Wine Geekery and Gadgetry

It's happened, I'm becoming a Wine Geek, well either that or a Wine Bore. Geek is preferable though. My sister has given me time slots to talk about wine, outside of these times wine is not to be mentioned. This is proving to be quite difficult. What did I talk about before this growing interest in wine? This is quite a worrying question and an additional hobby may be required.

However this blog is about wine so I can chat about it to my heart's content here and at any future events we do. (Really hope to do one in the next couple of months). But to indulge my geekery and try not to be a bore each of my posts will end with an interesting wine gizmo, because, hey who doesn't love to accessorise!

Presenting the Tether Lasso!



Unfortunately it only appears to be available in The States but what an amazing invention! No more worries about dishwasher wine glass breakage! I want some, and I don't even have a dishwasher!

The Whine List

Before I start, I have to say that the vast vast majority of my wine experiences are positive, even when I may not like a wine, I will always look for appreciation of it and think about why it may not be of my personal taste. An example of this is Vin Jaune from the Jura. I met loads of incredibly friendly, enthusiastic producers at the Vignerons Independents exposition in Paris last year but I bloody can't stand that wine! However I know it isn't a bad wine, it is just a certain style and let's face it, probably quite an acquired taste as you don't see it in any restaurants or shops here (let me know if you do please!).

Anyway, I like to think I am thoughtful and mindful when considering the qualities of a wine without just dismissing it as being bad or cheap without any justification. It is with this mindfulness that leads me to my big whine; wine lists in pubs. Not old man pubs and not the top end gastro-pubs but the pubs, the, particularly round my way Antic pubs, the we-serve-really-nice-food but the wine is an after-thought pubs. Trying hard here not to sound like a wine snob, but I'm finding it increasingly difficult to buy a lovely decent glass or bottle of wine in these types of establishments. I think the reason it frustrates me so much is that in the world there is so much wonderful good value wine, I just feel all these places are really missing a trick, however I expect there are brewery politics to contend with in many places. But next time I'm in a pub drinking a bottle of Rioja (not by myself), I'd rather it wasn't called Livor! (My problem, I know!)

So whine over. Some great wine lists I have experienced recently are:

Gong - Top O' the Shard, to you and I! A wonderful array of proper quality wines that actually for the location don't completely break the bank and taste amazing. First up is the Grüner Veltliner, Prager ‘Hinter der Burg’, Wachau, Austria, 2012. 

 A wine with lovely mineral undertones and bags of citrus with a sprinkle of spice. A beautiful smooth refreshing white wine. We then moved to the dark side and wow! The Shaw & Smith Shiraz, Adelaide Hills, Australia, 2012.

This was chocolaty, oaky, subtle dark berries, the most velvety tannins. A total knockout!
Here is my friend Victoria (another knock out, coincidentally she did teach me how to box!), very happy drinking some in the highest bar in Europe!

The Rivington, Greenwich - I have had issue with the weird offally food this place offers and the beans on toast they did at some point, but I do have some strange food issues so I'm going to attempt to get over them. Anyway, I'm happy to visit this this place not to eat, the wine list is great! A white Musar, well I have to try that! They have the great Tandem Syrah (Mentioned in the Morocco post) but I tried the red Bacio-cielo (Kiss the sky), Conciliis 2011, an Aglianico Barbera blend. It had a lovely depth, with a definite sweet cherry flavour with a hint of leather and well integrated tannins. A very good wine, makes me want to go back and try the rest!

So next on my Wine Hit List is The Sportsman in Seasalter. I am beyond excited about going there for my birthday in two weeks, I mean, they sell my favourite Viognier from a fairly small producer! They definitely have taste!

If you have a wine list you've loved recently please let me know.

Wine of the Month - A New Dawn for Dornfelder?

As part of the blog I am going to introduce a Wine of the Month post which will feature two wines. One, a mid-range (£5-£10) bottle, easily available and the other a high to premium priced  (£10-£30) bottle which could be a little more difficult to get hold of.


Throughout December and so far in January I have experienced some fabulous wines, as you will have seen in the Christmas post and easily all of them could be Wines of the Month. However for January I have chosen two.

