A Testing Wine

On the night we met, I told Maxime I thought French wine was overrated (I based my opinion on a plastic cup of Côtes du Rhône Villages I’d had on the plane from Australia. It tasted more like Coats du Rhône). I think I may also have told him I thought rosés were crap. Since then, of course, he has shown me (extensively) how wrong I was. Which was annoying … but then … from another point of view, rather nice.

And then things got serious. One evening in France, Maxime got out a bottle, which was not unusual. Then he faced the label away from me.

‘Guess,’ he said.

‘Guess what?’

‘What the wine is.’

Oh God.

‘Um …’ I began a stream of consciousness, working my way through grape varieties until arriving at what I thought might be a plausible answer, which was my way of playing for time. I could think of four red grape types: Cabernet Sauvignon, Shiraz, Merlot and Pinot Noir. This, I figured, gave me a one in four chance to get it right. ‘Ummm … Shiraz …?’ I said finally.

‘In France, it's Syrah. Syrah and?’

‘And what?’

‘And what other grape?’

‘Oh God, I don’t bloody know.’

‘Viognier.’

‘Never heard of it.’

‘How about the region? And the vintage?’

‘What? You’ve got to be kidding!’ I laughed. ‘I’ve got no bloody idea. Look, the dinner’s getting cold.’

‘1996. Côte-Rôtie. North Rhone,’ intoned Maxime.

`

‘1996 Rotty what? Can you really guess those things?’

I was skeptical. I also really hoped we wouldn’t be doing this every evening.

But now, in Australia, it’s revenge time! I’m the one that can guess the shirazes (mind you, I still wouldn’t be able to tell you if it was Heathcote or Yarra Valley). On the other hand, Maxime’s been working very hard to learn about Australian wine. A week after we arrived in Oz, he’d bought himself Jeremy Oliver’s wine guide, The Age Good Food Guide and other essentials and literally spent nights researching, cross-referencing between guides and looking on the net. The morning after a sleepless night, Maxime's notebook was full of notes in illegible handwriting and his head full of names like Clonakilla, Mount Mary, Bindi and Cullen.

‘What on earth are you doing, staying up all night reading about wine?’ I asked him.

‘I wasn’t sleeping anyway,’ he said.

‘Well you certainly won’t sleep if you spend all night looking up wines, that’s for sure.’

Some weeks later, we are at Giant Steps in Healesville for dinner, having done the Sanctuary with the kids. In an excess of folly, Maxime orders a Mount Mary Triolet, carefully hiding the price of it by putting his arm over the wine list. 

He takes his first glass of it, tilts it this way and that, swirls it, inhales, another swirl and finally a sip, which he swishes around in his mouth for what seems an age while I’m waiting on the edge of my seat for the verdict. If he rubbishes one of Australia’s top wines I will bloody well tip it on him. But, mouth still full of wine, Maxime starts to nod his head while waving his free hand around like the Queen.

‘That is wine,’ he says finally.

I must say I find his critique of the wine to be a little on the simple side. But hey, at least Aussie wine has proved itself to one of the world’s most fussy frogs!

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For more on the wine, see https://www.mountmary.com.au/category/estate-wines/triolet/