This is perhaps the wine tasting sans pareil. A few precious specimens of the world's finest and most valuable wines accompanied by an haute couture menu tailored exclusively for them by perhaps Australia's most celebrated and accomplished createur.

As a concept in dining, it surpassed perhaps eve Peter Greenaway's cinematic culinary triumph, The Cook, The Thief, His Wife and Her Lover. A table attended by some of this country's most dedicated oenophiles, indulging in a selection of the greatest vintages and names in winemaking from the personal cellar of Gary Steel, Managing Director of Domaine Wine Shippers.

From Bordeaux , 1961, considered not only one of this centuries finest vintages, but the greatest post-war vintage to date. Legendary bottles that are spoken of with a divine reverence; Chateau Lafite-Rothschild, Chateau Latour, Chateau Margaux, Chateau Mouton-Rothschild, Chateau Haut-Brion, Chateau Palmer and Chateau Montrose. From the same vintage and the famed vineyards of Champagne, an exquisite magnum of Billecart-Salmon Brut, especially air freighted to Melbourne for the occasion. Burgundies from another classic vintage, 1966; Richebourg, Romanee-Conti, La Tache; five recent vintages of the superb Le Montrachet, from 1988 through to 1984. Great port dating back to 1931; a Quinta do Noval and Pinhao; from 1848, an incomparable Madeira and a classic 1959 Chateau d'Yquem. And yes, just one more bottle. A gift from a friend to complete the series of first growth 1961 vintages; a bottle of Chateau d'Yquem '61.

These remarkable wines were to be sampled; no, not sampled but experienced in conjunction with a menu that would perfectly complement the characteristics of these pedigrees. Designed by Stephanie Alexander, the resulting menu was indeed yang to the wines ' yin; an embodiment of culinary perfection, a balance of flavours that would ensure the food was exquisite in its own right, neither submissive nor dominant to these great wines.

To further add interest to the evening, these vintages were savoured in a 'blind' tasting, with the table nominating its favourite wines and a friendly wager, a tenner, riding on who could most accurately guess the list of wines tasted.

The spirited round table comprised Graeme Lynch of Crittenden's Cellars; chef and restaurateur Jean Jacques Lale-Demoz, coin dealer Darren Harris, Nicholas Chlebnikowski of Nick's Wine Merchants, television personality Daryl Somers, winemaker Steve Goodwin from Baileys of Glenrowan wines, wine wholesaler Jon Osbeistin, part owner of the West Coast Eagles Murray McHenry ,from Sydney Kelvin Hack who enjoys both the textile business and wine, James Halliday who needs no introduction, VIVE's own Editor and designer Kostas Metaxas and the evening's most generous host, Gary Steel.

As the evening at Stephanie's began, Gary Steel explained his reasons for this dinner. "For some time now, I've had a theme dinner of great wines each year and this year I thought I would use the theme of the 1961's. It so happened whilst looking through Michael Broadbent's book that I noticed that the harvest for this vintage commended on the 27th of September, 1961. Having all the first growth of that year I've always had the idea to have them all together one day. I thought an appropriate day would be the thirtieth anniversary of the harvest and that happened to be the eve of the football grand final in Melbourne. I knew that my very good friend Murray would not be able to reneg on that date as he would be in Melbourne. That quite simply was my thinking behind this dinner tonight; to have a great dinner. "

The ritual opened with the magnums of Champagne Billecart-Salmon Brut 1961 which had been held on lees in the cellars for 29 years and disgorged just 12 days before. It was an amazingly fresh wine but with full honeyed fruit flavours underneath. Just the perfect but serious beginning to a great evening.

The opening of the Boal madeira vintage 1848 bottled in 1927 and one of only 293 bottles produced was a stunning entree into this voyage through the world's finest vineyards.

"I've never tasted anything of considerable age in a madeira that was remotely similar. It surprised me because I have not till this point in time, ever really enjoyed madeira. This is an extraordinary wine and has everything. You couldn't believe it was so old. It was a surprise, it was a curiosity and it was marvellous," said Darren Harris.

"Whilst the madeira may not be the best wine, it is certainly the most impressive, because of its age, its freshness and because old fortified wines like that often become bottle stale, but this tastes as if it had been bottled two years ago," added Steven Goodwin.

"It is just extraordinary," agreed Murray McHenry. "It's so seldom you get an old wine, an 1848 and you can sit here and say it's fresh, it's alive". "That's an experience," said Kelvin Hack. "If you have only one bottle of wine in your life, this is it and you don't have to have another bottle of wine ever. Unfortunately, I will."