On the way back from Germany after the New Year celebrations I had some time to kill in Hamburg Airport. Now, I wouldn't usually buy food or alcohol in airports as their mark-ups are utterly ridiculous and make you kick yourself for not having made time for proper shopping beforehand but as I only had hand luggage there was no possibility of buying wine to take back to London at any other point in the trip so my purchases are well justified!
I was pleasantly surprised by the German wine selection in the airport shop. There were many kinds of Eiswein, lots of Pinot Noir and Rieslings but also a couple of Dornfelders. The 2012 Dr. Loosen Mosel Reisling Eiswein and a 2012 Anselmann Dornfelder from Pfalz made it into my basket after much perusing.
These were then debuted at a family dinner the following evening. No one around the table (myself included) had drank a wine made with the Dornfelder grape before. I had my suspicions that the reason for this was probably because Dornfelder did not really make particularly good wines, well that was instantly disproved! But since hearing that Dornfelder is one of the only black grapes that is being planted in the UK I have been very curious about it.
One place that currently sells it is Bolney Estate in Sussex and a gentleman I met at the Winchester Wine Festival from the Danebury Vinyards in Hampshire informed me that they were growing it there. This Anselmann Dornfelder had a beautiful violetty, floral nose, with less obvious notes of black fruit coming through, in the mouth there were plum and cherry notes with a sweet vanilla flavour from the time spent in oak barrels, without an overwhelming oaky taste and a lovely smooth creamy richness in the mouth, the tannins and acid were well integrated into the wine despite it being a young wine. It was very easy to drink and went well with our turkey pie (yep, still had some turkey left over!). Everyone was very impressed with this wine so it has been designated my first Wine of the Month, but has had to slip into the upper price bracket as although around 10 euro at the airport, it is more expensive when trying to buy it here.

Over now to the Dr. Loosen. Dr. Loosen is probably one of the most famous quality Mosel Riesling producers in Germany. There are always pictures of their bottles in the WSET accompanying texts, so it is for those reasons I selected their Eiswein, (Icewine - made from pressing frozen grapes) and because it was a Riesling. Some of the Eisweins on sale were made from different grapes and I was a bit skeptical about those as there are few grapes that have the versatility to make both great dry and sweet wines and I know that Riesling is definitely one of them, as is Chenin Blanc.

The Dr. Loosen was popped open after the turkey pie and luckily for me, while there was still (a rather large amount of) Stilton about. This was certainly an interesting wine, with a frisson of frizzante as is the case with many Rieslings. A great wine to end an evening on as it has a very low alcohol content of 6.5% due to the halting of fermentation to retain the sweetness and the fact that Rieslings tend to have a lower alcohol content coming from a cooler climate.

We all enjoyed the wine but felt that it was not such great value. At around £20 for a quarter bottle (yes, a quarter bottle!) it was a super-premium price. This is justified to an extent, producing Eiswein is very very costly and particularly on the steep high slopes of Bernkastel in the Mosel. It is labour intensive and you need to pay a lot to get pickers to drop whatever else it is that they are doing to harvest in below zero degree temperatures, often around Christmas time or New Year. I think the Canadian Icewine harvest just happened about 2 days ago actually.
From a purely drinking point of view though and for a quarter of the price I would opt for a Coteaux du Layon any day. Though this Eiswein did have some delicious notes of lime, it was very citrusy, in a lovely sweet way, there were also notes of honey and dried fruit. It is a very full-bodied, even syrupy wine and I thought that the petillance gave it another quite unusual dimension. A very good wine but I probably won't buy it again! But here it is, the smallest bottle of wine in the world! I should have put something next to it so you can see how small (cute, if not so pricey) is actually is!

The second Wine of the Month is made from a grape I mentioned earlier - Chenin Blanc. I have cheated with this wine. I first drank it in December and it costs £10.50, so 51p over budget. I apologise, but it is a sensational wine, easily available as you can get it in the co-op. I think it is excellent value for what it is and not your typical dry white wine either. Here it is:

A beautiful white Savennieres 2013, Domaine Des Forges, Le Moulin de Gue. Like a Vouvray, also from the Loire, this is a white wine that can age, but I felt on drinking, that it is perfect for drinking now. The wine has a deep  flavour which come with some oak ageing. There were lemon and apple flavours, but with a clean and rich minerality cutting through. I felt it to be complex, yet refreshing and full of flavour. I would suggest a meatier fish maybe with this wine, possibly monkfish, yet there was an underlying delicacy in this wine so it could well compliment a lighter more delicate fish such as sea bream and I imagine it would go very nicely with scallops.
So there we have it, my Wines of the Month. If you have the chance give them a go and I would love to hear what you think about them or any suggestions you may have.

A Very Berry Christmas and a Glucklich New Year!

So, this was Christmas and thanks to my growing knowledge of wine I had the privilege of selecting the vast majority of the Christmas wines! A challenge I was extremely excited to be undertaking. Also rather a difficult one as there was a lot to think about. The wonderful thing about Christmas day is that it is the only day of the year where we drink wine with breakfast! Well, sparkling wine of course! So there were lots of pairing (and pacing) considerations. I'll begin:

Breakfast
To continue the sparkling wine tradition a lovely Cava was served up with the smoked salmon and scrambled egg, a Brut Castilla Perelada Cava purchased from the Castilla itself, fruity and buttery thanks to the traditional method and cheap enough to not feel guilty when transforming it into a Bucks Fizz.

