THE WINE-LIST INSPECTOR | July 19th 2008

dangoodwin

The Fat Duck is famous for crafting exquisite dishes out of seemingly incompatible ingredients, so the job of choosing complementary wines is a formidable one. Tim Atkin considers the wine list--and tips his hat to Isa Bal, the resident sommelier ...

From INTELLIGENT LIFE magazine, Summer 2008

There are times when eating at the Fat Duck in Bray is reminiscent of the Regret Rien, in Mike Leigh's comedy, "Life is Sweet". The link between one of the most acclaimed restaurants in the world and a failing fictional bistro might be hard to spot, but the menus have a good deal in common. For all the fuss about molecular gastronomy, it's not much of a leap from liver in lager and king prawn in jam sauce to snail porridge and egg-and-bacon ice cream.

The Fat Duck is famous for combining seemingly incompatible ingredients. To eat there is to witness something that is part theatre of the absurd and part chemistry lesson. There's a good deal of pleasure to be had getting your head around the different dishes, especially if you plump for the 15-course, £125 tasting menu, with its nitro-green tea and lime mousse, oak moss and truffle toast, parsnip cereal and whisky wine gums. Some of them are sublime; others are culinary mixed metaphors. But the food is never less than stimulating.

Matching wines to Heston Blumenthal's creations is another matter. Dining à la carte (£95 for three courses), you could easily end up trying to partner a single bottle with cauliflower risotto (with chocolate jelly), roast foie gras (with crystallised seaweed, rhubarb and oyster vinaigrette), pot-roast loin of pork (with gratin of truffled macaroni) and sole Veronique (with Champagne fluid gel and triple-cooked chips). There isn't a wine on earth that would work well with that lot.

Far better to drink a selection of wines by the glass, as most of Blumenthal's customers do. Of the 90 people who eat at the Fat Duck on an average day, 70 opt for the tasting menu and, of those, 50 or so stick with the specially tailored tasting wines. You pay either £90 or £165 for eight of these, ranging from a Manzanilla Sherry to a sweet Vouvray. Given that four wines appear in both selections, I'd recommend the cheaper option. Once you've added coffee and service, you'll still be looking at a £450 bill for two, although there is no limit on how much wine you can drink. And Maidenhead station is reassuringly close...

If you prefer your own by-the-glass selection (or allow the first-rate sommelier, Isa Bal, to make suggestions), the Fat Duck has 41 options, including 30 that don't feature among the tasting wines. The dessert-wine selection is especially good, with 11 different choices covering Greece, Canada, Spain and Australia, as well as more conventional sources such as France, Italy and Germany. The prices are on the steep side (dry whites range from £15.50 to £34; reds from £12.50 to £44.50), but it's good to see a restaurant having the guts to list things like a white Châteauneuf-du-Pape, a South African Bordeaux blend and a top Barolo by the glass. It's even more exciting to find a restaurant with 15 different sherries in 75ml servings.

The main list is divided by country rather than by style, which is a bit unimaginative compared with what's coming out of the kitchen. But by the standards of Michelin three-star restaurants, it's not an unwieldy, made-to-impress-corporate-suits selection. One of the best things about the Fat Duck is the fact that most of your fellow eaters appear to be food lovers spending their own money. There's a smattering of expensive wines (topped by the 1989 Château Pétrus at £6,950), but also a lot of good choices between £40 and £100.

The wine list, which is about the size of an old-fashioned photo album, has some interesting nooks and crannies, including bottles from Israel, Switzerland, Slovenia and Georgia, but its strengths are fairly traditional. The Burgundy, Rhône and Barolo selections are particularly good, but the list covers all the main wine-producing countries with concision and style. Again and again, I found myself applauding Isa Bal's choice of producers. He has the knack of choosing the best wines, rather than the most famous. The list could have a larger selection of mature red Bordeaux (1982 Cheval Blanc is as old as it gets), but maybe that reflects the comparative dearth of expense accounts. It could also have more half-bottles: 15 are too few.

For those who insist on ordering a single 75cl bottle of wine, there's plenty of choice. I'd guide you towards four interesting whites (a safer option than a one-stop red) at different prices: the fresh, honey-suckle-scented 2005 Savoie Chignin-Bergeron, Les Terrasses, a&m Quenard (£45); the structured, nutty 2005 Vinha Formal, Vinho Regional Beiras, Luis Pato (£65), which is one of Portugal's superstars; the peppery, intense 2006 Grüner Veltliner Smaragd, Honivögl, Hirtzberger (£90); and the classic, white-Burgundy-style 2004 Leeuwin Estate Art Series Chardonnay, Margaret River (£129). All these will work well with (most of) the things on your plate. One last piece of advice: avoid the chocolate wine, a gooey non-alcoholic confection that's half wine, half milkshake. It belongs in the Regret Rien. ~ TIM ATKIN

The Fat Duck High Street, Bray, near Windsor. Tel: +44 (0)1628 580333