Some musings on 50 years of air travel

Flying back from Genoa the other day, I mused over the quarter bottle of Spanish wine offered to me by British Airways. It wasn't a bad wine at all - I noticed that it had been sourced for BA by Bibendum, an independent wine merchant. Not that I have any problem with Bibendum, I have always admired them for the quality of wines that they handle and I am sure that BA have made a good choice here. It seems (perhaps someone can correct me if I am wrong) that they now have a monopoly on supplying wine for BA.

It's a far cry from the days when BA employed Masters of Wine to make the selections for them and it caused me to muse further on how cabin service has developed over the years that I have been flying.

My first flight recollection was as a teenager, I flew on holiday to Copenhagen. Sitting next to the wing I noticed flames coming out of the turbo prop engine, but I was comforted by a nice hot meal on the flight. Right up until the nineties, I think, airlines prided themselves on getting a famous chef to devise meals on long haul flights - even in Economy. Wine flowed and the meal was always rounded off by the offering of liqueurs or Port to make these flights you could really enjoy instead of the platitude you get from the Purser stating that "we hope you enjoyed your fight with us" nowadays.

Also now, I have had some pretty disgusting food on a plane - seemingly grudgingly given out on long haul flights, usually a choice of chicken or beef (pasta if you are a vegetarian) all of which horribly overcooked. With some airlines you get a glass of wine and some not, all in all it sometimes seems that the cabin crew are doing you a favour! Some airlines are better than others, of course, and on balance I suppose British Airways is still my favourite airline. Certainly, their loyalty programme is one of the best around.

In the sixties, seventies and eighties, I had the occasion to fly from London to Inverness a couple of times each year. When I first flew, we always had a splendid cooked breakfast on the morning flight up - then it was changed to a cold breakfast and then, nothing at all! Another great flying recollection was flying my car from Lydd to Le Touquet for the princely sum of £21 return and getting some food and drink on the flight as well!

The advent of the budget airlines really started to change the scene. Long haul budget airlines soon found out that they could be undercut by large commercial and State owned airlines and Laker and the all business budget airline, Maxjet didn't take long to finish up in money heaven. A pity - I flew both, and I thought they gave good value for money at the time. On the short haul side, Ryanair came in with a bang and I used them a lot at the beginning of the century, because they really were so much cheaper and you could put up with the discomfort, as the flights rarely lasted more than 2 hours. But of course, Ryanair found out that in order to survive they had to make lots and lots of hidden add-ons, which brought the price up to unacceptable levels for the comfort and experience provided, especially at check in. I haven't used Ryanair for three or four years now, as the price difference doesn't warrant the excruciating discomfort one has had to suffer.

So where does air travel take us now? Well, the big airlines have cut their margins to the bone, it seems. On my recent flight to Genoa, I noticed that the basic fare was £46, but taxes, fuel supplements etc., brought this up to £118. The big winners here have been the various governments imposing these stealth taxes and they will have no compunction in raising them so that in order to keep prices reasonable, the airlines may have to cut their margins even further. This will probably mean less food and drink on the plane (unless you pay for the poor value fare you will get in this respect), or some airlines will inevitably go out of business.

Every Prospect Pleases

A great blog by Robert Joseph on another load of Single Issue Fanatics on "factory" wine etc. Check it out on http://thejosephreport.blogspot.co.uk/2012/12/big-can-be-beautiful-too-and-small-can.html

These people's missionary zeal seems to have no bounds and I have taken the liberty to compose a suitable hymn for them which also encompasses the "natural" fanatics credo (with apologies to Reginald Heber).



From Mendoza's icy mountains to Queensland's coral strand
Where Afric's sunny fountains roll down their golden sand
From many an ancient vineyard, from many a Riverland plain
They call us to deliver their land from error's chain

What though the sulphur breezes blow hard o'er NZ's isle
And every prospect pleases and only big is vile?
In vain with lavish kindness the gifts of God do come
The heathen in his blindness bows down to chips and gum

Shall we, whose souls are lighted with wisdom from on high
Shall we to those benighted the natural wine deny
Salvation! O Salvation! The joyful sound proclaim
Till earth's biggest conglomerates has learned Messiah's name

Waft waft, ye winds, our story and you, ye waters roll
Till like a sea of glory, it spreads from pole to pole
Till o'er our ransomed nature the yeast for sinners slain
Peasant, plough, handmaker, in bliss returns to reign.

You can find the original text on http://www.scriptureandmusic.com/Music/Text_Files/From_Greenlands_Icy_Mountains.html

Happy new year everyone - let this be a year of peace and tranquility all over the world and let everyone be left alone to do their own thing without interference from anybody else.
 

