1964 Oddero for the Birthday Girl

A birthday celebration for a good friend. Birth year wine, courtesy of her husband. A meal prepared especially for the occasion and the wines by Chef Pierre Calmels at Bibou, one of my favorite restaurants in Philadelphia. Was I to turn down an invitation like that? Hell no! It was an honor and pleasure to join in for the festivities.

While the anticipated bottles of the night waited in the wings, we got things rolling with some fantastic grower Champagne from Laherte Frères (more on that at a later date).

Chef Calmels' trout gravlax — diced, ringed with cucumber, drizzled with basil vinegar, and topped with baby mustard greens — was one of the stand-out dishes of the night and a lovely match with our bubbly. After another course or two (corn soup with duck prosciutto, a terrine of sweetbreads), it was time to visit the birthday girl's wines.

All I can say is, "Thanks, Kelly, for being born in a good year." I'm a year younger (I'll leave the math to you, kind reader) and was not so lucky. In fact, I've yet to even have a wine from my own birth year, generally considered fair at best, more often bad to worse, in just about every wine growing region on the planet.

These '64s from Oddero, though, were drinking impressively well. My pal Bill had picked them up, especially for Kelly's birthday, from a shop that occasionally buys and sells wines from private collections. While the corks in both were showing their age, crumbling upon extraction, both wines were startlingly young in both appearance and structure.

The 1964 Barbaresco, I think we all agreed, was the wine of the night, still showing a dark red, only slightly going-to-garnet color in the glass; a rich, supple texture; and fruit tones that started out surprisingly primary then took on aromas of spice, roses and dried red fruits with air. The '64 Barolo, in comparison, was a touch darker, similarly evolved but much more brooding and animal in its aromas and textures, showing even greater overall youth and, as expected, more muscular structure. Both wines were a joy to experience but both, I feel, could easily have continued to develop for another couple of decades (though perhaps not without being re-corked).

Of the dishes that Pierre matched to the old Barbaresco and Barolo, my favorite was a last-minute surprise: veal ribeye and baby brussel sprouts on a bed of white bean purée and veal jus. Executed perfectly, the dish was a very fine match with the aromatic complexity and mid-life structure of our two Nebbioli.

Having been clued-in to the birthday girl's surprise, I'd brought along a much younger bottle from Oddero, their 2006 Barbaresco "Gallina." You know, simply for academic purposes. It, too, was on a good night, pure and vibrant, as surprisingly approachable in its near-sinful youth as the '64s were surprisingly youthful in their... well, like I said, you can do the math.