Topic: TN: The United Nations of lard (Alsace, pt. 9, long, img, repost)
Author: Thor Iverson
Date: 20041105123405

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Paris

The cheese that keeps on giving The lapin not-so-agile

Alsace

Monsieur is a great connoisseur The Beyer necessities Boxler rebellion An unfamiliar malady Pierre, poisson & penguin lust Brothel cuisine The key to life Tauntingly tart and steely grey

This is a repost of an earlier work, to fit it into the narrative and the navigation. Feel free to ignore; you’ve already seen it.

St. Hune's bells chime once, twice...muted and attenuated by blankets of misty pressure rolling from the brooding ridge of the Vosges. A humid breeze swirls briefly around the courtyard, moving a shower of fallen white petals from one wall to another, then back again. Clouds boil into a subdued sky, sending the wheeling, soaring white cigognes to the safety their steeple-top nests. The silence waits.

Far down the twisty rue du Nord, the oscillating acceleration and downshifting of a manual-transmission automobile zigzags along ancient walls. The volume increases, the pitch falls, a rough sputtering begins, and a shiny metallic nose sniffs around the corner of the open gate, followed by the source of the noise. I lean out the second-floor window of our gîte as the lanky figures of Uno and Due emerge from their car.

"Philly, the Italians are here!"

"Already?"

"Yeah. They're early! Can you believe it?"

She hurtles downstairs, her thundering step waking Louisville from his third nap of the day. His final snore dissolves into a series of snorts and snuffles that echo from the courtyard's cobbled walls. His wife Kentucky is already downstairs, putting the final touches on a dessert that may be either chocolate-, coffee-, vanilla-, or lime-flavored; she's been a bit mysterious about her true intentions. I shove few final slivers of garlic into the vivid dark red muscle of a hefty gigot, wash my hands, and follow my wife downstairs with lamb in tow.

Freshly-cleared of trolls

Working from the assumption that Hunawihr isn't big enough for anyone to get seriously lost, and thus my presence in the courtyard to greet each new arrival isn't required, I join the so-far small group that has reassembled in our downstairs caveau. It's a formerly-functional wine cave – free of mold and with only half the cobwebs – updated with a modern floor and lighting system and a reasonably well-outfitted kitchen (featuring a plate-warming machine straight out of the fifties and an on-demand water heater that appears to work on gerbil power). Philly and Kentucky are aligning candles on a series of tables while Uno and Due extract several trays of ingredients from a storage fridge; they'd been by the previous day (right on schedule, too; one just can't count on Italians anymore) to drop off said trays and a few cases of wine. OK, maybe one can count on Italians.

Due starts unwrapping 50-kilo rounds and wedges of cheese, which he then wheelbarrows to the dining room and winches onto a side table. Meanwhile, Uno assembles a small workstation at a corner table, out of the nonexistent but theoretically bustling traffic. He's soon in a smooth routine: a crispy baton-like breadstick is wrapped in a curling blanket of succulent pink pork fat, dipped in olive oil, and spread with butter. This assembly is then soaked in clarified goose fat, barded with alternating strips of webbed caul fat and bacon, and deep fried in bubbling tallow. The finished product is once more liberally coated with butter and a small drizzle of honey.

As Uno's mass-production continues, Nether and Hol (by the law and customs of their native country, they share the last name of "Land") arrive carrying bushels of white asparagus on their backs, each stalk as thick as a lumberjack's arm. Hol immediately commences peeling the mammoth stalks by threatening each one with a lawsuit, while Nether starts chopping hard-boiled eggs for a sauce.

"You might want some duck fat for those," Uno opines in his careful, measured English.

A shadow appears in the doorway. It's Belgium, though Nether advises me that it's actually pronounced "Bell-kkkhhhyyyoom."

A man, a plan, fat

"At least it's not pronounced 'Throatwobbler Mangrove,'" I reply.

Blank stare.

(Note to self: no more Monty Python references this evening.)

Gert wedges a terrine amongst the groaning weight of the cheese table and starts unpacking his wine. Finding myself with nothing much to do, I decide to fire up the caveau's sound system. CDs have been provided by the gîte: a selection of Latvian folk dances performed by mimes, Ella Fitzgerald's Greatest Bat Mitzvah Performances, a bootleg recording of Serge Gainsbourg's Bedtime With For My Daughter, and – amusingly – a collection entitled Great French Rock & Pop. I leave that one out; surely even our group of drunkards must have some standards.