Miami Airport - Avoid!

Some years ago, we bought a week's timeshare in a South African resort for the magnificent sum of $376. I won't say where it is, but we did visit it and whilst it was pretty downmarket and somewhat seedy, it has given us the opportunity to exchange our week with some more upmarket places. We've been to India, Zimbabwe and Mexico and this time, we obtained a week in Aruba, a Dutch colony island in the Caribbean.

Getting there, however, was hardly fun. The cheapest way to fly was with American Airlines via Miami. The problem with connecting flights in the US is the time needed to go through the rigmarole of immigration even if you are not staying in that country. On top of that, your bags are not checked through to your final destination, so you have to pick them up, go through customs and re-check them in again,

Originally there was a two hour time gap between the landing time in Miami and the take off time to Aruba, but this was cut by 20 minutes when they re-scheduled the flight to Aruba. In theory, this should have still given us enough time to clear all the immigration hurdles. However, the plane arrived an hour late and despite having priority through immigration, due to Sonia requiring a wheelchair as she had recently had an operation on both her knees, it was to no avail. We missed our connection.

So we were traipsed off to the American Airlines re-connection desks (and there were many) to get another reservation. Of course, there were no more flights to Aruba until the next day, so that meant one day less in Aruba. After quite a long time, we finally got re-booked but were told that we couldn't get a boarding pass until the next day. "Come two hours before the flight for this" we were told. All this without turning a hair - there were about 100 people waiting to be re-booked - this is obviously a frequent occurrence so it is why they have a special ticketing department to do this. I asked if they would put us up at a hotel. "Of course,"  they said, "and we will give you vouchers for dinner and breakfast". "That's mighty civilised of them" I thought, but the vouchers were for $12 each for dinner and $7 each for breakfast.   Hardly enough for an appetizer at the hotel restaurant, so we used out breakfast voucher to defray the cost of the dinner, thinking that we might snatch a bit of grub on the plane. Some hopes!

Well, at least, we had a free hotel room. All re-booked people were put up at the Miami International Airport Hotel and the room allocated to us was a tiny claustrophobic room with no windows! We were told that "that's all American Airlines would pay for". I think this hotel must have been built as a kind of purgatory location for re-bookers before deciding whether they are going to paradise or not! Well, the hotel front desk took pity on Sonia's knees and upgraded us to a bigger room.

In fairness to the hotel, we slept in a very comfortable bed with a good bathroom and the staff were very helpful. But it's quite clear that American Airlines are still in a state of poor financial health.

We decided to check in three hours before the flight and luckily we did. There was such chaos at the check in but we did manage to get checked in although it took the best part of an hour.

So the verdict on Miami airport is Avoid. That is unless you plan to make an overnight stop there because it's too risky fly onwards with a tight schedule. We could have gone to Aruba with KLM via Amsterdam, but it was more expensive. However, by the time we added up our extra costs on this trip we might just as well have gone with them.

We are not looking forward to our return flight!

Anyway, I am writing this on the beach in Aruba now and will write again with my impressions of Aruba in the next few days.

Restaurant Crissier

It’s about 20 years since I last visited the little village of Crissier, just outside Lausanne, particularly to eat at Giradet, then considered to be the best restaurant in the world. I had been there a couple of times before and was amazed – not only for the finesse of the cuisine, but also for Frédy Giradet’s amazing generosity as to what appeared on his plates. To boot – it really wasn’t THAT expensive (at least not for what you got); in fact we did work out once that it was cheaper to fly to Geneva, train and bus to Crissier, stay in a local hotel garni, and eat sumptuously at Giradet for less than a weekend in a posh country house hotel in the UK! The wonderful assistance we received from Giradet’s English head waiter, John Davey, was an added bonus.

Frédy retired in 1996 to be succeeded by his second, Philippe Rochat, who now, in turn, has been succeeded by HIS second, Benoît Violier. Unfortunately, I never got to taste the cuisine of Philippe Rochat, but a visit last week to a friend living in Vevey, about 20km. away, gave me the chance to renew my acquaintance with that restaurant. In a way of history repeating itself, Benoît has just been acclaimed as Cuisinier de l’année, by the Gault Milau restaurant guide, as Giradet was just before the occasion of my first visit.

After taking over the restaurant earlier this year, Benoît went immediately about re-designing his kitchen and restaurant and they re-opened after 5 weeks of work this  autumn. The restaurant itself consists of two spacious rooms, with naturally well-spaced tables, beautifully decorated in white setting off the works of art hanging on the beige background walls.