A hard act to follow perhpas but the Le Montrachet vintages attracted similar praise from these perceptive palates. "This wine is purely and simply the extraordinary piece of land from which it comes," explains James Halliday. "Four hectares is the whole of Montrachet and it has been known since the 1700s. In the earliest wine writings you find writings on this wine. It's just totally exceptional and it is not only a reference for the rest of Burgundy and the rest of the world. Certainly it gets Rolls Royce handling but it's all in the land. It is such perfection you can't improve on it, you can only spoil it."

Graeme Lynch was impressed particularly by the 1985 vintage. "Whilst the 1984 has all the power and proclaims what Montrachet is all about, the '85 is a beautifully balanced wine with a perfumed bouquet and a balance that is good o n the palate. I don't think it finishes short, I think it finishes with a very complex, lingering finish which is beautifully silky and refined."

"I think they certainly display a remarkable difference in direction and quality from Australian wines," suggested Nick Chlebnikowski. "I think the '85 showed a degree of finesse and power and elegance, that Australian winemakers should be aiming for."

For Daryl Somers, "These wines are a law unto themselves, quite apart from other burgundies. They're like purebreed racehorses. You're looking at the top wines of the world here and it's a privilege to drink them."

CHAMPAGNE BILLECART-SALMON BRUT 1961 (Magnum)

Disgorged 12 September 1991 and air-freighted to Australia specially for the dinner. Substantial amount of relatively slow rising pin-point bead. Amazingly fresh and youthful for its age. Intense fleshy pinot flavours with great texture and subdued fruit flavours. Good balance with a dry finish and excellent acidity.

BOAL MADEIRA 1848 "Henriques & Henriques" Bottled in 1927. Recorked 1957. Bottle No. 292 out of 295.

Pure amber colour with a lemon amber rim. Rich, intense and concentrated bouquet. Medium bodied with long and powerful yet exquisite flavours and superb balance. A fabulous wine.

LE MONTRACHET 1987 "Domaine Delegrange-Bachelet"

Citrus fruit bouquet overlaying the oak. On the palate, a little lean, but has reasonable intensity of fruit. High alcohol with high acid will allow this wine to benefit from further bottle ageing.

LE MONTRACHET 1986 "Domaine Delegrange Bachelet"

What was expected to be the best wine of the bracket was spoilt by the cork. Unfortunately, undrinkable.

LE MONTRACHET 1985 "Domaine Delegrange-Bachelet"

Although quite closed on the bouquet it has the citric fruit and vanilla oak characters of all the wines. The palate however, is very concentrated with intense fruit, terrifiç structure and a very long after taste. Should be the best wine of the bracket at its peak - discounting the poor bottle age of the 1986 - it just requires time.

LE MONTRACHET 1984 "Domaine Delegrange-Bachelet"

Most developed in colour and quite complex on the nose. Typical Edmond Delegrange signature of citric fruit and toasty vanilla oak overtones on the bouquet. Rich concentrated fruit on the palate and the most approachable of the bracket at this stage.

CHATEAU HAUT-BRION 1961

Developed scented/earch cedary Graves bouquet. Soft silky texture with sweet, ripe fruit and long aftertaste. Not as tannic as the others but a superb wine in a different mould.

CHATEAU MONTROSE 1961

Still very closed on the bouquet with faint çedary characters. Massive tannins with good fruit underneath although one feels that the tannins will outlive the fruit and this wine will never come into balance. A wine for those who enjoy the firm tannic style of Bordeaux.

CHATEAU LAFITE-ROTHSCHILD 1961

Daryl Somers was the only taster to identify this wine correctly. Very ripe intense fruit nose with cedar/vanilla and a touch of earthiness. Good weight and balance on the palate. Rich but just starting to dry out a little. Still, many good years to go.

CHATEAU MOUTON ROTHSCHILD 1961

Judged the wine of the bracket by five of the twelve tasters. Still very deep rich colour. Extremely complex, powerful and concentrated bouquet. The palate has amazing power. Layers and layers of flavours with incredible length. Balanced but still quite unready. A fabulous wine.

CHATEAU LATOUR 1961

Almost opaque with no sign of ageing at all. A veritable monster, and the most backward of this bracket. Good fruit but the extractive long tannin finish will require another 30 years to become approachable. One would have to have some doubts that this wine will ever come into balance.