"Please, a little help here" cries a weak voice from the courtyard. Hol pauses her asparagus intimidation long enough to join Nether and myself in identifying this new arrival. It's a bent, wrinkled old man, surely at least in his late 80s. He extends a shriveled hand and speaks, quietly and shyly. "Hello. I'm Neutral." The three of us assist him down the stairs – Nether and Hol carry him, while I follow with his cane, wine, and a homemade terrine – and after a brief return to his car for a case of specially-designed crystal stems from Riedel's "Dentum" line (they have straws that don't irritate his dentures), we prop him into a well-cushioned high chair and return to our food assembly.

Amongst all the preparation, candle-lighting, and fat-ladening, I finally lose patience with the lack of something to drink. Uno offers a pint of surplus leaf lard; I demur, and instead open the first wine of the evening.

Kreydenweiss 1999 Riesling Wiebelsberg "La Dame" (Alsace) – Piercing iron/chalk minerality and wet grapefruit in flawless balance. Long on the finish and with years to go.

And then, our tummies a-rumblin', like a pack of wild dogs trailing drool and slobber in their frenzy, we descend on a table of Uno's lard wands and several hundred tubes of Due and Philly's cured sausages (Bambi, Thumper, Babe – the whole animated stable is here), as well as Neutral and Belgium's terrines. While devouring plate after plate of flesh and fat and goat and boar, we greedily guzzle more wine.

Mmmmm…fat

Jeannin-Mongeard "Domaine du Mas Cremat" 2001 Vin de Pays du Côtes Catalanes Grenache "Vieilles Vignes" (Roussillon) – A light oxidation is easily overwhelmed by spicy peach and cashew in a thick, assertively lush package. Impressive.

Vigneti Massa "Costa del Vento" 1998 "vigna di timorasso" Colli Tortonesi (Piedmont) – A thick powdery mineral sensation followed by a dusting of powdered mixed nuts – is this wine from Colli Tortonesi instant/concentrate? – and an intense hazelnut finish.

Vigneti Massa "Costa del Vento" 1997 "vigna di timorasso" Colli Tortonesi (Piedmont) – Creamier, shorter and seemingly more developed than the single year's difference between this and the previous wine would indicate.

Hol is tall. So is Nether. And so it is, bent nearly double and still sanding the backs of their heads against the caveau's ceiling (taking a few cobwebs with them) that they retreat to the kitchen to finish off the peeled (and trembling in fear of another subpoena) asparagus and its sauce.

"Is this grand cru asparagus?" croaks Neutral, wrapping his thick wool cloak tighter around his shoulders; he'll be complaining of circulation problems all night. As Hol serves us each a well-warmed log of spargel, Nether launches into a lengthy dissertation on the qualities of the different controlled-appellation Dutch asparagus patches – their exposures, their drainages, their soil types, their susceptibility to grey rot – which leads a brief argument between Louisville and Belgium on the nefarious effect that Parker's scores have had on the international asparagus market. Once the argument abates, Nether returns to his exposition; this is a man clearly in the midst of his studies for the difficult and much-admired Master of Asparagus examination. Louisville continues to scoff at the elevation of certain plots to grand cru status, which causes Due to throw little bits of emu sausage at him until he quiets down and resumes his regular yawning. We return to drinking.

Fritz Haag 2002 Brauneberger Juffer-Sonnenuhr Riesling Kabinett (5 03) (Mosel-Saar-Ruwer) – Floral and perfumey? Is this actually muscat in disguise? It goes suspiciously well with the asparagus, and eyebrows are arched 'round the table, until finally Neutral's fall off and land in the sauce. He appears not to notice, and continues to happily gum his food.

JM Boillot 1999 Puligny-Montrachet La Garenne "1er Cru" (Burgundy) – There’s that slightly oxidative note common to many white Burgundies, plus full-bodied and spiced pear layered on a foundation of mushroomy soil, with hints of nutmeg on the finish. Full, complex and surprisingly enjoyable for chardonnay.

Your Bartender: Isaac, or Belgium?

