Bad news too, because of course by mid-January everyone had checked into rehab to get over Christmas, and there was no possibility of our even beginning to drain the cava lake that had suddenly welled up in our lives. Moreover, it is now the end of March, and we still have thirty-two bottles to get through, and with the best will in the world, I am starting to struggle.
Not that there’s anything wrong with the basic Tesco Cava, as long as you chill it to death. I know a guy who once worked with the Freixenet company and he was told (by the boss, indeed) that the way to serve cava was to chill it so much that ice crystals formed in the glass as you poured it. Which is terrific if you’re in, say, Madrid, on a hot June night, less so in England in winter. Still, after some trial and error, my routine is to get the Tesco product down to a hairsbreadth above absolute zero, and what do I find but a nice prickly mousse, followed by a hint of burnt caramel on the tongue, then a ferocious poof as it expands rapidly across the floor of the mouth like a CO2 fire extinguisher, leaving only a chesty rasp in its wake. It passes the time very nicely, especially when you consider what we paid.
Then I get bored. I still have over thirty bottles to get through, and how long does this stuff keep? PK suggests six months, but that’s counting from January, which means I now have four months in which to neck my thirty bottles, which is roughly two bottles a week, and even with help from the wife and anyone else around, I don’t think I have that much frivolity in me. So I try to trick myself into thinking the Tesco Cava is something else, not cava, by adding things to it.
Not the home-made sloe gin which No. 1 son once used to make an intriguing champagne cocktail, only to discover that it produced a lethal fizzy syrup, a kind of psycho cherryade. No, I have professional kit, charitably donated in second-hand form by our French friends, in the shape of an almost-empty bottle of cassis; some Crème de Figue, similarly used; and a bottle of Crème de Pêche, almost untouched, which should have told me something.
As it turns out, the cassis is the only one I can look forward to without apprehension. It may have gone a bit brown in colour and have a certain amount of jammy horror around the neck, but Tesco Cava + elderly cassis = quite a funky sensation of cloves and gravy browning, oddly warming in the context of the frigid cava. The Figue, by way of contrast, while starting off with a promising chocolaty introduction, turns fairly quickly into a garbled story of deodorant, granulated sugar and aircraft dope. I want to like it, being the nearest in character to that slinky Crème de Noisette you sometimes find, but is it an inferior brand? Inherent nastiness? Something morbid turns the Figue into a drink occupying the narrow isthmus that connects the unusual to the merely weird, and I cannot bring myself to love it.
But at least it’s not the Crème de Pêche. Peaches are lovely things. The label alone enchants. So why has it been barely touched? Well, as it turns out, it breaks new ground in potable filth. I get as far as discovering that yes, drain cleaner and marzipan can be found in the form of an alcoholic drink, before reflexively tipping the rest down the sink, an action I almost never perform in the real world. Toxic is the only word.
And then I sit and stare angrily at the still fairly full Crème de Pêche bottle, and at the thirty remaining Tesco Cavas. Who would have thought it could be so challenging?
PK
There is a nearby wine merchant posh enough to have an ampersand in its name. The manager has the physique of those nourished without a concern for cash, contained within an inevitable striped shirt. He sweeps out from behind the counter to intercept visitors, with an extraordinary combination of the grovelling of Uriah Heep and the swagger of a Pall Mall club porter (‘Are you entitled to be here, sir?’). And before one can orientate oneself between the Bordeaux and the bargain bins, he asks: ‘Can I help you?’
No. You cannot help me. I am not looking for anything specific; I am browsing. I do not need to be monitored like a potential shoplifter, and I certainly do not wish to be escorted around the shelves to the accompaniment of a running commentary. There may be a purchase somewhere in the offing, but at the moment, thank you very much, I am just looking.
What is the point of ‘just looking’ at wines that are created in order to drink?
Well, first, an education. Have you ever compared the colour of five vintages of Château d’Yquem? Did you know they make half-bottles of Château Lynch-Bages? Have you noticed how the Rothschilds are inspired by the style of the Lafite label on their lesser wines? Or the undiscovered wines which carry in small type the names of winemakers like Moueix and Chapoutier? These are all things I have learnt through browsing.
I have remembered more about the relative prices of wines, regions and vintages by browsing than I ever have from lists. Somehow the visual element of a label, on a bottle, in a store registers those things more clearly in my mind.
Browsing gives you a good indication of the nature of a merchant. The presence of one or two great wines on their shelves establishes benchmarks, of price, good taste, long-standing and industry connections, which enable you to put the rest of their offering into perspective. One of the sure signs of the collapse of Oddbins was the absence of any recognisable wines in their shops.
And then there is an almost emotional element to browsing – imagining the wine, the flavour, the occasion. Simply being in the presence of wines you are trying to understand, may never be able to afford, and sometimes find it hard to believe even exist. Have you actually seen a bottle of Screaming Eagle, which is allocated only to those on its waiting list? Or a 1961 claret, one of the greatest vintages of the last century? People thrill to first editions not because they want to read the contents, but because that’s how the book first appeared. Surely wine’s even better, because every vintage is a first and only edition.
There are plenty of things people simply look at, without ever using them for their intended purpose. No one spends their coin collection. People wander around commercial art galleries without the intention (or indeed the wealth) to buy the items on display. Secondhand bookshops depend upon browsing, and people flick happily through the racks in record shops without anyone feeling the need to offer fatuous advice. (‘Looking for a record beginning with B then, sir?’)
I am not a timewaster; except in the sense that the only person’s time I am wasting is my own. I won’t waste the staff’s time, because I don’t need to occupy their time. So if you happen to recognise yourself as the chap who runs Pompous & Disdain (Wine Merchants), may I suggest (ever so ’umbly) that the phrase ‘Let me know if you need any help …’ is much better. I will indeed let you know, and may then actually buy something.
But sometimes it’s hard. On a recent trip to Paris I made a pilgrimage to Les Caves d’Augé. Opened in 1850, it’s the oldest wine store in Paris, and was Proust’s local. I’ve always loved the French phrase for window-shopping – lécher les vitrines or, literally, to lick the windows – and that’s about all one can afford to do in Paris these days. But in Augé, it’s actually quite hard even to browse. It’s two wonderful old, crowded rooms, each piled to the ceiling with dusty bottles, like being in someone’s actual cellar. The phrase ‘kid in a sweetshop’ comes to mind, and any parent knows just how long that kid will take to make up its mind.
But the staff hover expectantly behind you, watching every move as you shuffle between the cases. Even hiding behind the language barrier isn’t enough to dispel their attention. No, I am not going to lift that bottle of Ausone 2005 at €1380 and give it a shake. Like saintly relics, it’s enough just to look, to revel in the presence. Leave me alone!
I began to think it impossible to browse wine in Paris. But then I passed La Maison des Millesimes, in Saint-Germain-des-Prés,