Millet and Pommery
A dining experience
- 2 - 4.30 pm
- 6.15 - 8.45 pm
Tickets
| Lunch: | £160 |
| Dinner: | £195 |
This event is available to House Members.
Fully booked
This event is now fully booked. Become a member to gain access to Members' exclusive events.
About
Join us for a very special dining experience celebrating the current exhibition, 'Millet: Life on the Land' with Champagne Pommery.
Jean-Francois Millet was the foremost painter of French rural life. Marking the 150th anniversary of his death, Supporters' House hosts a private dining experience with Champagne Pommery. Hosted by Martin Dibben, Head of Wine & Champagne at Searcys, and Sara Hicks of Champagne Pommery, the four-course menu draws inspiration from seasonal harvests, French flavours and cuvées, telling a story of Madame Pommery and Jean-Francois Millet.
You'll learn about the young widow, Jeanne-Alexandrine Pommery, who quashed rumours of over-extended finances by purchasing Millet's 'The Gleaners'. You'll also enjoy vintage cuvées, rare bottles from the Pommery cave and share inspiration taken from the exhibition with fellow Members.
This will be our first special dining experience within the Private Dining Room, a room dressed in copper and inspired by JMW Turner’s penchant for painting sunsets. The menu, developed by Executive Chef Imma Savinelli, includes goats’ cheese mousse with heritage tomatoes and tarragon, as well as seabass and mussels with cream velouté and parsley oil.
Dietary requirements can be accommodated but must be communicated at least 7 days before the event takes place. Non-alcoholic options are available. Please note you will be sat at a shared table and served individually.
Cheese straws reception paired with Pommery Brut Royal NV in magnum
Lunch
Starter: Burrata, tomatoes basil, paired with Pommery Apanage Blanc de Blancs NV
Main: Pan fried stone bass, mash potatoes, chantarelle mushroom, beurre blanc, chives, paired with Pommery Brut Apanage 1874
Dessert: Vanilla pannacotta with berries compote, paired with Pommery Brut Rose NV
On arrival, Pommery Brut Apanage 1874 in magnum
Dinner
Starter: Burrata, heritage tomatoes, basil, paired with Pommery Cuvée 150
First course: Risotto wild mixed mushroom, 36-month Parmigiano Reggiano Cheese, paired with Pommery Apanage Blanc de Noirs NV
Main: Beef fillet, parsnip puree, Swiss chard, crispy parsnip, paired with Pommery Grand Cru Vintage 2009
Dessert: Vanilla pannacotta with berries compote, paired with Pommery Apanage Rosé NV
Madame Pommery
After the death of her husband, the young widow, Jeanne-Alexandrine Pommery took over the running of the wine business. With big plans to make a champagne of ‘joyful lightness’, Madame Pommery began an immense building project at Domaine Pommery. At this neo-Gothic Elizabethan-style castle in the heart of Reims, she requested her vigneron to leave the grapes on the vine longer, delaying harvest and thus sales. This request resulted in the invention of ‘Company patronage’ almost 30 years ahead of the rest of the world. Yet the rumors began. Had Madame Pommery overextended her finances?
To quash these rumours, she heard of a painting for sale in Paris and asked her staff to bid on it anonymously at auction in 1889. Millet's 'The Gleaners' was on sale at the height of his popularity. Madame Pommery purchased the painting for 300,000 Francs, sending the French press into a frenzy at the possible risk that 'The Gleaners' may be lost to France. Madame Pommery then let it be known that she had acquired the painting, silencing the gossip around her financial situation. Upon her death in 1891, she bequeathed the painting to the Louvre for all of France to enjoy. It is now at the Musée D’Orsay, Paris.