Chef

Hanh volunteer to bring desserts so I can concentrate just on cooking. She brought a variety of desserts from Whole food.

Cannelloni filled with cream and chocolate chips and chocolate cake with coffee mouse and raspberry mouse.

We started the evening with a Margarita. Duy brought a few bottles of Tequila and we managed to finish a little more than one bottle of Tequila among us.

Dung brought a few bottles or white wine from Silver Mountain Chardonnay 2002. They were perfect with the first two course: to with the Hamachi Carpaccio and Salmon Tartare.

Phuc supplied all the red wine for the evening. On the left it is Magnum bottle of CastelGiocondo (2001) The second bottle is a premier cru, Chateau Pape Clement (2000), and the third bottle is a Vieux Chateau Certan (1995)

Caltegiocondo 2001

Review - Wine Spectator: Aromas of currant, berry and light vanilla. Full-bodied and structured. Fine tannins but not giving much now. This is big and powerful. Needs lots of time. Best after 2010

Score: 94

Phuc's comments:

Castelgiocondo has been one of our group favorite for a while now. We already drank one case of the 1999 and believed it or not 6 magnums of the 2001, I only have 1 magnum left.

Review-Wine Spectator: Wonderful fruit and texture. Best VCC I have ever tasted. Dark-colored, and bubbling over with blackberry and raspberry character with undertones of chocolate, mint and vanilla. Full-bodied, with very velvety tannins and a long, flavorful finish. Score: 95.

Phuc's comments:

The Vieux Chateau Certan is quite famous and highly rated and expensive (ie. all the Frenchy wine snobs would go ooh and aah) but I thought it was just good and not great, great nose but lack the umh.. at the finished

REVIEW AND DESCRIPTION

Phuc's comments:

Compare with the Vieux Chateau Certan, the Pape Clement 2000 is about 1/3 to 1/4 the price but it was quite excellent. I stumbled on this gem since their highly rated 1995 release and had never been disappointed. It tasted best in the past with Osso Bucco. The funny thing is the Vieux costs more than the magnum of the brunello and Pape Clement combined.

Phuc also bought a wonderful Port for the evening. In one of the review they describe the Taylor Port as the "LATOUR" of Portugal. The review for this port is stellar.

REVIEW & DESCRIPTION

We also opened a bottle a champagne from la Veuve Clicquot. Needless to say that after sampling all these wonderful wines some of us were a little tipsy.