After hoodwinking the Russians in Operation Payback Lola Frieberg aka Tirana Tigress and the Penniless Pensioner wisely decided to head back to PP’s home in Toronto a luxurious penthouse The Lonsdale on Avenue Road with a huge wrap around balcony and a view of the campus of Upper Canada College. If the Russians ever got wind of his sabotage of the Iranian drones rewired so they would return to the Russian and Belarusian batteries from whence they were fired PP would be dead. As it stands President Putin has been so humiliated, he most likely will soon be dead. So far all is clear and for the time being Lola and PP have a two person RCMP security detail discretely protecting them. In a secret ceremony in Ottawa the purple haired Governor General of Canada would soon bestow the Order of Canada on PP for his bravery in the Ukrainian conflict. Lola is 22 years younger than PP!
We decide to celebrate after I pick them up at Toronto Pearson Airport. They come to my little Leaside house where we celebrate. Both Lola and PP are bloated and gassy after ingesting putrid Air Canada food on their flight from Athens. The trick then is to fight gas with gas so I open a Crémant de Bourgogne rosé. It is a Labouré-Gontard.
PP is so sick of the Ukrainian sparkling wine he had in Albania he just about retched when I poured a glass of the Crémant. It had an anemic pink colour which could promise just rip snorting acidity and too little fruit? The bubbles are not fine but they are rip snorting! Some gentle raspberry, strawberry and a bit of field tomato skirting about the edges. On the palate sharp and crisp. I say to my guests knowing the queasiness Air Canada food causes to let lose with a few belches and for a few minutes the wine does battle with the squalid Air Canada pig slop and wins. There is some strawberry and raspberry but the sharp cutting acidity is rather classic brut. Cleans up the palate which is extra important with dry chicken in Campbell Soup tomato sauce and plastic cheese, stale roll, limp salad and the dark chocolate square that never was as the hot dish had been placed on top of the chocolate. And the wine low tier French wine the white being a Colombard long ago used in California jug “Chablis”.
The Crémant is no better or worse than many of the entry level Champagnes on the market but a third the price and as there is “penniless” in PP’s name he warms up to the wine’s price tag.
PP also says we have his new book to celebrate “My Life as the Penniless Pensioner” which will be released here on this site in a serialized basis sometime early in 2023. By the way I will be the ghost writer!
We also celebrate the anticipated birth of their child in March of 2023. Has the Penniless Pensioner finally witnessing stability with the Tirana Tigress? They are cuddling up a storm after a huge round of raucous belches which have cleared the Air Canada induced bloating. PP remarks even Air Albania can prepare better food than Air Canada!
(Brut Rosé Labouré-Gontard Crémant de Bourgogne AOP, Mersault, France, $21.95, 750 mL, 12%, Liquor Control Board of Ontario # 460816, RKS Wine Rating 88/100).
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