FRANCE'S GREATEST WINE LIST

Tim Atkin visits La Tour d'Argent, a Paris institution. Though it has lost yet another a Michelin star, its wine list remains remarkable ...

From INTELLIGENT LIFE Magazine, Autumn 2009

When La Tour d’Argent lost its second Michelin star a few years ago, continuing its slide down the ranking of top French restaurants, television crews were camped outside for days. Its food may not be what it once was, but this Left Bank institution is as newsworthy as ever. To many people, it is the most famous eaterie in Paris, a 400-year-old restaurant that continues to attract actors, musicians, business leaders, politicians and the beau monde.

The food isn’t bad, just a little predictable and—at €180 for the tasting menu—pricey. No matter. There are still two things that make a visit to La Tour d’Argent unforgettable. The first is the jaw-dropping view from the sixth-floor dining room, taking in Notre Dame, Sacré-Coeur, the Pompidou Centre and the quais of the Left Bank.

The second is the wine list, which can justifiably claim to be the greatest in France. So extensive is the 14,970-bottle selection that guests have been known to arrive two hours early just to read a part of it before dinner. If I tell you that the full list weighs a bicep-straining 9kg, you’ll have some idea of its dimensions.

For lovers of great French wines, there is no better place to drink. To take only two examples, the warren of cellars contains 35 vintages of Château Cheval Blanc and 95 different Montrachet Grands Crus. The same strength in depth applies to virtually every top wine from Bordeaux, Burgundy, the Loire, Alsace and the Rhône, with some vintages dating back to the 19th century.

La Tour d’Argent specialises in old wines. And when I say specialise, I mean it. Apart from a youthful Aligoté (used to make Kir) and the excellent non-vintage house Champagne, the youngest wine on the list, red or white, is a 2003. “If I can’t keep a wine for 20 years,” says the restaurant’s chef-sommelier, David Ridgway, “then I don’t really want to buy it.” Maturity is not always an easy sell, mind you. “Apart from here,” he adds, “the people who like to drink older wines in restaurants are probably drinking bad older wines, and that can put them off.”

Patience, provenance and temperature-controlled storage are the key. La Tour d’Argent buys nearly all its wines young, storing them until Ridgway considers they are ready. The list does contain younger vintages, tantalisingly held en vieillissement in the cellars, but these are off limits to diners. One punter apparently offered $1,000 to drink a youthful, if highly praised, Châteauneuf-du-Pape, and was turned down.

Unless you know a fair bit about wine it’s hard to know where to start. The list is arranged by region and appellation, starting with the youngest vintage and descending, step by venerable step, into the past, but there are no tasting notes and no indications as to the style of the wines.

That’s where Ridgway comes in. An Englishman with a wry turn of phrase, he makes a personal selection each week of 20 or so bottles that he thinks are at their peak, which cuts the choice down to manageable levels. Failing that, you can ask him to recommend something else. He’s been working at the restaurant since 1981 and estimates that he has served 700,000 bottles of wine in that time. The man arguably has a deeper knowledge of old wines, especially Burgundies, than anyone else in France.

I gave him a budget of €100 per bottle—which is modest by the standards of La Tour d’Argent—and asked him to choose a red and a white that could both partner the seven-course tasting menu. His choices were as unpredictable as they were inspired, matching the food to perfection. The 1985 Riesling Grand Cru Muenchberg, Lorentz (€95) and the 1985 Montus Prestige Madiran (€95) were delicious old wines, the first a dry Alsace Riesling of haunting restraint, the second a mature, Tannat-based red that’s as good as many a Classed
Growth Bordeaux at three times the price.

It’s almost sacrilegious to say, but the list could be improved. A few by-the-glass wines would help, although there are 1,000 half-bottles by way of compensation. I’d also like to see more information about producers and vintages, even if you’d need a small crane to prise the resulting list off the table. Lastly, a handful of younger wines wouldn’t go amiss. Not everyone wants to drink six-year-old Sancerre. But these are quibbles. This is an amazing treasure trove of wines, priced fairly and sold with knowledge, passion and obvious enjoyment. If they gave Michelin stars for wine lists alone, La Tour d’Argent would earn three.

La Tour d’Argent 15-17 Quai de la Tournelle, 75005 Paris; +33 (0)1 43 54 23 31

IN THE BIN
Number of wines 14,970
By the glass 2
Under €30 None
Over €100 4,000+
Best value1991 Volnay Pitures, Domaine Boillot, €125
Worst value1982 Château Pétrus, €19,826
Gluggability •••••
Expense account adjuster* •••••
Sancerre index Not applicable

** Probability that the next-door table arepaying with the company’s money
** No one else sells six-year-old Sancerre.

Picture credit: Sam Barker (of Tim Atkin)

(Tim Atkin is a Master of Wine. His last Wine Inspector column for Intelligent Life was about a wine hotel. Sarah Dallas describes her own experiences dining at La Tour d'Argent.)