New England style FleurBurger in mustard sauce

[Covert]

You can do the FleurBurger in various shades at different price points. At the very old Norwich Inn, in Vermont, last night, I ordered a giant venison burger, medium rare, in a toasted bun with their sophisticated, homemade mustard sauce for dipping, and a small order of fries, with homemade catsup for dipping.

The only Bordeaux available was, again, 2001 Greysac, which has become a mainstay on the road. My dining companion and I drank only half the bottle before starting on the burgers, which went very well with the wine. It is rare that I drink wine with food, but I have finally found a way to do it without overcoming the wine experience.

For an appetizer, with the first half of the bottle, and glasses of Chardonnay, we enjoyed their cheese plate. Then, after the “main course,” even more uncharacteristically, I ordered dessert; mostly because the French lady associate I was with always does: a double scoop, hot fudge Sundae with a glass of port.

As we were seated in the pub area, which I requested, I asked the owner if she could replicate the famous burger with truffles and foie gras. She told me I was in the wrong restaurant and treated me like an interloper (or as Hoke would say, the poser that I am) after that.

I highly recommend the above combination. But I am probably learning late in life what everybody else knows well.

[Jenise]

Covert, you're right that fancy burgers have been all the rage for some time now. Kobe beef and a $27 price tag were the starting points at I forget which NY restaurant. Then came the foie gras. Daniel Boulud took decadence a step further by blending already-cooked short-rib meat into the ground beef at one of his NYC eateries. Keller's version is only particularly notable because of the pairing with the Petrus and the price tag.

We made our own version two summer ago when we our L.A. wine group visited, complete with the homemade condiments.

[ChefCarey]

Covert said:

"It is rare that I drink wine with food, but I have finally found a way to do it without overcoming the wine experience."

What are you saying???? The overwhelming percentage of wine on this planet is made to be drunk with food!!!!!!

[Covert]

I know and I avoid that kind of wine.

[Jenise]

Covert, you're incorrigible. Seriously though, I know you do prefer to drink your wine before the meal and that on weekends, based on your forum descriptions, that's usually two bottles, a chardonnay first followed by a Bordeaux. I don't need to know exactly how you manage that, only how you and Lynn get dinner on the table post-wine. I'd still be lucid, no problem--never was a cheap date, am not now--but I sure wouldn't have the energy to care about perfection the way I do sober.

[Covert]

We tend to prepare the meal while we are drinking the wine. If it is a complicated recipe, we will complete the hard parts before opening any wine. And we thread the wines: a sip of Chardonnay followed by a sip of Bordeaux. By following every sip of red with a little white, it permits a renewed red experience on every sip, rather than a more continuous experience of drinking from just one bottle.

Even the smell of food shuts down a fine red to some extent, so if the meal is particularly odoriferous, we cook the whole thing, put it aside, covered, and let the kitchen air out. After the wine, we re-heat the dinner.

Bordeaux is an art form for us. So is Lynn’s food, designed to be consumed on its own merit. Her flavors might be too strong for many people - certainly too strong to go with fine wine.

One of our reasons for this unconventional approach is to preserve our livers. We enjoy food Sunday through Thursday, when I am not on the road, with no alcohol. (I add Thursday night to my wine nights when traveling.) Then we don’t have to feel guilty about each of us killing a bottle on Fridays and Saturdays – and daily on vacations; and our faces don’t get blotchy like many of the people we know who drink ample wine every day.

I don’t think I am unique in taking this approach. Many connoisseurs recommend the simplest foods with wine. I found that a hamburger, like bread and some cheeses, does not detract from the wine, and may even enhance it.

Many people who regularly consume wine with food, like many Italians and French people, drink simple wine, which also makes sense…if you don’t mind people calling you Rudolf.

[Jenise]

I agree that some foods can easily overwelm wine, but choosing wine and food to complement each other is one of those arts you mention. We had a 79 Haut Brion a few weeks ago that was superb in and of itself. But with the lamb shanks in onion reduction sauce? It became stratospheric.

You know what, you're essentially doing the same thing the rest of us do, using a contrast to enhance your wine experience, you're just substituting chardonnay for food. On the one hand, that gives you a very consistent contrast and allows you to make much more reliable comparisons between yesterday's wine and last week's, but on the other hand you'll never know how absolutely f---ing amazing a 79 Haut Brion with lamb shanks in an onion reduction sauce is.

It seems that what you're trying to do is limit your downside potential, but in fact from my perch it seems you're actually limiting your upside. But hey, it works for you.

One question though, isn't drinking all that wine on an empty tummy one of the no-no's for liver preservation?