CHATEAU PALMER 1961

Judged the wine of the bracket by four tasters. Lovely deep rich colour with a powerful rich/ripe concentrated fruit bouquet. Almost Burgundian. On the palate, heaps of intense sweet fruit characters although not as long on the aftertaste as some of the others; but compensating for it with the sheer volume of complex fruit flavours. A Burgundy drinkers Bordeaux.

LA CUVEE DE LA COMMANDERIE DU BONTEMPS 1961

This association of Chateau owners had for many years paid their annual subscription with one barrel of wine per year. (20 cases from the first growths, as they were the only ones to be Chateau bottling their entire production.) All wines were blended together at Chateau Gruaud-Larose by Jean-Paul Gardere who has made this wine for over 30 years. (A donation by James Halliday). RIch colour but the least deep of the bracket. Cinnamon/spicy bouquet. Some fruit but drying out on the palate. Nice, but unspectacular in the company of the 'Heavyweights' of the vintages.

CHATEAU MARGAUX 1961

Three tasters chose this as their best wine. Deep rich colourr with a lovely spicy fruit bouquet. Palate has developed integrated flavours, rich elegant, soft and silky with lovely balance. A superb wine.

LA ROMANEE-CONTI 1966 "Domaine de la Romanee-Conti"

Quite a light developed colour, with a sweet almost confectionary bouquet. A delicate structured wine with very intense fruit. Long powerful palate´, but drinking at its peak or just after it.

LA TACHE 1966 "Domaine de la Romanee-Conti"

The second failed cork. Mould had developed underneath the lead capsule and travelled down the cork, meeting the wine as it moved up, leaving a grey/white mould ring around the cork half way down. The wine was undrinkable. A good enough case for recorking every 20 years.

LES RICHBOURGS 1966 "Domaine de la Romanee-Conti"

Rich intense ripe nose although very pale in colour. Bigger extract than the first wine. Powerful flavour with a lovely long aftertaste.

CHATEAU D'YQUEM 1959

Amber gold in colour with a lovely intense nose of coconut and honeyed fruit. Palate is very rich, sweet and luscious. Concentrated, long taste with a balancing dry finish. A great d'Yquem.

CHATEAU D'YQUEM 1961

A very developed orange peel colour. A mature bouquet without noticeable bortyris characters. Sweet rich fruit that is now starting to dry out.

QUINTA DE NOVAL 1931

Very rich plummy colour. Initially quite closed bouquet but opened up after 40 minutes in the glass (after having been decanted for three hours, previously!) Complex liquorice/blackcurrent/mulberry/peppery bouquet with spicy spirit. Incredibly rich fruit flavours on the palate with soft tannins balanced by superb spirit and great aftertaste.

PINHAO 1931

Lighter in colour with a mahogany rim. Superb intense spicy nose. Again, liquorice and pepper but without the berry characters of the previous wine. Beautiful clean spirit. Lighter on the palate but with magnificent depth and concentration. Sensational balance of sweet velvety fruit and the firm spirit backbone. Extremely long aftertaste.

*********

"The Montrachet is the greatest wine," declared our knowledgable host, "but it's also the hardest wine to make because no one really has enough to be able to make a decent batch of it. There's no process of selection and throwing out at the bottom end."Eventually the conversation shifted from the wine at hand to wine culture in general.

"James, wine with food really is a Mediterranean concept. The English for example, their cuisine doesn't lent itself to wine the way Italian or Spanish or French food does."

"England is not a great wine producing nation. There's no tradition of winemaking so there is no tradition of wine and food, which means there's no intuitive understanding. If you don't make wine why on earth would you understand what food to eat with it. If you look at the flavours of Provencale food and the wines of the region; they're rustic, they're wonderfully flavoured, they're hearty. You slap them up and put them down and they're fantastic. Why is it tha t the gastronomic heart of France is around Lyon and north of Lyon? It's because there you have Rhone and Burgundy and I remember tha t in the 1850s Hermitage was the greatest of all the French wines. The 1846 Hermitage was just legendary.

"However, the English are such a large market for French wines, yet their food isn't really suited to it. But it isn't a popular happening," insisted Jean Jaques. " A class of the population were able to buy the best. It is very interesting. Ihave been to both Hong Kong and Macau. Hong Kong is far more modern than Macau, but it is very difficult to find any English culture o n the level of cheap meals. In Macau, 98% of the places are serve grilled sardines and you have four or five different wines imported from Portugal. Workers in Portugal are able to treat themelves to Portugese fare whereas in Hong Kong you can't treat yoursel f to English fare at that same basic level."

By this stage, the great Reds of Bordeaux had arrived at the table and, displaying the charisma of any great star, captivated their audience.

