TN: '94 St. Em, '98 Alsace

Last night we had a long-delayed dinner with some dear friends. We had given them a gift certificate to a local bistro back at Christmas, and they had suggested we go at the same time. Schedule difficulties kept putting things off, but Friday we finally managed it. I had checked with Chiboust in Tarrytown, and learned the corkage was a reasonable $15. So I carried a white and a red.

1998 Albrecht Pfingstberg Grand Cru Riesling A bit shutdown at first, opened to a nice dry traditional Alsace. A bit of petrol on the nose (Dave described as "cheesey", but liking it) with tart lemon-lime fruit, with just a hint of peaches. There's a slate-flint touch to the finish. Does well with my Crab Napoleon (paper thin crackers layered with blue-crab claw salad, haricot vert,s, nuts, and blood orange vinaigrette) and ok with Betsy's gravlax. Could use 5 years, but nice wine. B-B+

I've had very mixed experiences with the 1994 Beaus=E9jour-Duffau (St.-Emilion). The tannins can be daunting, but it's overall the best '94 St-Em I've run across (faint praise). I decanted this for sediment about 5, rebottled at 6:30. It was probably 8:30 by time we poured, but not enough time. Hard tannins still there, though the underlying fruit (raspberry and red plum) was standing up and asking to be heard. Luckily I had a rare Australian strip steak (with a foie gras butter and sides of roasted potatoes, roasted tomatoes, and asparagus) to act as a counterbalance to the tannins. Dave and Lenore seemed to like, Betsy wasn't as enthused (her dish, bison short ribs braised in stout with coriander and allspice wasn't as good a match). I had the last glbutt of the evening, and that showed what I remembered from the better showings of this wine. A rather dense, minerally, big St. Emilion with some cedar-cigarbox and graphite. That glbutt was an A-, the rest of the meal the wine was a B.

Overall the restaurant was quite nice (though it's small and tables are a little tight to cloth dividers). Very good food, affable and competent service. I'm not crazy over the balloon stems for the reds, but nice enough for reasonable corkage. I'll go more often.

Grade disclaimer: I'm a very easy grader, basically A is an excellent wine, B a good wine, C mediocre. Anything below C means I wouldn't drink at a party where it was only choice. Furthermore, I offer no promises of objectivity, accuracy, and certainly not of consistency