[Covert]

'79 Haut Brion. My word! Had a chance to buy some '66, but I passed; since Mr. Parker said it was long gone. I beleived him. I am still trying to score a spectacular bottle of some '66 wine to celebrate Lynn's and my 40th, in less than two weeks. Latour is probably the best choice, but Lynn would not be happy with a $750 bill on the credit card bill for a single bottle, especially if the wine didn't live up to hopes. Can't find any Mouton, and it would probably also be too expensive. I wouldn't mind spending a ton, but it is not Lynn's style; she's a Taurus; she'd be happier with me making a smart choice. We may have to settle for an '88 Mouton and pretend it is a '66.

I doubt there is any data to answer the question of how bad a couple of bottles on an empty stomach per week is. It would depend on the person's individual physiology, too, of course. I actually drink more than one bottle per weekend night on an empty stomach, on the QT. I can't get a buzz on less. So you will at least have a data point of one, since I will let you know if anything untoward befalls me.

[Jenise]

66? Pichon Baron!!! I've had two in the past six months--one from immaculate storage and the other from god knows where, but it was a shabby looking bottle. They were both teriffic, and can be found for around $150.

[ChefCarey]

>Many people who regularly consume wine with food, like many Italians and French people, drink simple wine, which also makes sense…if you don’t mind people calling you Rudolf.

I know dozens of Italians and French, Spaniards etc. - and Americans for that matter - who consume wine daily with their meals and are free of both liver problems and a cerise proboscis. I myself consume a couple of glasses with lunch daily - have been doing so since you were still in diapers (assuming you wore them during and not before...er...nevermind.) I don't believe I have the right stuff to guide Santa's sleigh.

We prepare cuisine both simple and complex. And I can find a wine to go well with nearly everything we make.

I have and drink Pinchon, La Conseillante, Montrose, Lynch-Bages - all go *very* well with food. I also have and love Hermitages.

And while I find the chardonnay/bordeaux ritual you have adopted kinda silly...hey...if it works for you...it works for you. I assume y'all don't have many dinner parties.

[Dale Williams]

I drink wine with dinner almost every night, and to date my nose is only red when I'm in the sun too long. I'd be careful as dismissing as simple wines that you haven't tried.

As to '66s, I've had the Mouton and the Gruaud-Larose twice in last year or so. In each case I had one disappointing bottle (though certainly neither was at all undrinkable), and one that was quite good. A Palmer was disappointing, but fill level was top-shoulder. There are no guarantees with older bottles, of course. Rather than spend $750 for a Latour, glorious though it might be, if it were me I'd buy a bottle of the Gruaud ($125 at Cellaraiders) and one of the Mouton ($345 at 20/20, or a mag for mid-$400s from Schneiders), and one of Jenise's Pichon Barons ($120 at Wallys). So for $560 (plus shipping) you have 3 contenders. Open one, if it sucks go to number 2. You can save any you don't get to for anniversary 41, 45, or 50 (that might be getting iffy, cause even the good bottles are fully mature).

[JoePerry]

FleurBurger? Must be just in those fancy Vermont Inns that only New Yorkers go to.

In Maine they'd call that "Ground Deer"

I'm with you on enjoying the wine apart from the food.

Best,
Joe

[Covert]

Thanks, Dale: I'm having a '66 Gruaud Larose and an '83 Talbot shipped today. The Pichon Baron would have to come from the West Coast, so I opted for the St. Juliens, which don't have far to travel. The '83 doesn't have anything to do with the anniversary; I just like old Talbots. I didn't dare try a $350 wine. If it was oxidized, or something like that, it could spoil the dinner for Lynn. An older wine has to be absolutely perfect, like the '81 Lynch Bages that the three of us enjoyed in Greenwich Village, or Lynn doesn't like it. I don't mind some oxidation and other mild over-the-hill-ness.

I admit that you don't show any worse for the wear. But some of the noses that I see in the wine magazines, yikes!

[Covert]

The FleurBurger comes from Las Vegas. The Vermont Inn wasn't fancy, believe me; I was the only one without a flannel shirt.

After having the deer burger pretty much plain, except for the mustard, I forgot about the fancy trimmings. From now on it is bison, deer or stand-up beef, if I want some food with my wine.

I just remembered potentially the best combo I ever had: one night, out in the country, my brother flamed some deer patties on a very hot wood chip fire to go with the french fries already on the table. That looked good enough, until his girlfriend plopped down a bottle of 1989 La Mission Haut Brion next to my plate, just for me. That was probably in my subconscious the whole time driving my choice of the deer patty, over something fancier, and this whole thread.