The real work of art, though, was in the cuisine and here we were not disappointed.

As is usual on the continent of Europe, there is a selection of prix fixe menus, ranging from SFR 185 for a “quick lunch” to SFR 390 for a 10 course blow out, but due to advancing age, I’m not sure if I could take that any more! My two companions, several decades younger than me, concurred anyway, so we decided to go à la carte. What swung that decision in a way, was the extraordinary array of game dishes on the menu. It turns out that Benoît is a game fanatic and is never more at home than when cooking game.

The choice on the carte was fantastic – Teal, Snipe, Woodcock, Ptarmigan, Wood Pigeon, Venison, Chamois and Hare, left me drooling and after much humming and ha-ing, I went for the pan fried Alpine Chamois chops with a pepper sauce. I persuaded my young friend to be bold and go for his first taste of woodcock and here it was roasted with a game sauce and accompanied with a giblet tartine. His wife, perhaps a little less adventurous, went for the pièce of grilled Limousin beef with a grey shallot confit.

Our pre-starter was a velouté of caviar and crispy chopped vegetables – a really good palate awakener. A fine selection of home-made breads, spankingly fresh, also got us off to a good start. My starter was an incredible dish – oeufs en surprise à l’italienne aux truffes blanches d’Alba façon Philippe Rochat – a tribute to Benoît's predecessor. This consisted of two lightly boiled egg yolks covered with concentric rings of spaghetti, looking somewhat like Brünehilde’s breast plates (although considerably smaller, of course) in a jus made from the egg whites studded with 15 generous shavings of white truffle. The delicate consistency of the dish made it truly outstanding.  Jean-Daniel’s croustillants de foie gras de canard du Périgord Noir aux cerises séchées, was intensely flavoured and surprisingly crusty on the outside with softness on the inside – no mean feat as I have seen this kind of dish messed up in other places a number of times. His wife, Roxane, chose Cône de champignons Sylvestres du pays de Vaud aux truffes blanches du Piemont, sacristains au cumin – a cone of local wild mushrooms, again garnished with white truffle shavings and little cumin sticks, rich, but light at the same time.

Oeufs en surprise ȧ l'italienne aux truffes blanches  d'Alba façon Philippe Rochat

Cône de champignons Sylvestres du pays de Vaud aux truffes blanches, sacristains au cumin

On to the main courses. My Chamois was utterly delicious – perfectly cooked à point, and perfectly accompanied with the pepper sauce enhancing the slight gaminess of the meat. The only criticism here was that it really wasn’t warm enough for my taste, but this could have been because it might have stayed too long at the passe, or also because the policy of the restaurant is to send the dish out from the kitchen without sauces which are then poured on to the plate afterwards by the waiting staff. That’s a bit of a double edged sword – on the one hand it’s a good idea because the sauce isn’t left evaporating on a hot plate in the kitchen before it is sent into the dining room, but on the other hand, if there is a delay in putting the sauce on the dish, there is a risk of it getting too cold.

The woodcock was incredible. Split down the centre lengthwise, you had a perfect mirror effect on the plate. And of course, this made the eating of it that much easier, particularly in getting into the brain. With a whole bird, to get to this delicacy, you had to bite into the head and suck out the brain, but here you were supplied with the tiniest of spoons, so that you could scoop the brain easily out of the cranium which had been perfectly split in half.  The breast was again, perfectly cooked à point and the deeply flavoured, gamey sauce was also light and delicate. I must say that I was very grateful to Jean-Daniel for letting me have a taste and so pleased that he found it so delicious as a game-eating novice.

The piéce de boeuf was based on a classic Troisgros invention of simplicity and accuracy of cooking although I felt the texture of the beef to be a little tougher than I expected.

Bécasse des bois en salmis, tartine d'abattis "grand siècle"

Pièce de boeuf du Limousin grillé aux èchalotes grises confites

All this was washed down with a bottle of Gamaret 2009 from Nicolas Bonnet, one of the top producers in the Geneva appellation. Gamaret is a hybrid grape produced by crossing Gamay with Reichensteiner and is especially found in French Switzerland. This example had more spicy depth than pure Gamay, quite full in the mouth and an excellent accompaniment to the game as well as the beef.