Garofoli "Serra Fiorese" 1996 Verdicchio dei Castelli de Jesi Classico "Riserva" (Marches) – Lightly botrytized with soft, powdered chalk breezes. Interesting, though I'm not sure how typical it is.

I take a few moments to retrieve something from our upstairs room, sliding past Nether, who is sitting at the top of the caveau steps smoking a fragrant asparagus. The smell of well-oaked sauvignon blanc fills the Alsatian night air. As I come back down the stairs, there's another car pulling into the courtyard, and a cheery "Hi! Sorry we're late!" announces the (admittedly late) arrival of Minneapolis and St. Paul, in the midst of a whirlwind twelve-day trip on which they'll visit every major city of Europe seven separate times. "We've brought fish," exclaims Minneapolis, pulling several thick baguettes from his satchel. "And cheese!" adds St. Paul, holding a bag of morels aloft. Clearly, the wine is beginning to get to us all.

I, however, have work to do in the kitchen. The gigot, cooking while we noshed and sipped and wiped little bits of food from Neutral's wizened chin, has not yet been completely turned to charcoal, and so I turn up the heat for a few minutes before bringing it into the dining area. "I thought the lamb was far too tasty," I somewhat sheepishly explain, "so I turned it into a proper British roast. No mint sauce, though." Everyone seems excited at this opportunity to re-sole their soles (and Neutral his slippers), and we commence with the reds as I carve slabs from the gigôt with a freshly-sharpened chainsaw.

Cooperativa de Sanfins do Douro "D. Fernăo Sanches" 1991 Douro (Portugal) – Spiced red cherry, rosemary, and soil notes in an earthy and slightly faded, though still delicious, package.

Fourrier 1997 Gevrey-Chambertin Clos St-Jacques "1er Cru" "Vieille Vignes" (Burgundy) – Silky at first, then turning more gamay-like with strong lacings of volatile acidity. Eventually, it's a little like morels bathed in laundry detergent, though that's a particularly unpleasant descriptor for a wine that isn't all that bad. Its future prospects seem dim.

Sierra Cantabria 1994 Rioja "Gran Reserva" (Spain) – A milky coconut and chestnut soup served in a cedar bowl, smooth and balanced and thoroughly desirable, with much life ahead of it. Gorgeous wood. Uh, I mean wine. Did I type "wood?" My bad.

Uno's sleight-of-hand & the drooling masses

Nether takes a second hiatus from the festivities, and soon his silhouette is framed in the doorway as he puffs away on a cured trout plucked from a stream high in the Vosges.

St. Paul arrives with sliced and toasted fish (that still looks an awful lot like bread), onto which Minneapolis spoons the cheese (which looks suspiciously like creamed morels). There's only one thing to do at this point: argue about the most beautiful country on earth.

"New Zealand, definitely," asserts Philly. I concur.

"It was...okay. They've cut down all their trees," counters St. Paul.

Philly gapes, slack-jawed, turning more yokel by the moment. Kentucky retreats to the safety of a nearby space heater. "But...but...but..." she sputters. "So, where?"

"Mendocino."

"Mendocino?!?"

"Well..."

"Neutral, what do you think?"

Neutral lifts his wizened head. "I have no opinion." This, we'll find, is typical for Neutral; he rarely expresses, or even appears to have, an opinion on anything.

The satisfied smile of the sausage-stuffed

Having reached a sort of impasse, we tuck into our fish 'n' cheese, working through the last few reds.

Jullien "Mas Cal Demoura" 1998 Côteaux-du-Languedoc (Languedoc) – Like all the great reds of the world, nearly 100% carignan. All it lacks is petit verdot, and perhaps a bit of pineau d'anuis. Tough and rustic, with strawberry and plum fighting off acid on one side, tannin on another side, and alcohol on the third side; interesting, and there are some theoretically balanced raw materials here, but at the moment none of them want to be in the same room with each other. Will they come together? Will Gilligan ever really get off the island?

Vigneti Massa 1998 "bigolla" Colli Tortonesi (Piedmont) – Carrying a whopping 14.5% alcohol, but it doesn't bother us a bit, as this is corked. Inevitable, really.

