Vintage Madeira Sercial

How else to warm up for a trade tasting of invigorating Champagne this afternoon? Penetrating Sercial Madeira from the year that brought us the Boy Scouts of America. If wine were merit badges perhaps I'd nearly be an Eagle by now... After this evening's tasting I'll have quite a heavy merit badge sash for Champagne -an obsession that can reach no surfeit -it becomes more fascinating and evermore nuanced. For the moment however I'm awash in crushed kumquats in honey, marmalade, hazelnuts and roast peanuts -all layered among so much more in one of the richest Sercial Madeiras I've tried to date.