Desserts were a highlight, both pleasing to the eye as well as the palate. Roxane’s Guyaquil chocolate and coffee fondant was a dense piece of semi-melted chocolate wrapped around an equally dense coffee ice cream and Jean-Daniel’s meringues givrées au citron, orange et pamplemousse was an extraordinary concoction of little meringue balls hollowed out with frozen lemon, grapefruit and orange sorbet within – a simple effect, but oh so complex to produce – a masterpiece which tasted so refreshing and refined. My Baba aux vieux Rhum de Guadeloupe, crème double de la Gruyère à la vanilla de Bourbon, was a lovely light baba soaked in alcohol, but I found the accompaniment of the cream cheese a little on the heavy side and lacking a bit of unctuousness. I drank a glass of Amigne de Vétroz 2009 from Madelaine Gay, a pretty unique varietal found only in the Vétroz area of the Valais. This wine is produced either dry, medium or sweet. Of course I had the sweet version with my dessert, but it didn’t really have enough sweetness to compliment the dessert, which was a pity, but as such afterwards it was a very pleasant digéstif.

Meringues givrées au citron, orange et pamplemousse

To sum up – this is one of the finest restaurants that I have ever been to. The cuisine is accurate, punctilious, and above all, non-fussy. What I mean by this is that it is wysiwyg. (What you see is what you get). Everything on the plate, apart being beautifully presented, is edible and there are no too clever by half inventions or adventures into strange combinations that may or may not work. That’s very comforting. This is really Haute Cuisine with a capital “H”, a fine continuation to the guidelines laid down by Frédy Giradet 40 years ago, a continuation of perfecting traditional standards with modern aplomb.

Benoît and Brigitte Violier

Of course, this doesn’t come cheap. Our meal for three came to SFR 752 – about £500 or $800, but to sustain this level of quality, a large brigade of chefs are required in the kitchen and we also shouldn’t forget the front of house staff as well. In fact, service was pretty night impeccable – attention to detail without being either overbearing or obsequious was an important contribution to the overall satisfaction of the evening. And the sommelier gave us a great call with the Gamaret.

A busy kitchen!

I’m saving NOW to be able to come back next year!

Restaurant de l’Hôtel de Ville

1, rue d’Yverdon

CH-1023 CRISSIER

SWITZERLAND

Tel: +41 (0)21 634 0505

Email: contact@restaurantcrissier.com

Food:                             49

Wine:                            18

Service:                           9

Ambience:                      5

Value for money:         13

Total:                             94

Gentlemen vs. Players

Last week a bit of a furore arose in the Twttershpere over a blog by a young man called James Isherwood on visituing Claude Bosi's Hibiscus restaurant in London. The review didn't make the greatest reading in the world, but it did severely criticise one dish and the service. Part of the game, one would have thought but Claude's reaction was, so to speak, a little OTT, particularly as he thought that having asked James if he had enjoyed his meal whilst going through the restaurant (as chefs do), James replied in the affirmative. Having then read his review, Claude tweeted as follows

Nice way to gain respect with chefs...!! I think your a Cunt and this its personal sorry...!! [sic]

and

As a man you should say something to my face when I ask,Please buy yourself a pair of balls and play with them

Now I know that running a Michelin starred restaurant is a very fraught occupation - but this?

It isn't only amateur bloggers who make "mistakes". When I had a restaurant (many years ago) a then leading critic, Jonathan Meades, mumbled "OK" when asked if everything was all right, but still proceded to give a lousy review, compounded by the fact that he wrote that the lamb dish he ate contained curry, which it never did. To me this showed the level of his taste buds to be completely fraudulent, but he did write well. We did conplain to "The Times" and did get a one line apology from them the following week, although it was not on the restaurant review page so probably nobody saw it anyway. To Claude I would say that it isn't easy for someone to criticise a meal to the chef's face, but you do have to realise that you are always going to get criticisms, whether they are fair or not. I'm sure that James's blog will not stop people coming to your restaurant. To James, I would say, don't let this incident stop you blogging. Your reviews will get better and better and don't be afraid to tell the chef face to face if asked whether you enjoyed your meal (or not) if you were not happy. He (or she) will probably call you a c**t there and then but at least it won't be all over the bloggersphere unless, of course, you decided to include that comment in your review!

A Merlot to savour from Roberto Voerzio

 Roberto Voerzio is rightly famous for his magnificent Barolos – some of the most sought after in the world of wine for the sheer concentration of flavours that he produces from his heavily pruned vines. The average yield per plant is around 500grams of fruit whilst his neighbour’s vines could be yielding at least six times that. Over the years he has learned how not to over extract his wines which can now be considered some of the most balanced of efforts – provided, of course, you resist the temptation to drink them too young. With already a legal limit of four years before Barolos can be sold anyway, it’s still but a small start toward optimum drinkability.