Lunch
Well, what a feast. Goose and turkey and gammon! So the traditional Chateaux Leoville 2003 St Julien Bordeaux magnum was dragged up from the cellar and a very nice 2005 Chateau St-Pierre St Julien too, these very well selected by my dad and perfect with the goose (most excellently prepared by my sister Anne-Louise). I popped in a Lebanese classic, the Chateau Musar 2007 to add a little Arabian spice and excitement and that was the contribution to the main meal. I had decided that post-lunch wine could be my focus. So after eating and eating and drinking and eating we drank some more, this time a wonderful wine introduced to me during the WSET level 3 course at Berry's. A vino da meditazione, a wine to just enjoy and while away the time, no food required. This delightful smooth, caramel and cherry tasting extravaganza is definitely wine for an occasion at £47 a pop, we were drinking a 2009 Amarone de Valpolicella Classico Riserva, Le Balze. After a little break from the food came the cheese!

Cheese
My friend Lucy and her mum Barbara joined us for this part of the day. All the cheeses were from Neal's Yard Dairy in Borough Market apart from the Comte, which was bought from the stall selling mostly Comte in Borough Market. To pair with the Comte and other nutty hard cheeses I chose a white Gravonia Rioja Reserva 2004, my other sister Marie-Claire quite controversially said it tasted like water!? In a way she had a point, she was drinking it after having a glass of the rather lovely Waitrose Brut Special Reserve Vintage 2006 Champagne produced by Piper-Heidsieck, which with it's high levels of acidity and bubbles would make many white wines taste blander by natural comparison, but that was a bit unfair. I really liked the Rioja, but I have to say when I had tasted it the first time at the Winchester Wine fair I was more taken with it, in hindsight now I might have opted for it's slightly more expensive older sister the Tondonia Rioja but it still had a lovely mellow, mildly nutty flavour, yet surprisingly light, which I welcomed at that point of the day.
Also on offer with the platter of cheese was another Berry's discovery and a wine I shall love for the rest of my life, a Malvasia, 10 year old, Vinhos Barbeito, Madeira. An unctuous dried fruit and honey delight (Christmas pudding in a glass! Kind of, except I don't like Christmas pudding but I liked that), this just tasted amazing with everything! However, because we had to try even more wine (it was Christmas) a very little bottle of the sweet Coteaux du Layon reared it's tiny head and made a big impression with the very large quarter wheel of Stilton. And this is why I am now on a serious diet! I do have to say though that I am so happy that I have discovered Coteaux du Layon recently, it is a fabulous wine and I have managed to get a few friends to buy bottles (from Waitrose), so I shall continue in 2015 to spread the Layon love. The one I bought was from Davy's Wine Shop in Greenwich. I don't have the details and can't remember the name (shame on me) but they only had the one kind. It is quite difficult to buy in this country and is easily as lovely as a good Sauternes.
So here's the photo of most of the wonderful line-up. The Rioja made it into Boxing day! Went very nicely with Christmas dinner no. 2.

The diet however did not start on New Year's Eve! I was in Germany visiting my friend Erika and her German fiance Sven. I was lucky enough to be invited to eat at a wonderful restaurant not far from their home in Flensburg called Norditeran. It was a fabulous 8 course tasting menu - see below and see if you understand it - I couldn't, but it didn't matter as it was all delicious!

To accompany this fine array of flavours we got well stuck into a beautifully aromatic Markus Molitor 2013 Pinot Blanc which was a wonder to behold with lobster. I then chose a French oaked Chardonnay, following that Erika picked an outstanding Spatburgunder (Pinot Noir to you and I) which I have to say was probably the most lovely Pinot Noir I have ever drunk (and I'm not it's biggest fan), but it being NYE and me having photography issues, I didn't get it's name!! Biggest regret of 2014! I'm on the case though. So not a Riesling consumed but my eyes (and tastebuds) are now so more open to German wines, and rather sad that there are not more of the varieties mentioned above readily available to buy over here. In my next post I will be continuing the German theme with a couple I bought at the airport (no other choice, only had hand luggage). One will feature in my new Wine of the Month post. Auf Wiedersehen!

