#sommelierproblems: The Most Intense Sensory Experience of my Life

The most intense sensory experience of my life came to me, unexpectedly, on the night of April 20^th of this year at the Crabtree Kittle House in Chappaqua, NY. We’d sat down to an 8:00 dinner reservation and at 8:02 ordered a bottle of the 2001 Coche-Dury Meursault. To the discontent of my girlfriend, I’d spent the past two hours in the room pouring over the textbook-like wine list so that when we sat down to dinner--I knew what to order, exactly what to order.

For those of you unfamiliar, the Kittle House is a quaint little inn in Chappaqua NY with okay food, top-notch service, and the best wine list in the country. I should say that the occasion of our visit was to celebrate my 24^th birthday—something that I’d forgotten almost completely by the time the Coche-Dury arrived. You see, my girlfriend was there to celebrate me. But I was there to celebrate Coche.

Coche-Dury is the greatest white winemaker in the world and I’ve become a slave to the liquid. In fact it was a Coche-Dury Bourgogne Blanc, drank 6 months earlier that changed the way I look at white wine. Needless to say, the wines are surreal.

The 2001 Coche-Dury Meursault was poured and it was young. Exceptionally young. And beautiful. But tight. I asked for it to be decanted and set aside to open up, to breathe. I ordered an IPA. Julie ordered a cocktail. We ordered food—I can’t remember what. As I said, the food at the Kittle House is just okay—and ‘just okay’ by necessity. At the Kittle House, the food takes a supporting role to the greatest wine list in the country. And I wouldn’t want to have it any other way.

After oysters on the half shell, I went to use the bathroom. I stood at the urinal staring at the wall in front of me thinking; ‘Life couldn’t get any better. Kittle House. Girlfriend. Coche-Dury.’

Walking back to the table I realized that it had just gotten better. A lot better. I noticed 4 additional glasses on our table and two open bottles of wine. A 1957 Chateau Latour. 1945 Bernard Sachs Chambolle-Musigny.

I never could have imagined that our Coche-Dury would take a backseat that night, but for the moment it did.

Leo, one of the Kittle Sommeliers explained that a very well-cellared collector was having dinner in the other room that night. He’d brought by some serious bottles and he wanted to share. For the next hour my nose was buried in magnificent wines that were older than I was, older than my parents were. After the Bordeaux and Burgundy, Leo brought us the 1935 Cappellano Barolo. And a 1992 Jadot Montrachet. We ate dinner with 10 glasses of wine on the table and the wines were unreal. I’ll always remember each and every one of them.

After finishing the wines I went off to find the gentleman who had bestowed these magnificent wines upon us, but he was gone. I don’t know what I was going to say to him but I remember feeling my heart sink a little bit after learning that he had just left.

I returned to the table to drink the 2001 Meursault which in the meantime had transformed into something hauntingly decadent while sitting in a decanter on a side table. Coche-Dury is an emotional experience. It shows you something that you didn’t know a grapevine was capable of, and then it teaches you to understand it, and then for a brief moment you comprehend the esoteric. And then the wine is gone and you are left only with shadows of what it was.

I recall leaving the dining room thinking that I didn’t deserve to experience such divine works of art. Who was I to drink 70 or 80 year old wines, just to piss them out the next morning? I thought of Mr. Cappellano in 1935, punching down and pumping over thick Nebbiolo caps. Was I the one that he had intended to drink this wine? Surely not.

But it was the most intense sensory experience of my life.

Gems from the Kittle House Cellar: