1920 Clarets
BY NEAL MARTIN |
Each year I attend a dinner at Domaine de Chevalier hosted by Olivier Bernard. It’s been held for many years, long before I joined the table. The theme is always the numerical vintage, for example in 2022, all the vintages ended in two. You can work out the theme for other years. It is run along the lines of La Paulée whereby guests contribute their own bottles. There is no rule specifying that they must be Bordeaux, which spices things up a bit. Furthermore, all bottles are served blind. Since nobody has an inkling what others have brought, you must keep your wits about you while the cross-table discussion gets lively. It’s a fun evening, yet one that involves a lot of work because it’s a unique opportunity to assess aged wines blind.
Tasting notes for most of the wines on this evening are folded into a “Century of Twos” article. However, in this occasion, four bottles came from the 1920 vintage. So, why where they allowed to break the numerical rule?
