| The Vantage of Vintage |
Appetite noses around five of Singapore's most outstanding cellars, in search of stellar vintages that put a new perspective to age.
The St Regis Singapore
Occupying a prestigious location in Singapore’s shopping district, The St Regis Singapore stands out from its peers for its refined luxury and opulence, offering not just stellar gourmet experiences but also a world class wine list that reads like a sommelier’s dream.
Champagne Louis Roederer Cristal Brut 1990 sits among the list of the finest Champagnes available on the wine list. “1990 was a very good year for Cristal. The growing conditions for that year was outstanding, so it was possible to make a very good vintage,” shares chief sommelier Romuald Le Calonnec; at $2,600, it also ranks among the world’s most expensive Champagnes.
At $9,500 you can purchase a bottle of Château Mouton Rothschild 1959 — a steal, if you compare it with the producer’s more vaunted vintages — while a bottle of Château Latour 1961 could be yours for $11,558.
The DRC La Tâche 1985 is worth considering if you are looking for DRC’s finer vintages that wouldn’t cost an arm and a leg, but at $13,398 it is not exactly inexpensive either. The DRC Romanée-Conti 1978 will cost a little more, but understandably so; production for that year was miniscule at only 6,535 bottles in all, and there probably aren’t many bottles left in the world. It is selling for $44,258.
Buyan Russian Haute Cuisine & Caviar Bar
Perched among the slew of newly opened restaurants on Duxton Hill is Buyan, a Russian restaurant that features premium vodkas, beers and what must be one of the most extravagant cellars in Singapore.
On our visit, sommelier Indra Kumar brought out some exceptionally rare bottles. First up was a Louis Violland Pommard ‘La Pierre du Roy’ 1921, priced at $18,888. “This is probably the oldest Pommard you can find here in the region,” he declares, before bringing out a bottle of Château Chalon 1929. Produced on the hilly terrain of the Jura, Chalon is made from the Savagnin grape, and is reputed to possess very long aging potential, so the 1929 could in fact be drinking very well—but you will have to fork out $8,888 to find out for sure.
If you’re in the mood for some bubbly, try a bottle of Piper-Hiedsieck 1907, recovered from a ship called Jonkoping, which was sunk by German submarines in 1916. Kumar shares, “When the Champagnes sank with the ship to the seabed, the atmospheric pressure equalled that inside the bottles, so they basically froze in time, aging in perfect conditions until they were discovered in 1998. It’s really a miracle.”
We could not believe our eyes when Kumar brought out a bottle of Château Chalon 1821, a wine of great commemorative value as it was made in the same year that Napoleon I died. Kumar tells me there are only two bottles left in the world, and one sits right in the cellar of Buyan. It is not for purchase, but you might like to know that 10 years from now, when the wine celebrates its 200th birthday, it should have an estimated value of an astounding $2 million.
[ED'S NOTE: It was also revealed a few weeks after this interview was done, that Buyan was the winning bidders behind the record-breaking purchase of the world's oldest shipwrecked champagne, an 1841 Veuve Clicquot. The bottle was one of 145 salvaged from a 19th century shipwreck in the Baltic Sea, which were all remarkably preserved as they were lying horizontally 50m under, away from light and heat.The bottle they purchased cost an astonishing S$53,000]
To see the other cellars featured in the article, including Bar A Vin, Raffles Hotel Singapore, and L'Atelier de Joël Robuchon and Joël Robuchon Restaurant, pick up the Appetite July 2011 issue now.
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