19-01-2012
Brilliant, a wine tasting at the home of cricket, Lords (or Marylebone Cricket Club) in London to sample French only - strange choice of venue - I have never met a Frenchman (or woman) who has the vaguest understanding of this fine game. Still, they find it funny that we try to make wine ( I did try and explain the brilliance of our award winning sparkling wines....). Anyway I was as equally impressed by the setting as I was by a few of the wines on show.
90 small, independent producers with their offerings from all corners of France - some with only 2 or 3 employees, these are not wines you will find in Tesroseburys etc. What they did show was what great little wine producers with huge enthusiasm can do, and promote some of the more ignored regions. Think of them as the sort of wine you find by mistake in that little bistro in the middle of nowhere when you are rushing on to somewhere more lively.
My copious notes and Franglais chats threw up Roussillon down in the foothills of the Pyrenees as a region worth your attention. Overshadowed by the more marketed Languedoc next door, this hot, arid and vast area is producing easy drinking juicy reds from classic Syrah, Cabernet, Grenache and high quality Mourvedre grapes. The sort of wine to swig roughly out of tumblers during the week or around the Bar-B-Q, and reasonably priced at about £5 - £7. A speciality of this region are the fortified sweet reds from Banyuls on the coast. Lovely rich, nutty wines in the style of light Port - the perfect after dinner treat and heavenly with chocolate. Other names for this style are Maury or Rivesaltes.
From the more established regions a lovely older couple were promoting their Muscadet. A long ignored dry, tangy white that is quaffing and shellfish friendly as well as being on trend with its light 12% alcohol. Refreshing, and with a hint of spritz, it really should be challenging Sauvignon Blanc and Pinot Grigio as the default dry white choice. If you can get past the old fashioned labels you'll see what I mean.
Two other pointers - the white grape Rolle (aka Vermentino in Italy) from Provence, making fruity, sun filled ripe wines at a quality level to rival good Chardonnay- well worth its £10 tag. Rosé, good ones abounded, all dry, pale coral pink and refreshing, my favourites were from around Nimes in the southern Rhone valley made from Syrah and Grenache grapes. Roll on spring and summer.
Now, the LBW rule in French...
Santé
29-11-2011
Everybody seemed to hunker down and drink more wine at home this year. Rather than pay £20+ for a bottle in a restaurant, spending half that meant really good choices from the high street. What did I find? Well surely its "enough already" with NZ Sauvignon Blanc - such a good quality style but it is everywhere and all pretty much the same. Experimenters went for some less well known European (old world) whites - Greek Santorini, French Picpoul de Pinet and Italian Falanghina anyone? Spanish Godello and possibly even German Riesling?! We are so lucky in the UK to have all this choice, so why not give them a go? 2011 finally saw the acceptance of English sparkling wine as at least on a par with a lot of Champagne (and why not - it's the same soils, topography and grapes on the South Downs). Get over the fact that they will cost the same and you really can't go wrong with Ridgeview or Nyetimber's bubbles, but, be quick, they sell out. My personal top wine moment this year was a style that is difficult to enjoy regularly, mature red Bordeaux (or Claret as it is decreasingly known). With 10 years ageing, a gamey, savoury red wine appears, all singed meat and blackcurrant with a soft hint of cigar box tobacco!!! Very nice but either stupidly expensive or returned as 'corked'. A Sunday lunch of roast lamb made this my vineous highlight.
So here we are again with the big day - huge meals nearly upon us and lakes of wine offerings. Answer - drink what you like, why make it complicated? If you like Bucks Fizz made with cheap Cava go for it and the myriad of food styles that you WILL be consuming means the wine has a hard time competing. