French Wine Week - Day 5 - Saint-émilion!
This post is part a series celebrating Fleming's Orlando upcoming French Wine Dinner with guest Raffaele Benassi - European Wine Expert- August 5th. Call (407) 352-5706 for reservations, or message me directly with any questions.
Fourth Course - Filet Mignon Bordelaise - filet mignon, with classic bordelaise sauce featuring flavors of shallots, red wine, thyme and rosemary served with asparagus
For our fourth and main course we're featuring a French Classic - Filet Mignon Bordelaise. Bordelaise sauce traditionally is made using Bordeaux wine, shallots, bone marrow and various herbs. After some testing we decided to use butter instead of bone marrow, and thyme and toasted rosemary for the herbs.
For the wine - well that was an easy one. We of course needed something from Bordeaux while having something that could pair well with the richness of the sauce and the red meat. We wanted something that had some age to it that could show the benefit of allowing a nice Bordeaux to age to it's potential. From this, we decided on the 2005 Chateau Simard Saint-émilion.
Chateau Simard Saint-émilion, 2005
70% Merlot
30% Cabernet Franc
Wine Making:
Soil: Clay with sand and gravel.
Both varietals go through malolactic fermentation with no exposure to oak. The wine is bottle aged and only released for purchase in 2012.
The vineyard observes "lutte raisonnée" which literally translates to "reasoned fight" or "supervised control". This means the vineyard refrains from using any chemicals unless absolutely necessary - rare in today's wine making world.
2005 was an interesting year in Bordeaux. Borderline drought conditions where the region got just enough rain at just the right time resulted in an incredible vintage. With warm days and cool nights, with just enough rain - the winemakers had perfect opportunity to time their harvest so that the fruit achieved phenolic ripeness (which means that not only the sugar in the fruit had developed, but also the tannins in the grape skins, seeds and stems were able to hit their peak).
Nose/Palate:
With 2005 being an exceptional "reference point" year for Bordeaux, the wine stands with fantastic concentration, balanced tannins and acidity, and the dark juicy ripe fruit that the Merlot brings to the table. This is a wine that will make any meal extraordinary, and will leave you wanting more.
This post is part a series celebrating Fleming's Orlando upcoming French Wine Dinner with guest Raffaele Benassi - European Wine Expert- August 5th. Call (407) 352-5706 for reservations, or message me directly with any questions.