Claude Darroze eating out under the plain trees
I suspect this may be the last post about our trip around southern France during August. We spent a couple of days staying at the Claude Darroze hotel and restaurant in the centre of Langon, the market town of Sauternes. Back in 1979 on our first visit this was the first Michelin star restaurant we ever ate at and the experience remains memorable. In those days we camped in the municipal site by the Garonne where we encountered some of the largest and most viscous mosquitoes ever. Incidentally the Darroze hotel still supplies each room with a large can of fly and mosquito killer.
When had two excellent dinners at Claude Darroze. On the second evening it was dry and warm enough to dine outside on the terrace under the plain trees, which is always special. The restaurant's wine list is extensive mainly centred as one would expect on Bordeaux. On each occasion we chose a Bordeaux white for our aperitif and first course and then a red from the south west as they offered better value. On the first night it was the 2003 Montus (Madiran) from Alain Brumont and on the second night the fine 1999 Prince Probus from Clos Triguedina (Cahors).
4 comments:
So so so ! WE are supposed to transform into organic farmers – of which I approve, of course – but you spray “fly and mosquito killer” by the “large can” at Darroze’s !!!
I would suggest a new label, and stringent conditions at that too: “organic hotel guest”. It would go along following lines: refusal of disposable plastic mug for the tooth-brush in the bedroom, of wifi connection, of a cooled minibar (the frigorific performance of these small units is terrible), of chlorinated toilet flush, of individual airco (one room wants the temperature rather high, the neighbouring one very cool indeed, all interfering with one another) and ... long live the blood suckers!
But you easily reach atonement, Jim, thanks to your choice of wines: Alain’s tannat (even in 2003?) and Baldès’ cot are beauties indeed. Me too, “I can’t wait to have dinner there”, as is implied by Triguedina if we are to believe the legend.
Anyway, it takes guts to drink “les vins du Haut-Pays” while seated in the Bazadais.
I can already hear the wine-waiter whisper in petto: “Pfff, bloody froggies, always drinking them cheap stuff !”
Luc. Thanks. You strictures about the 'fly and mosquito killer' assumes that we used it. We didn't – I merely observed that one was supplied.
Perfect, my friend.
No sooner had I posted my little note than I realized I left the door partway open to this kind of escape. This would be so easy an excuse for any man of lesser courage and value than you.
But I take your word for it: you would not do to others, what you would not like them doing to you, hence: “No me moleste, mosquito!”.
My second inuendo – but you did not pick up on that one – is that the wine-waiter clearly thought you were a local, probably because of your exquisitely discrete shirts. Foreigners always go for the more expensive items on the wine list. In a sense, he was right: Aquitaine has always been part of England, hasn’t it?
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