It wasn't meant to be an international competition, but there you go.
Friday was supposed to be my day off. My one day to hang out and relax, head to Borough Market for a quick shop, eat something nice for lunch, and then sip something sparkling in the afternoon - just because I could. The day before, I found a bottle of prosecco for just under £10 at one of my locals from the Istituto Enologico Italiano, so I was all ready.
Except the prosecco was horrible. Not a dud, like my recent bottle of champagne, but actually nasty, awful, pure-alcohol-tasting, almost-flat wine. It was so bad, I poured it down the sink - not even worthy to use for cooking.
My husband is a star, though. Sensing my disappointment when I met him at the train station later that day, he stopped at another of our locals and picked out a bottle of cava from Codorniu - also for less than £10. This was their Reserva Raventos, a blend of chardonnay, macabeo, and xarello that they released for their 125th anniversary in 1997.
We drank it on Sunday with melt-in-your-mouth roasted pork belly that my husband cooked. The cava was spectacular, and totally made up for my disappointment on Friday. The wine tasted like fresh-baked-bread and had more than enough bubbles for my super-sparkling preference. Had I tasted it blind, I would have thought it was champagne, and a more expensive one, at that.
I often overlook cavas when I'm out looking for bubbles, mostly because I have this preconceived (and incorrect) notion that they tend to be sweet. I've had a lot of very nice cavas, though, and will have to keep them higher up on my shopping list from now on.
Tuesday, 24 March 2009
Tuesday, 10 March 2009
I Got a Dud
It's one of the worst sounds in the world - the soft little 'pffft' that happens when you open a dud bottle of champagne. And that's what I heard on Saturday, when I opened one of the bottles from my case of Maison Lenique.
It was so sad. We had planned a nice meal, my husband having cooked an amazing lemon and caper chicken, to celebrate both a change in job for me and the fact that our 17-year-old cat has lived for a month despite the 'days-to-weeks' diagnosis provided by the vet. But there it was, flat champagne, tasting of vinegar. It's only happened to me once before, years ago, and it was no less disappointing then.
So, we ate without bubbles, and threw another bottle of the Maison Lenique in the fridge. We opened it on Sunday with a resounding 'POP' - and drank it while we watched a Sarah Silverman DVD. It would have been fantastic with the chicken, but we enjoyed it with a laugh instead.
Post-script: My husband used part of the dud bottle of Maison Lenique a couple of weeks later to make the most fantastic champagne risotto. While it's not how I thought we would enjoy it, enjoy it we nonetheless did!
It was so sad. We had planned a nice meal, my husband having cooked an amazing lemon and caper chicken, to celebrate both a change in job for me and the fact that our 17-year-old cat has lived for a month despite the 'days-to-weeks' diagnosis provided by the vet. But there it was, flat champagne, tasting of vinegar. It's only happened to me once before, years ago, and it was no less disappointing then.
So, we ate without bubbles, and threw another bottle of the Maison Lenique in the fridge. We opened it on Sunday with a resounding 'POP' - and drank it while we watched a Sarah Silverman DVD. It would have been fantastic with the chicken, but we enjoyed it with a laugh instead.
Post-script: My husband used part of the dud bottle of Maison Lenique a couple of weeks later to make the most fantastic champagne risotto. While it's not how I thought we would enjoy it, enjoy it we nonetheless did!
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