Drink - Victoria Moore books in for the night
"Ah yes, a good Sunday lunch wine," Anton Edelmann, the Savoy's head chef says to the wine merchant, who nods and smiles. "But do you think there is too much oak in it for modern tastes?"
Jeremy roars with laughter and then has the decency to be honest. "You can't put wine prices up in the New World like you can with white Burgundy. That means you can't afford to keep stock in storage for years on end, so it's sold young. And this wine is actually a touch too young for the quantity of oak."
In the bowels of the Savoy, it is hot (only the front-of-house rooms are air- conditioned to withstand midsummer heat) and it is noisy (the windows are open to building work outside). Commanding a view across the vast kitchens is Edelmann's office, and in it, beside the shelves of cookery books on which Charlie Trotter and Nigella Lawson both have a place, we are seated at a table laid out for lunch.
I am here to spy on the preparations for a dinner to showcase Robert Mondavi's Californian wines. The wines have been chosen, and our task is to eat through the options that Edelmann has devised for a five-course meal and to decide on a final menu. It's a trial, but we'll get through it somehow.
The first course, to go with Mondavi's Fume Blanc 1998, is asparagus wrapped in salmon smoked to the Savoy's particular specifications, and tuna tartare with cucumber. The tuna is an easy winner: Edelmann admits he hadn't tasted the wines before now and had expected the wine to be slightly crisper, which would have suited the asparagus better. In fact, the astringency of the Sauvignon Blanc is softened by 11 per cent Semillon and a touch of Viognier and Sauvignon Musque.
"What do you think, Jeremy?" Chef asks. "Could the wine take any more spice in the food? A little more chilli in the guacamole?" As he speaks, he winks across the table at me and shakes his head. "No," says Jeremy, after some thought, and passes the test.
Next up is the 1997 Chardonnay, redolent of toasty oak - an unfashionable wine at the moment, as Chef points out, but in truth it's very good. And on paper at least, its creamyness and vibrant fruit are an obvious match with the seared scallops cooked with applewood bacon. They do taste good together, but Edelmann's sea bream on chickpea cake with white corn coulis is even better. "Oh yes," says Jeremy, who before tasting the two together had expressed concerns that the creamy sauce would be too sweet.
But there is barely time to savour it before the next wine is poured: Byron 1998 Pinot Noir, to which I immediately become very attached. "A good Sunday lunch wine," says Chef happily, as he sips. We point out that he seems very keen on Sunday lunch wines. "Yes. It's the one time of the week I get to drink."
Jeremy tells us that, whenever he goes on a wine-buying trip, he carries a bag of apples in his car and always eats one to clean his palate before sampling. "Cheese, if you're selling wines, because it dulls the palate; apples for buying, because then you taste the faults."
"Surely not Coxes, though," says Chef. "Granny Smiths?" Jeremy nods. "With skin or without?"
"With," says Jeremy. Chef turns smoothly round and asks for a dish of Granny Smiths, cored, sliced, with skin on, to be brought to the table, the better to taste Jeremy's wines.
The wine is still very good, as is the bourbon- and maple-glazed duck we decide it should be drunk with. The final dry wine is quite special: Mondavi's 1997 Cabernet Sauvignon Reserve - very concentrated and rich with black fruit, but also "too young", as the Savoy's sommelier whispers when he is conjured to the table to taste it. He adds that it is superb.
We drink it slowly, so there is barely time to appreciate how beautifully the Quady Essencia Orange Muscat (delicious) meshes with Edelmann's burnt orange ice cream, itself so smooth and gentle it almost demands to be eaten lying down. To be honest, I've eaten and drunk so much that I need to lie down anyway. How much for a room at the Savoy?
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