Portugal and Morocco - A Discovery of Southern Wine

Thanks to Eid this year Friday 3rd of October was a holiday so I seized the chance to take myself away on a mini-break to Sagres (yep the beer is named after it!) in the Algarve, Portugal. Although the Algarve is not an area known for it's wine there are lots of local producers and I found the wine to be be fruity and delicious, of which the reds have a great affinity for oak. A good local producer is Quinta do Barranco Longo and one of our favourite meals was in a restaurant in Vila do Bispo called A Eira do Mel where they had a great selection of local wines. One of the wines or should I say experiences, that I truly loved was a white Dao, drunk with fish on a terrace over looking the sea, it was a perfect moment and one sadly that was unsuccessfully recreated in southeast London. White Dao is definitely a wine that needs a holiday context! But some lovely house wines were consumed, Vila Velha did a nice line in Quinta do Carqueijal Duoro wines both red and white which were very good value. However being in Sagres more beer than usual was consumed on this holiday.

With the arrival of half term came a highly anticipated trip to Morocco. I remember my first ever trip there about 15 years ago being a very sober affair, wine wasn't something I was particularly interested in then and being a Muslim country alcohol was quite difficult to get hold of and was rather pricey because of it, though I do remember getting very drunk on a bottle of rose in a Chinese restaurant in Casablanca! This time however most places we stayed in had a fantastic selection of Moroccan wines. The first part of the trip was in Marrakech staying in the very well located Riad Dar Najat. Our first meal was at the highly recommended La Maison Arabe where I had my first ever glass of Vin Gris, no, it's not grey! More orange really, but very similar to a rose in style. I wasn't blown away, but it was very pleasant. We then moved on to reds, the Cuvee President Cabernet Rouge, which was a perfect if not very exciting accompaniment to our tagines. I was excited to see a Syrah, Tandem by the French winemaker Alain Graillot on their wine list which happened to be their most expensive wine as the Wine Society used to sell it, don't know why they no longer do, luckily I still have a bottle, it is a lovely full-bodied spicy Syrah and as it says, a great accompaniment to a lamb dish.
There are 14 wine regions in Morocco and a lot of the wines I saw on the wine lists came from the areas of Gerrouane near Meknes. Most wine lists had many of the same wines on them which  included the Domaine de Sahari Reserve, a Bordeaux blend from the Gerrouane, which became a firm favourite, particularly with our dinners at Maroc Lodge in the foothills of the Atlas Mountains. The manager David hails from Burgundy so he knew his stuff when making the wine recommendations! The wine industry is really growing in Morocco and it shouldn't be too long until there are some firmly on the shelves in our supermarkets as they are truly delicious, full-bodied and fruity, great with food and very good value.

New Year, New Wine & New Qualification (fingers crossed!) - Summer Summary

So it has been a while and lots (wine-wise) has been experienced. I sat the WSET Level 3 exams last month (results pending), been to tastings in Winchester, London and Paris, sampled some beautiful French, Spanish, Portuguese and Moroccan wines in their respective countries over the summer and just returned from NYE in Germany where I managed to make more sense of the German Wine classifications which were slightly eluding me in the run up to the Level 3 exam! All that may be why I have failed to write any posts since June! However a new year and less intense studying is incentivising me to start writing more regularly and sharing my wonderful wine experiences. I shall now attempt a brief summary of my experiences over the holiday months of July to the end of August with the following posts bringing us more up to date. I shall focus primarily on the stand out wines encountered since my last post. Please excuse the lack of accents on foreign words, I have not yet mastered how to insert them on my mac.

Much of summer was spent in France. My father and I travelled from London in the car down through Burgundy and the Rhone to our destination, close to Mirepoix in the Ariege which is where we spend most of our family holidays.

As much as I can appreciate a good Pinot Noir, my wallet and inclination did not lead us to pursue a buying or tasting foray in the Cotes de Beaune or Nuits so we focused on more southern parts of Burgundy. Our first night was spent in the Macon region of Burgundy at La Marande, (http://www.hotel-restaurant-la-marande.com/uk/index.php) a small hotel with a great restaurant (quite odd decor!) with of course a great wine list. We drank some St Veran, Deux Roches 2011, a lovely soft, minerally yet buttery dry white wine with some apricot notes and a very nice Mercurey Vielles Vignes Raquillet 2012 with lots of red fruit flavours with some subtle metallic notes. The following day we shopped and tasted in Macon, known for it's beautiful buttery, fruity and rich chardonnays, which are always brilliant value. We visited both Talmard Domaines (they are cousins I believe) in the village of Uchizy and bought rather a few bottles at both including a Talmard Macon-Chardonnay, I will always be excited to buy a Chardonnay made in the village of Chardonnay! Then a trip to Vire-Clesse to the Domaine Bonhomme was in order to purchase some of their outstanding wines (my sister Anne-Louise's favourites "I don't like Chardonnay but I love Vire-Clesse!").
We then travelled down to Condrieu in the Northern Rhone - see the proof below! Via Beaujolais.

