If imitation is the highest form of flattery, then I recently paid the highest tribute to Burgundy winemaker and icon Jacques Seysses at a dinner party here in Washington for friends of the American Institute of Wine and Food...

The occasion was an annual ritual local AIWF maven LaVerne Yost initiated a few years back to find a means of enjoying all the marvelous oversized bottles of wine she had collected over the years at auctions and fundraisers, and as gifts from appreciative winemakers both here and abroad. Living in an empty nest as she does, it simply was not practical for LaVerne to open and enjoy these treasures on a whim, and so she arranged for locally and nationally acclaimed chefs to come to her home and cook marvelous meals for her and her friends. I was fortunate to be invited to one such event last Fall, and the centerpiece of the dinner that night was an Impériale, or six-liter bottle of 1988 Opus One.
But I get ahead of myself. Several years earlier, I had been along for the ride on a wine sojourn to France with a group of 15 or so Washington area chefs and wine pros. On our pass through Burgundy, we were invited for a visit and tasting in the cellars of the renowned Morey-St.-Denis producer Domaine Dujac. This is a small domaine, entirely family-owned and operated by two generations of Seysses since its inception in 1967. Jacques had done an apprenticeship at the legendary Clos de la Pousse d’Or in Volnay, and after two or so years there had begun seeking out vineyards and property with his friend Aubert de Villaine, Director of the Domaine de la Romanée-Conti. Within a few very short years of the Dujac’s beginnings, the wines of this property were routinely being hailed as among the most detailed and elegant of all of Burgundy. So it was no small accomplishment for our group to have secured an invitation to tour and taste with Jacques himself, and he proved most generous with his time and his cellar.
To top it all off, Monsieur Seysses invited us to be his guests for luncheon at an elegant restaurant in the village of Morey, and as we entered a small private dining room in the establishment that afternoon, we were greeted by the magnificent sight of a rehoboam of the 1978 Domaine Dujac Clos de la Roche Grand Cru; four-and-a-half liters of Burgundian elixir! Well, as the meal progressed, I can only vaguely remember the food, as excellent as it was, for I was much more intent upon the increasingly refined parade of red wines marching to the table: Chambolle Musigny Premier Cru, Gevrey-Chambertin aux Combottes, Charmes-Chambertin, Bonnes Mares, and then that imposing behemoth of a rehoboam staring down at us from its perch on a table at one end of the room. How does one serve such a bottle in polite company, I had to wonder?
But I didn’t have long to wait. As the main course was being plated, Jacques stood to address the hushed and reverential room of sybarites. I noticed a coil of plastic hose in his right hand. He removed the foil from the great bottle, and easily extracted the oversized cork. He then unceremoniously knelt down on the floor beneath the wine, reaching up and forward with the length of hose, and slid one end into the neck of the bottle. I am incredulous. Like a furtive schoolboy on a dare, he began sucking on the hose, siphoning off a gentle stream of rosy Burgundy, which dribbled into a succession of decanters, posed at the ready nearby. Mission accomplished, and he never once hoisted the hulking bottle off the table! A hearty cheer erupted as course and wine are served.
Back in Washington, and nearly a decade later, I relish the chance to replicate the performance, this time before an audience of colleagues, friends, journalists, fellow travelers. The impériale of ’88 Opus stands regally on a stool to one end of the small dining room. There is much speculation about the size of it, and the rigors of service of a bottle so large, the wine’s current drinkability, and the like. I intend to play this for all it’s worth. I approach the bottle warily, eyeing it from several different directions, as the assembled crowd becomes aware of my concentration. I kneel below the stool, reaching below to pull out a coil of shiny plastic hose. “No!” gasps someone in the room. “You’re not…!”

Mission accomplished. Thanks, Jacques.