"Thirty years ago," began our host by way of tribute´, "these wines started coming off the vines. They were just sap out of the vine , and now they have really evolved into great wines. Of course, some of them are a little bit disappointing but the thing is once a wine has been locked into a bottle for twenty eight years, you're going to see changes in different bottle character.

"Mouton Rothschild is a classic. It, to me, is the very best of the first growths.. It has the structure, it has a beautiful, concentrated powerful bouquet. It has a great depth, layers of flavour on the palate."

"The Empire State building of wine", added Somers.

Somers' analogy was vindicated because it was this wine, the 1961 Chateau Mouton-Rothschild, that our guests voted in a blind tasting as the premier wine of the evening, closely followed by the '61 Chateau Palmer and the '61 Chateau Margaux.

Dessert provided more highlights with the two Chateau dYquem vintages and some intersting observations from Halliday. "It doesn't matter what the sticky wine is, the taste before the dessert, during and after the dessert are three utterly different things. If you're ever going to tell anyone, not only about the importance of the match of wine and food, but also of the effects of the match, nowhere is it more dramatic than with sweet wine before a desert and then taste it immediately afterwards, it is completely different."

The event ended; a culinary triumph that revealed some of the mysteries and joys of some of the great wines. As the guests left the elegant confines of Stephanies, only one mystery remained, Who pocketed the tenner?

INTERVIEW WITH STEPHANIE ALEXANDER AND GARY STEEL

VIVE: Stephanie, when Gary came to you to discuss the creation of a menu for this evening, what were your immediate thoughts?

ALEXANDER: Well, I was interested in the challenge, but it was also wonderful because you're rarely asked to do such a thing. As a chef, it's a very interesting professional challenge to overcome the problem of matching the wines.

VIVE: Let's go through the wines in sequence. Obviously Gary would have given you a bit of a description of each wine.

ALEXANDER: He certainly did. He also gave me quite comprehensive tasting notes. Without them it would have been a rather one-sided exercise because I do not consider myself to have an exhaustive knowledge of French wine or any wine for that matter.

STEEL: Aged French wine; tell me who does!

VIVE: But when you were told about the madeira, when you were told about the basic flavours, how did you intepret these?

ALEXANDER: Well, there are some things that just seem to me to be wonderful combinations and I think that the principles hold whehter or not the wine is thirty years old; it just means that if the wine is particularly gorgeous the combination will be particularly successful.

STEEL: We actually brought that up. I discussed it with you and told you that I did have this very old madeira, an 1848; 143 years old, and it is an exceptional wine and I wanted to put it on as I've always like it.

VIVE: Well, why would you include such a rare wine in the first place?

STEEL: Well, if we're going to have all the great wines you may as well include something quite outstanding, as an appreciation to te people that supported me. Stephanie suggested that she could do a consomme and I've always like madeira with a consomme, early on in the meal. I think it's great after the champagne, when everyone sits down, to have a light consomme and a beautiful madeira. It's a perfect way to stimulate the taste buds.

VIVE: That was followed by the entree, the Marron served with the Montrachet.

ALEXÅNDER: That particular freshwater crustacean is very sweet and it also has a much more powerful flavour than, say, a yabbie. The golden delicious apples are, I think, perfect with it. They bring out that golden sweet honey taste which is not sickly; it has that edge to it. I though it would be a beautiful dish with any Montrachet that I've ever tasted.

VIVE: Next was the Bordeaux which would have presented a daunting task, since i t offered so many options in terms of meat or venison.

STEEL: Yes, but before the Bordeaux, I'd just like to mention the champagne. The 1961 champagne was specially disgorged; it had been on less for twenty nine and a half years and it was air-freighted out for the particular event. Given its age and its delicacy, any oily type of hors d'oeuvre would have completely taken the edge off the champagne and the palate. So we had the champagne and then had...

ALEXANDER: ...Those little crisp pastries with pumpkin filing. Once again it's slightly offbeat but I think a nice beginning. It's smooth and lets the champagne stand out, it doesn't overpower it.

STEEL: It was a rich year, a big rich year for champagne, and because it was a very delicate champagne the pastries were a perfect combination.

VIVE: Let us get back to the Bordeaux. You had eight wines to pick from, all the very different characters and strengths. You would have had an extensive choice of meats, why did you choose the squab?

ALEXANDER: Well, from the cook's point of view, squab was my first choice. I think it goes particularly well with wine of that weight. It has incredible intensity of flavour but it isn't overpowering. It allows you to make gorgeous sauces which can be very fine and thin, allowing the meat to come through.

