Sharon Bowman
Sharon Bowman
A note.
2002 Huet Ptillant - the top of the cork is pinheaded, like that of some kind of prosecco, but such is the last disappointment this wine has to offer. I made that cork sigh, and then poured what was a deep, amberish bubble into the glass. Hoo! Nice nose of slightly oxidative biscuits and crushed honeycomb (as though a donkey had gone stamping through a bee keeper's yard). Swirl, and on the palate, this is very thick and heady. Fat body to it. But its length streamlines it, and one quickly sees that all of that stuffing wasn't just a lump of dough someone smacks down on your plate. No; there are tiny little sideways and byways here, rivulets of complexity. Then: it has a bitter cut to the finish, but one that, to my senses, is not a flaw in the way that the final bitternes on the thin frame of so many other non-Champagne bubblies is. (If one refers back to my "Crap bubblies" post on Wine Therapy, there was often talk of sugar slicked over turnips, or something like that.) This is anything but a crap bubbly. The bitterness is a pristine white flag proudly unfurling its non-Champagneness. You know, I can live with that. And I did for a while. Yes, I savored the thing.
This wine was drunk for Chris Coad.
2002 Huet Ptillant - the top of the cork is pinheaded, like that of some kind of prosecco, but such is the last disappointment this wine has to offer. I made that cork sigh, and then poured what was a deep, amberish bubble into the glass. Hoo! Nice nose of slightly oxidative biscuits and crushed honeycomb (as though a donkey had gone stamping through a bee keeper's yard). Swirl, and on the palate, this is very thick and heady. Fat body to it. But its length streamlines it, and one quickly sees that all of that stuffing wasn't just a lump of dough someone smacks down on your plate. No; there are tiny little sideways and byways here, rivulets of complexity. Then: it has a bitter cut to the finish, but one that, to my senses, is not a flaw in the way that the final bitternes on the thin frame of so many other non-Champagne bubblies is. (If one refers back to my "Crap bubblies" post on Wine Therapy, there was often talk of sugar slicked over turnips, or something like that.) This is anything but a crap bubbly. The bitterness is a pristine white flag proudly unfurling its non-Champagneness. You know, I can live with that. And I did for a while. Yes, I savored the thing.
This wine was drunk for Chris Coad.