But this blog isn’t about his Barolos. Since 2001 he has been producing around 350 cases a year of an extraordinary Merlot from the Fontanezza and Pissotta vineyards in La Morra. I have been in the fortunate position of having drunk this wine from three of the vintages he has produced and yesterday I finished my third of the 6 precious bottles I had acquired of his 2005 wine. Of course, there is no legal time limit for the selling of this wine, but the Merlot, after having been fermented in stainless steel, and then spending 15 months in 30% new and 70% used barriques, spent a further 5 months in stainless steel tanks again and 24 months in bottle before he released the wine for sale. That’s almost four years in my book! He husbands the vines in pretty much the same way as he does for his Nebbiolos and Barberas – no chemical fertilizers, weed killers or fungicides are used which can interfere with the vegetation cycle of the vines or the ripening of the grapes. His absolute USP is his customary thinning out of around 50% of the grapes in mid-July with a further thinning out taking place in mid-August where the size of each cluster is reduced by cutting off the bottom section and leaving just the more concentrated upper sections on the vine. Indeed, I have visited his vineyard in September where there seemed to have been more grapes on the ground than on the vine!

Such attention to detail can only be achieved by costly effort and of course does merit a price which is somewhat similar to the price of his Barolos. However its quality can only be measured perhaps against some of the best examples from Bordeaux’s right bank. Certainly, in my book, at around the same price as Clos Fourtet or Ch. Larcis Ducasse for that vintage, it can definitely hold its own for price/quality ratio. It’s certainly up with the likes of Vieux Château Certain or Troplong Mondot where you will pay up to 20% more. As stated above, there’s not much of it although one UK merchant is offering the 2007 vintage at £80 a bottle in Bond, but the 2005 should be more expensive – if you can find it.

Tasting notes? I don’t wasn’t to bore you with comparisons with every other fruit except grapes, but three hours after I finished the last drop in the bottle I can still feel the wine tingling the back of my palate – now that’s what I call some length on the finish!

You can read more about Roberto Voerzio on page 273 of Wine Behind The Label.

Genoa - the fourth "M"

GENOA – THE FOURTH “M”

There seems to be something with me and restaurants in Genoa beginning with “M”. Having fallen in love with Mario, Mua and Il Marin – all well worth a visit for entirely different reasons – I have now discovered a fourth baby – Migone. Well, actually, the restaurant is called SanMatteo, but the usp here is that it is attached to a wine shop called Migone under common ownership.

So what’s the big deal?

Well, you can choose your wine from the shop and you will just pay a small corkage charge over the retail price for your wine. This works out at between €4 and €6 for a modestly priced wine to €8 to €10 for a grand vin where they will need to decant and give you huge glasses etc.

Now this alerts to various possibilities. With my first two choices on their restaurant wine list being out of stock, I was invited to go into the shop and choose my wine. Bearing in mind what I had ordered, I felt that something with a bit of body was needed – not a real Dolly Parton, but something, say, a little chunky and which would not break the bank. The owner helped me in my choice by suggesting a bottle of “Rigoleto” 2010 from the excellent Colle Masari estate in the Montecucco DOC which abuts the Brunello DOGC area. It’s organically produced to boot, for whom these things matter, a blend of 70% Sangiovese, 15% Ciliegiolo and 15% Montepulciano and aged for 10 months 50% in stainless steel and 50% in barrique and tonneaux of second and third wine. It was a pleasant drink with fruity spiciness on the palate but for me it was really far too young to really appreciate, but at €13.50 in the restaurant (€8.80 retail) I couldn’t really complain.

It did somewhat overpower the mezzelune ai porcini (half moon shaped stuffed pasta with wild mushrooms) but fared better with the tagliata di vitellone (grilled and sliced pieces of contrafillet or entrecote of young bullock) and better still with the selection of strong cheeses with which I finished the meal, although of course, by then it had plenty of time to oxidise and soften up. The quality of the cuisine was perfectly sound – plain and specialising in Genovese cuisine – there’s certainly no attempt to gain Michelin stars here but is more geared to fitting in with the range of wine choices from the 1,400 different labels in the shop. A three course meal here will set you back about €35 and the wine choices are of course, endless.

I’m looking forward to coming back. It may not be for a little while yet because I am saving up for a €100 bottle which I can drink in then restaurant for €110. I’ll keep you posted.

Ristorante SanMatteo/Enoteca Migone

Piazza San Matteo 4/r, Genova

Tel: 010 247 3282

Open Monday to Saturday for lunch and dinner, but also on Sundays during the month of December