The wine at lunch was a 1929 Château Mouton Rothschild, poured at Harry’s Bar in Mayfair, and the first thing anyone thinks with a bottle that old is that it may already have given up. A wine from 1929 has lived through the Depression, the Second World War and the best part of a century in cellars and auction rooms. When it was made, Mouton wasn’t even officially a First Growth, a promotion that only came in 1973. It’s a little nerve-racking to sit in front of a glass like that, wondering whether the star will be too out of condition to sing.
This one was very much alive. Wild strawberries, cooked down almost to a compote, sat over a background of mocha, and the acidity was still fresh an hour after it had been poured. It came with a t-bone of Limousin veal, porcini and roasted artichokes, the kind of plain, careful cooking an old wine needs, because it leaves the wine the whole stage.
The lunch had been arranged by Amir Gehl of Difference Coffee Co., and for our host, the point of it was what came afterwards. His argument was that if a restaurant pours wine of this calibre, it seems a shame to end the meal with a cup of muddy dishwater. So after the veal came what he called the first growths of coffee: a Jamaica Blue Mountain, a Hawaiian Kona and a wild Kopi Luwak.
Kopi Luwak comes with a story that makes people either lean in or push their cup away. The coffee cherries are eaten by the civet, a small cat-like mammal of South-East Asia, and the beans are collected once they’ve passed through it, partly fermented on the way. It is famously expensive and also controversial, since demand has led to civets being kept in cages, which is why the word “wild” on the label matters.
Tasted side by side, the three coffees reminded me of the 1929 more than I expected. They had the same clarity and a kind of sobering precision, with a finish so clean it left the mouth lifted instead of coated, and the Kona in particular had a sweetness that sent me back to the strawberries in the Mouton.
There’s a greeting-card line that says life is what happens in the hours between coffee and wine. That lunch ran them backwards, with an old Bordeaux first and the coffee to finish, and I’ve thought ever since that the two have more in common than their admirers like to admit. Each is a crop shaped by place and weather, and each only shows what it is when someone takes the trouble to pour it properly.
What we ate and drank
- Panama Geisha coffee “tea”, with NV Billecart-Salmon Brut Sous Bois
- Seared bluefin tuna with Sicilian orange dressing, with 2002 Kistler Vineyards Chardonnay, Sonoma Valley, and 2012 Rotem & Mounir Saouma Châteauneuf-du-Pape Magis Blanc
- Pumpkin ravioli from Cremona with butter and sage, with 2011 Castello di Vicarello and 2012 Stellenrust Quota Cuvée
- T-bone of Limousin veal with porcini and Albenga artichokes, with 1929 Château Mouton Rothschild
- Tiramisu and desserts, with Hawaii Kona from Buddha’s Cup Estate, Jamaica Blue Mountain from Gold Cup Estate and Wild Kopi Luwak Grand Reserve
Archive note: First published in October 2016, after lunch at Harry’s Bar, London, on 6 October 2016. With thanks to Amir Gehl, Douglas Blyde and Neal Martin.
