Food review by James Hill and wine review by Stephen O'Halloran

Food

Our Foodmaster Steve Sparkes was in the kitchen for our monthly wine tasting.

Canapes

Good mix of canapés today all happily devoured by members. One member said the best canapés ever!

• Tuna Pâté

This one consisted of a tin of tuna in oil, anchovies, shallots and onion sauteed until golden, a decent slug of Sherry, bay leaf, and tarragon as well as a good whack of butter and seasoning. All blended together at high speed for 5-10 mins (without bay leaves!!) and served on a tomato and basil cracker.

This was a favourite, and many requested the recipe. It was parfait-like in texture with perfectly integrated rich flavours.

• Duck Rillette

Confit of duck maryland shredded with a blend of herbs, some duck fat and duck stock. Served on toasted baguette.

• Fig and Prosciutto

The third canape was a halved fig stuffed with goat cheese, wrapped in prosciutto and baked in a hot oven for 10 mins.  It was then cooled and drizzled with honey, balsamic vinegar and black pepper prior to serving.

Main

A lot of preparation in today’s main, It looked simple “meat and two veg” but what grabbed us first was the presentation, the glaze on the duck and the silky mash. The dish was a great bridge to the wines on taste today.

Confit of Duck

The duck marylands were 'dry marinated' with some garlic, thyme, onion, carrot, tarragon, orange rind, black peppercorns, allspice berries, crushed juniper berries, fennel seeds, star anise, fenugreek seeds and cumin seeds overnight.

It was then cooked sous-vide at 75C for about 12 hours and then laid out on trays in its own fat in the fridge overnight.

On the day, the duck was flashed in a hot oven for a few minutes and then painted with a glaze for a few more minutes until crispy and shiny just prior to service. The glaze consisted of brown sugar, sherry vinegar and some marmalade.

The duck was served with a basic mash and green beans dressed with EVOO, raspberry vinegar as well as some toasted almond flakes for a bit of crunch.

The sauce/jus/gravy was a bottle of red heavily reduced with a decent amount of Creme de Cassis liqueur and a lot of diced shallots. A couple of litres or so of intense chicken and duck stock was added and reduced to the required consistency. 

Comments reflected the quality of the lunch today.

Thanks Steve.

Cheese

Our Cheesemaster Mark Bradford managed to secure some Pyengana reserve vintage cloth-bound cheddar.

A cow’s milk from Tasmania, it’s handcrafted from a 130-year-old recipe unique to Pyengana and matured in traditional cheese cloth for 24 months.

A great example of this cheese today, crumbly, bold, bitey and some crystals.

So good, Patto pocketed his leftovers!

The cheese was accompanied by a simple salad of mixed leaves dressed in red wine vinegar and olive oil with some added toasted almonds and a rather intense beetroot jam.

The bread was the standard large sourdough loaf from Bourke Street Bakery in Newtown. 

Wine

A splendid lunch delivered via the skills of one of our multi-talented chefs Steve Sparkes. Le Canard was the dish, for those not familiar with French, Duck. A brilliant main, with some superb pass-arounds. See the Food report for more details. With regard to the wines, our stand-in Wine Master Paul Irwin, had selected for us an array of our finest Australian reds, for our considered opinion, ranging from a 1990 Yarra Yering Dry Red No 1 to a 2012 Penfolds Bin 389, and plenty of goodies in between. So, let's get started.

The aperitif wine was an aged Lindemans Bin 0555 Sem from the Hunter Vintage 2005 12%. Sealed under screw cap the wine was in great presentation, clear, no browning or deep yellow colour you would expect from a 19 yo white. That is where the praise stops with the first bottle opened. I could almost not drink it, such was the overpowering acidity of the wine. It killed any further assessment of the wine. You would think that after 19 years the acid would be falling away, but not with this baby, getting more acidic as time progresses. However, redemption was at hand with a second or third bottle, which were totally different, and highly enjoyable, as you would expect from a top Hunter Sem from a great year. Talk about bottle variation. Under Stelvin you would think this would not happen, but it did today. I was stunned by the difference between the two bottles I tasted. The “Good” bottles saved the day, delightful, fresh, well-balanced Hunter Sem.

The main/cheese wines were from any objective viewpoint, a cavalcade of great Australian wines of the last 25 years. Read on gentle reader and let me guide you through this cornucopia of our best and fairest First off was a crowd favourite the Penfolds Bin 389 14.5%. Let me put my cards on the table for a moment. We had three Bin 389 today so when I say the wine was in the Penfolds style/formula, tannin, oak and alcohol, you will know what I mean. Their red wines never vary from this format. Very predictable, but you know what you’re getting. This wine was the 2012, very highly regarded by Penfolds. Very dark fruit colour, with hints of mulberry and blackberry. Great balance between oak, tannin and acid producing a firm finish. I would not call this wine “elegant” as it is too muscular at present. Perhaps it may achieve this description when Penfolds says it will achieve its full potential in 2040! If anybody has at that stage some connection with the afterlife, please let me know if Penfolds are correct!

Red wine No 2 was the 2012 Lindemans Limestone Ridge Shiraz Cab.14%. My pick of the litter. Lighter in structure than any of the Penfolds wines, this was a beauty. The brilliant clear colour of cherry red, elegant yet powerful, balanced with some mild oak and tannin showing, leading to a drawn-out sweetish fruit-driven finish. I picked up hints of chocolate and blackberry. A really enjoyable drink.

Wine 3 was another 389 2002 14%. I rated this wine above the 2012. The usual Penfolds style, but in my view better than the 2012 above. Perhaps the 2012 needed more time, as with this wine we had ten extra years of maturity and development. 54/46% split of Cab and Shiraz 14%. Very strong flavours of dark fruits, but combining well with the tannin, oak and residual acid to produce a beautifully balanced wine, dare I say a classic 389 with predictions by Penfolds to drink well until 2045!

Wine 4 the Hardys Eileen Shiraz 2002 14%, was to my taste a somewhat sad wine, at least in so far as the bottle on our table was concerned. Maybe there were other bottles in the room that fared better. The colour was still black/purple but the acid had fallen away to a considerable extent, leaving the wine, to my palate, dull and flabby. Perhaps 22 years is just too long for this wine,10 years would have produced a better outcome for this well-regarded wine.

Wine 5 was another 389 this time a very old one, 1991 13.5%. Drinking very well in the Penfolds style. Strong tannin and oak. This wine to me was a different 389 to the earlier bottles probably because it was 11 years older than the 2002 we had beforehand. It had the usual mix of black fruits and cherry flavours. Despite its age, the wine drank very well.

The final wine, the famed Yarra Yering Dry Red No 1 from 1990 was to many the wine of the day at 13%. A Cabernet blend of assorted French Cabernets and a dash of Malbec. I think it is fair to say this wine has achieved cult-like status amongst keen Australian wine lovers. At 24 yo the wine still had plenty of time left, no obvious ageing. Superb palate, rich and complex, with a firm finish. All round a great wine doing credit to its reputation. Near perfect balance, great length. Justly regarded by many as the wine of the day.