Lafon 1997 Volnay Clos des Chęnes (Burgundy) – Huge black cherry and strawberry seed jam layered on a bed of pine needles. The core is intense and wrapped with slightly underripe tannin, and the finish is brisk and crisp, but it's a little odd.

Nether returns, brushing a bit of green vinyl ash from his shirt front; he's been smoking a ping-pong paddle at the top of the stairs. Hol shakes her head, disapproving. But soon, everyone is shaking their head, trying to shed the taste of:

Ridge 1991 Zinfandel Lytton Springs (Dry Creek Valley/Sonoma County) – From magnum, and purchased within the last year from Ridge's cellar. Huge and brutish in such genteel circumstances, showing blueberry, walnut, eggplant, and some lingering big tannin with a little wood smoke. It's fully mature, and actually quite tasty in its smoky/jammy/vegetal way, but it manages to frighten the locals.

Due secretly plates up more fat

Uno and Due have taken over the CD player, treating us to a series of albums by top European musicians – Monica Bellucci, Laetitia Casta, Carla Bruni, Fabio – but soon, Hol has torn these musically-adventurous selections from the player and replaced them with the 15-Grammy-winning American album Music to Snore By, recorded by the daughter of famed sitar artist Gary "Ravi" Glitter. Soon everyone – except, surprisingly and for the first time all night, Louisville – is sound asleep in their chairs. Louisville, however, rouses us with a hearty "yeee-haw" and rustles us towards the cheese table, where we partake of far too many Italian cheeses that are outdone in their taste only by the pungent aroma of a small gang of Munsters, glaring and brandishing their aromatic knives at an otherwise inoffensive gorgonzola. (The latter is a unique cheese, made from milk drawn only at seventeen minutes past the hour on the third Friday of the month by a raven-haired virgin transvestite wearing a "Free Abruzzi" shirt, or so Uno informs us.)

Back at the table, Nether has his feet up and smoking a breadstick (surprisingly long-lasting if one lights the larded end), while Belgium attempts to defend the existence of waterzooi to a dubious Kentucky. The rest of us begin to partake of a series of sweet wines. Minneapolis, however, feels that we've abandoned the great tradition of WLDG offlines – talking about other WLDGers – and so we immediately seize on the most obvious target, someone conspicuous by his absence (and he promised, too), Benicia Corkstein.

Philly recounts an amusing sexual adventure tale whereby Benicia and a famous Grecian feta dealer's sister got amorous, which prompts Minneapolis to assert that "Benicia's taste in women is like Parker's taste in wine." We all take a few moments to ponder this, unsure as to its meaning. Gobs? Extended extraction? Lots of wood? Nether lets fly a hearty chuckle. As does Hol. Which causes Nether to squint suspiciously at Hol; "Is there something you're not telling me?" Hol takes a lusty swallow of her Ridge, and says nothing.

Neutral raises his face from the table. "Uh...is Benicia some sort of...uh...Casanova?"

Eleven mouths spit their extra-virgin gorgonzola across the room. (They all land on a large canvas sheet, which we later sell to the Pompidou Center for €13,000 and a lifetime supply of Apéro-Flips.)

Nether in a kitchen built for little people

Primitivo "El Abuelo" Quiles Oloroso "Rancio Viejisimo" (Monóvar) – (There should be a double-accent over the second "o" in "Monóvar.") Chewy, rotting cherries and Brazil nuts; odd, and I find myself in complete misunderstanding of this wine. Much hmmmm-ing ensues, but there's little to enlighten me.

Felsina "Berardenga" 1990 "Fontalloro" (Tuscany) – Very short and dark, with good acidity but no finish whatsoever.

Jos. Christoffel-Prüm (S.A. Prüm-Erben) 1976 Wehlener Sonnenuhr Riesling Beerenauslese (8 77) (Mosel-Saar-Ruwer) – This wine sparks a lusty debate between Nether and Neutral, who as usual has no opinion and thus proves difficult to argue with, as to the actual identity of the producer. The Trombley number – 2602 44 8 77 – is no help, and we're forced to muddle through by ourselves. Shy and elegant, lightly sweet cinnamon-scented apple, and fading away into a touching night's slumber.

