Part I – The History of the Bordeaux Club

Bordeaux Club Dinner, Christ’s College, Cambridge November 13th 1989

Present

Sir John Plumb (host), Neil McKendrick, Michael Broadbent, Harry Walston , John Jenkins – Harry Waugh was unable to attend and Dr Ingham of Christ’s College was invited to take his place

The Menu

La salade des fruits de mer Le perdreau roti Les choux de Bruxelles et les pommes chasseur Cheese ramekins

Pears in red wine

Coffee

The Wine

Before Dinner Dom Pérignon 1969

At Dinner Corton-Charlemagne 1949 Château Mouton Rothschild 1976 Château Margaux 1959 Château Haut-Brion 1953 Château Pétrus 1950 Château Lafite 1948 Château Doisy-Védrines 1961

After Dinner Grand Champagne, Hine, bottled by the Ionian Bank 1971 (In Piam Memoriam EMB)

The fifth claret was Lafite l948 – a favourite wine and a favourite vintage of our host, but alas, it was not a success after the previous three winners. Most of us thought that it was a disappointment, a strangely unbalanced wine. Michael and Jack mounted a defence and it has to be admitted that it did improve in the glass, but not enough to stand comparison with what had gone before. My own terse notes read: ‘Alpha on the nose, beta on the palate, a wine completely out of balance, doubtless the lovely bouquet would have won more admirers if it had not been for the earlier competition.’

The Doisy-Védrines ’61 was deliciously attractive at first but was frankly outclassed by what had gone before. My notes read: ‘A lovely drink, but no great depth. After the wonderful clarets this wine brought us back – pleasantly but undeniably – to the the everyday world. A quotidian wine – nice but rather ordinary.’

The brandy was Hine, 1971. I did not take any and if anyone else did I failed to record their comments. By this stage of the evening we were all so sated with satisfaction and pleasure that brandy seemed superfluous. Jack had already done more than enough to maintain – indeed to enhance – the remarkable standards of the Bordeaux Club. As Geoff Ingham, our guest, said: ‘What an astonishing club. How many dinners does one go to when a Mouton and a Lafite are the disappointments of the evening!’

FEBRUARY 2ND 1999, 50TH ANNIVERSARY DINNER, CHRIST’S COLLEGE, CAMBRIDGE Sir John Plumb (founder member and host),

Neil McKendrick, Michael Broadbent, John Jenkins,

Hugh Johnson, Paul Readman (guest)

Alas, our other founder member, Harry Waugh, had to withdraw at the last minute because of ill health. We sent him our warmest good wishes for a quick recovery.

In an inspired and characteristic choice Jack invited a guest in his mid-twenties to take the place of our member in his mid-nineties and summoned up a brilliant young Christ’s historian, Paul Readman, to join us. Paul has just started to build up his first wine cellar and Jack wanted to

give him a glimpse into the remnants of one of the most remarkable private cellars Cambridge has ever housed. It was a marvellous idea to choose someone of that age to carry on the baton of wine tasting for the future. It proved to be a great success and Paul wrote a charming note of thanks for what he called ‘an incredible evening’, adding modestly: ‘Even to my palate, the wines seemed wonderful, and I have no doubt I will remember both them and the genial company I kept that night for the rest of my life.’

Jack had decided to make this dinner his last. It was our 140th dinner and marked the fiftieth anniversary of the club he and Harry had founded back in February 1949. It proved to be a sadder occasion and an even more memorable one than we had all expected it to be. Indeed, it proved to be almost intolerably sad when Jack decided (just as the Latour ’24 was being poured out) that his health and his spirits could hold out no longer. Without warning he got to his feet, graciously thanked us all for our friendship and good fellowship over the years, and announced that he was retiring for the evening – and forever.

The company was stunned by his departure.

To soften the impact, I was urged to take a glass of the ’24 up to his bedside so that at least he could taste it and record his verdict on it. As he said, having done so: ‘If one has got to go, Latour ’24 is not a bad wine to go out on!’

It was bound to be a poignant moment when he retired from the club, but his sudden departure when he finally had to succumb to fatigue left everybody feeling that they had not had a chance to say what they would have wished to have said in thanks for all his splendid and inspiring hospitality over the years.

It is my pleasant privilege to try to compose a suitable send-off for Jack in the minutes and try to record what everyone felt about all he had done in creating the Bordeaux Club and in remaining the vital life force that kept it going for so long. The record is a proud one and needs to be scrupulously kept. We all hope that the club will survive and indeed flourish in the future, but we know that it will be a very different animal without its remarkable founder and unforgettable character, Sir John Plumb.

He can be sure that he will live on in our memories and our anecdotes and our affections for many years to come. He may have retired from the club, but I can assure you that he will not be allowed to retire from the minutes as long as I am keeping them. If I did overlook him the other members would constantly invoke his name and evoke memories of his

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280 CHAMPAGNE ON THE MOVE