VIVE: Did you use any wines in the cooking at all?

ALEXANDER: I think that the basic stock had a bit of deglaze, but that would have been just with a white wine, very early on. Wine certainaly wasn't used in the pan in the kitchen. We would have used the consomme together with the juices from the mushrooms and so on to make the sauce to tie it all in. As a cook, I think squab is a wonderful meat. I think it is a meat that allows a wine to speak.

STEEL: Not only that. The cooking of the wine was perfection. We had some people that dine regularly overseas. People of some international experience and they all commented that it was the best squab they'd had in Australia.

ALEXANDER: We should really only take a part of the credit as those squab are a very fine Australian product.

VIVE: The theme was very much Australian food. Was there a temptation to turn to classic French cuisine?

ALEXANDER: Well, there are classic preparations, but using Australian products that I think stand up well. I think that Mungabareena cheese is a magnificent cheese. It seems to me a wine lover's cheese and it could be argued that it would be better with a sweet white wine. It reminds me of a famous cheese from Burgundy in a sense that although it's soft and buttery, it's also very powerful. It actually smells fare more than it tastes. The powerful aroma isn't reflected in the flavour of the cheese and the walnut bread is a perfect accompaniment.

VIVE: Dessert. Chateau d'Yquem is one of the most interesting and important wines on French wine lists. Why select a sauternes custard to complement it?

ALEXANDER: Firstly, I must explain that this particular dessert was actually created by Phillip Searle from Oasis Seros, but I think that you probably can't beat it other than when peaches are in full flood. A custard made from a great sauterne, though it wasn't made from Chateau D'Yquem; it was, I think, made from a De Bortoli, is just lovely. It carries the scent right through and the little madeleines, which I think are gorgeous, go beautifully with it. If it wasn't such aperfect wine, you could almost be tempted to dip the madeleine in it... which the French would do of course.

... Like bread and milk.

Then with the Vintage Port we had the panfort, which is just a very rich solid version of fruit and nuts. It was filled with things from MacLaren Vale, with almonds and figs from Berri, it was all done with carefully sourced Australian produce.

VIVE: Gary, looking at it as a wine connoisseur, what was your overall impression of Stephanie's menu?

STEEL: Incredibly good. Each and every course went superbly with the wines: No single course overshadowed any of them. When Stephanie and I first discussed the wines, her perception of the combination of the flavours of fhe wines and her reasons for combining certain flavours and ingredients in the dishes were spot on. With a dinner such as this one, you can't have a rehearsal, so it is a credit to her ability and knowledge to create complementary combinations of flavours to marry with the wines. I would also like to compliment Stephanie on the capabilities of her dining room staff - faced with so many wines and so many glasses they served them all correçtly with the appropriate courses. Christoff particularly, in his decanting and wine service, the way in which he handled the old wines, removing the corks and decanting without clouding the wines was extremely helpful. There are not many sommeliers i n this country with his ability.

VIVE: Let's talk about the madeira. How valuable is it?

STEEL: Well, it would most probably not be the dearest wine of the night because Madeira isn't fashionable. But I've had it for many, many years and it's probably worth, in monetary terms, somewhere between $400.00 to $700.00 a bottle. But you can't gauge that particular wine because in 1927 there were only 295 bottles. It was recorked again in 1957 so there's most probably nothing left of that vintage; there's no gauge. Whereas with the 1961 Mouton-Rothschild and the '61 Chateau Palmer, both are great, great wines and there's enough of them around to make people want to go and buy another bottle.

VIVE: In that case, which was the most expensive wine we drank that night?

STEEL: Oh...I suppose; if you're talking auction prices there were a lot of extremely expensive wines all around a thousand dollars or more a bottle. The '66 Romanee-Conti, the '59 d'Yquem, the '31 Quinta de Noval vintage port, the '61 Mouton-Rothschild, Lafite-Rothschild, Latour...all are up around the thousand mark although Mouton-Rothschild is without a doubt the best of all the '61s. I've had it quite a number of times and it always shines.

VIVE: Stephanie, have you ever done the same kind of thing with quality Australian wines?

ALEXANDER: I probably have, though no particular occasion comes to mind. Very rarely does one have the opportunity to match food to wine, mainly because it is such an expensive exercise.

STEEL: There were over ten thousand dollars worth of wines alone, although nearly all of those wines were my personal wines. James Halliday said "You can't drink all that first growth '61s on the 30th anniversary of the commencement of harvest without the '61 d'Yquem, so as a friendly gesture he donated a bottle for the dinner. That is why it's hand-written on the menu.