Léon Beyer 1989 Gewurztraminer "Sélection des Grains Nobles" (Alsace) – Waves of spiced celery salt. Really, this is botrytized celery with a nasty finish, which one would expect botrytized celery to have. A bottle tasted at the domaine three days previous was nothing like this; talk about bottle variation!

Louisville reaches deep into his saddle bag, eyeing us all with an evil glint. We'd shudder in fear, except that we're all three jibs to the mainsail.

Perlé de Mirabelle "Cuvée Réservée" (France) – Plum-scented candle wax. Mirabelle makes great eau de vie, good liqueur, lovely desserts, and lousy sparkling wines.

Piero Costantini "Villa Simone" 1998 Frascati Cannellino (Latium) – Uno assures us that this sweet Frascati is both traditional and exceedingly rare. Perhaps some things happen for a reason. There's absolutely no nose whatsoever. On the palate, banana and canned pineapple, with some thin and lingering apples of the wan variety. Eh.

"Hey, barkeep, we're dry here…"

József Monyók Tokaji Aszú Eszencia Király Dúló (Hungary) – (There should be double-accents over the "u" and "o" in "Dúló.")As ever, I live in fear that the censorious ghost of Michael Pronay will smite me for a single frickin' spelling error. Oh well, as ever one must live on the edge. Paint and hugely acidic coffee beans, followed by varnished plums and a long, concentrated dusty raisin finish. Simultaneously excellent and painful to drink. I must turn in my wine geek card and say that while I find Tokaji interesting, I have yet to find one that has really moved me.

István Szepsy 1993 Tokaji Aszúessencia Mádi-Király Szólészet (Hungary) – (There should be a double-accent over the "o" in "Szólészet.")Sultanas and crushed flies with very, very high acidity. This is a little disappointing, but my lingering lack of understanding is getting in the way. Also, it's something like 3 AM at this point, I'm gorged to the point of eruption, and Louisville is snoring in four-part harmony. I approach Neutral for help with these wines, but he's soundly asleep on his Craftmatic adjustable bed.

The desserts arrive: a blueberry tart from Kaysersberg, the myrtilles picked by gnomes frolicking in the vales of the rivers descending from Lapoutroie. Little coffee cups-o'-goodness courtesy of Kentucky; she has firmly decided on chocolate. Except for the ones that are actually coffee. And thirty-kilo amaretti doorstops made by itinerant yak herders in the hidden mountains of Calabria, courtesy of Uno, or Due, or possibly both, or neither, of them. Who can tell, at this point? Due attempts to add some scoops of iced bacon fat to the dessert options, but we decline with a heartfelt "mbgh."

Louisville finally nips off to bed, snoring with each right foot's step, yawning with each left foot's step. The rest of us clean like scouring banshees, scrubbing and bubbling and nipping at the remains of a surprisingly small number of leftovers. What are we, pigs? Yes, we proudly assert, we are! Oink oink.

Hol's solo rendition of "99 botttles of beer on the wall…" (we listen politely)

Soon Nether and Hol are off to destinations nearby, whacking their heads on low-hanging constellations and dangling asparagus pots from their belt buckles. Nether puffs away on the smoking remains of the gigot's leg bone, laughing heartily and lecturing Hol on the benefits and drawbacks of pre-phylloxera asparagus. Belgium and the Twin Cities are next, ascending into an Hunawihrian morning arguing in a most affable and genial way about something totally inconsequential, but that Minneapolis finds "a heck of a deal." Uno and Due pack up their cheese, their salty animals, their various and sundry fats and lards, and prepare for their arduous two-minute drive to Zellenberg.

And at this point, Neutral awakes. It's before dawn, and as a senior citizen it is now his breakfast time, his wakey-time, his time to catch Lawrence Welk reruns and regale me with tales of his years as a championship eyebrow trimmer. I don't have the heart to tell him that his are now missing. He bends my ear as I clean, finally breaking it right off. It's a frustrating conversation, however, because he just won't take a stand on anything, despite my best attempt to goad him into one controversy or another. Finally, I throw my hands up in frustration, but they get caught in the ceiling beams. And thus, hands-free and missing an ear, I drag Neutral to his car, and trudge off to bed.

It's 5 AM, and the bells of the St. Hune are chiming once more. I nudge some crumpled wads of pork fat into my ears and fall soundly to sleep.

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