Desire lines

Salted caramel chocolate at first, then greengage, cocoa, aged sweet Chenin from the Loire and madeira sponge cake. A dram that induces hushed silence. It continues with melon liqueur, raspberry cordial, muesli, spiced dark fruits, rum cocktails, gingerbread and figs in syrup. A rather humbling complexity. Reduction brings savoury umami, dense chocolate, black pepper warmth, nutty, meaty and bready qualities. Leaf mulch, aged cigars, red chilli and leathery game meats. The mouth upheld this dazzling complexity with brown bread smothered in treacle, caramelising brown sugar, toffee apples, cider brands, blackcurrant cordial, bread pudding, sugary black tea and bitter marmalade. Water brought aged calvados, old white balsamic, endless dark fruits, wintergreen, cough sweets, dried marjoram and a kind of herb-tinged sooty waxiness. Sublimely complex and mesmerising.