by Anto Coates
Murphy’s Law
clearly states that when you promote a cognac tasting as Beyond Corporate Consistency, the two most commercial cognacs will
inevitably get all the votes and show their class in an unequivocal manner.
And so it was with
Daniel McLaren-Moon’s tasting at Regional Wines &
Spirits. The single malt faithful had
turned out in droves to have a go at cognac, to see if the finest of all
brandies could offer something their Speysides and Highlands
could not.
As is usual when
entering one of Daniel’s tastings, the room smelled heavenly with the aroma of
over 200 pre-poured cognacs. The tables
were bathed in the warm glow of the light refracting through the rich amber
spirit and the mood was perfect for evaluating a drink that is associated with
decadence and warmth.
The cognacs were
served blind and the gathered tasters were asked to shout out whatever they
picked up on the nose and the palate. The tasters certainly didn’t need to be
asked twice and soon the descriptors were being flung around like recriminations
in the ACT party.
The first cognac (which
turned out to be Delamain XO) on the nose was described as dried fruit, spice,
banana, toffee, almond, vanilla, musty, leather, sawdust, pepper, pizza, cloves
and pine. On the palate the tasters detected pear, oil y texture, spice and
marzipan. On the long finish there were notes of rancid butter, salt,
passionfruit, cough syrup and carbon.
Cognac number 2
(Pasquet) had a nose of Christmas cake, almonds, coconut, vanilla, play dough,
tyres, metallic, raisin, pineapple, oxidative sherry and crayon. The palate
showed juicy fruit, lemonade popsicle and wine gums while the medium short
finish showed notes of liquorice, bitter, spice and metallic.
Cognac 3 was Camus, and had a subtle nose of salt,
vapour, paint, medicine, boot polish, grass, banana splits, wet hay, bread
nutmeg and oak. In the mouth it tasted of caramel, oak, a touch of spice and
balanced fruit, while the finish was variously coconuts, carrots, spice, oak
and medicine. A couple of people (including me) commented that it had a sort of
anaesthetic quality like Fijian Kava.
The fourth cognac
was collectively the most favoured of the evening and turned out to be the
Hennessy XO. It had a dark brown colour and a nose of Muscat, Christmas cake spice, dark cherry,
plum, violets cedar, raisin and pineapple. You can almost tell it was the
favourite because there nobody offered any objectionable smell descriptors. The palate was thick and creamy with Muscat, cough syrup and
caramel. The finish had clove, chocolate
fish, nutmeg, oatmeal and rhubard. This really was one special cognac and even
the most ardent malthead was starting to come round at that point.
Cognac number 5 was the Ragnaud Sabou. This was a
cognac that puzzled some at our table, causing some to speculate that it might
be the mystery drink, perhaps even a single malt. Some described the nose as
like Lowland whisky with caramel, pencil shavings, grass, old pew bibles, salt
and soap. It seemed a touch harsh after
the Hennessy XO. The finish built but
was mostly described as sweet and alcoholic.
There were certainly some who warmed to it though as we took some orders
for it afterwards.
Candidate number 6
emerged as the second most favoured cognac of the night, the Courvoisier. The
gangster rappers would have been proud of their two favourite tipples with the
Courvoisier running the Hennessy close and probably winning out in the dollar
for dollar value stakes. The nose was described as glazed cherry, nutmeg,
bacon, cloves, Christmas cake, mulled wine, orange peel, spearmint and new
car. Smoothness, butterscotch and
oranges dominated the taste profile and I had to say that personally this is
the one that’s going on my private jet when I get it.
By a process of
elimination, the 7th glass had to be the mystery. Most knew what the
nature of the drink would be: armagnac, cognac’s cousin, and it turned out to
be the Delord Armagnac XO. The tasting
note seems perhaps the most muddled of all, perhaps because it was the odd man
out or perhaps because it was the last drink of the night! The nose was
described as sweet and sour, green apple, pickle, caramel, roses, herbs,
cheese, marshmallows, old butter, chives, dental surgery, ripe bananas,
leather, cabbage, veges and peanut. The
palate was described as ‘Welsh’ of all things, thick, muddy, astringent,
cloves, chocolate and M&Ms.
After all the
cognacs had been tried and unmasked, there was a twenty minute ‘deliberation’
period, which was more to polish off the rest of the food baskets and wash it
down with some Emersons Bookbinder. The votes were cast with good humour as
various factions of the room lampooned each other’s viewpoints and the whisky
in-jokes flowed. But the results were in the end fairly uniform with the
Hennessy and Courvoisier coming out conclusively on top.
Thanks to Daniel
McLaren-Moon for allowing me to sit in on his tasting. As a wine taster, it was
great to see how the other half live (or drink) and I think there were some
excellent elements of the tasting that we will be looking to incorporate into
our own tasting program in the coming months.