After a quick stop at George DuBoeuf's empire near Moulin A Vent in Beaujolais and an interesting visit to the Moulin A Vent Cru Chateau de Jacques (one in Louis Jadot's portfolio, the most atypical Beaujolais Cru I have ever tasted!) we travelled down to the village of Condrieu. We stayed at the gorgeous river-side Beau Rivage hotel http://www.hotel-beaurivage.com/en and ate at their stunning restaurant (most extensive impressive French Wine list ever!) where we opted for the tasting menu where I got to taste for the first time ever a Viognier from Condrieu! At last a taste of my favourite white grape from and in it's native home! An evening to remember. It was a Merlin Condrieu 2012, a much more subtle affair than I am used to but a sensational wine none the less with notes of pineapple and banana and very creamy, a good fish pairing I believe. We also experienced a wonderful white Crozes Hermitage, Charpoutier, Petite Ruche 2012. A wonderful complex wine with a smooth full finish. And of course in the Northern Rhone no meal would be complete without a Syrah, so over to a Cote Rotie Sarrasine Bonserine 2011. It had all the pepper you would expect with black fruit flavours with some oak, coffee and ash all chucked in for good measure but we suspected it might have been a bit young with a slightly astringent flavour and rather high level of tannins which weren't yet well integrated into the wine. However, kept a few years would definitely be impressive. One star of the evening was the St-Joseph Faury 2012 white wine made with the Marsanne grape, it was a very complex wine, with apple, lemon and mineral notes and a beautiful and sustained finish. It needs food but really blew us away. So after a sensational meal that included foie gras, salmon, pigeon and the BEST CHEESEBOARD EVER.

The meal was accompanied by a massive awe-inspiring storm over the Rhone. The following day we set sail (almost had to after the storm!) to the Southern Rhone (a region very close to my dad's heart). After spending a small fortune on a couple of bottles of Condrieu we paid a visit to the Cave de Tain where much Marsanne-Roussanne was bought and a few red Crozes-Hermitages. Then down to one of my dad's favourite wine makers; St Damien in Gigondas.
There he is buying up the place.

Their St Damien Gigondas Classique Vielles Vignes red wines is one of the most sensational, earthy, dirty, fruity full-bodied wines. It ages extremely well and benefits from a good decanting a couple of hours before drinking to get all the lovely intense flavours going.
So after spending some time and a lot of money down in the cellar next to their (newly en vogue concrete vats) we set off with not even space for a half bottle left in the car and a worrying suspension concern to our destination in the Ariege.

A summer spent in this part of the world would not be the same without at least one lunch spent at the Domaine Gayda in the Malpere region (http://www.domainegayda.com/) where I think their IGP Viognier competes easily with those tried and tasted in Condrieu. Their Syrah and Grenache IGP wines are not to be missed either. Another local favourite is also the Chateau Pennautier (http://www.lorgeril.com/1-32888-Chateau-de-Pennautier.php?connect=ok) in Cabardes. Their red AOC Cabardes Collection D'Altitude is as good as any Bordeaux Cru Classe and never fails to knock my socks off, an outstanding wine. Also in the Malpere is the lovely Chateau de Cointes (http://www.chateaudecointes.com/). They knock out a lovely AOC Malpere and some pretty beautiful others including their Blanc de Jean, Rouge de Noelle and a red Clemence. They always hold an annual summer party where you can try their wines and the food this time was pretty good too, with delicious mussels, cheeses and various canapes accompanied by live music and sunshine!

With the proximity to Spain, it would have been a missed opportunity not to pop to the Costa Brava and my favourite city Barcelona. Apart from the famous red Palermo prawns, a highlight of this trip was the beautiful house wine drunk at my sister and I's favourite Catalan restaurant in Barcelona Cal Boter (http://www.restaurantcalboter.com/en/) a great value, down to earth restaurant in the Gracia district. They traditionally serve the house wine in a Porron (see photo of my sister Anne-Louise!).

You can drink it from the narrow pouring opening but after witnessing a gentleman spill it all down his shirt (much to our amusement) we opted to pour it in our glasses. The wine is included in the 11 euro lunch menu, it was easily half a litre and I had to ask what it was as it was so smooth, fruity, oaky and delicious, turns out it was a Priorat, the nicest of which I can remember drinking! Unfortunately I made very few notes on my short trip to Spain but quite a few DOC Emporda Perelada wines, including their Cava was purchased. Unfortunately after these exciting experiences work beckoned on 1st September.