in the bottle. On the nose it was quite stunning - candied orange peels and honeyed fruit flavour. I have to say that Im not a fan of dessert wines - I find them too sweet, and they just make me cringe when I taste them. This one was no exception, but it had an amazing depth of flavour and the taste remained on my palate for ages. The guy who bought the bottle is having dinner upstairs in the function suites tomorrow, and they are chosing some clarets for a tasting over dinner. So I offered them an impromptu cellar tour. Im glad I did, because it gave me a chance to find out what kinds of wines they want to look at tomorrow, and then it gave me the opportunity to help steer their selection. It seems that they are keen to try some great wines, and theres a small possibility that the 95 Double magnum of Petrus might be one of them.

In the mean time, Ive got all my digits crossed!!

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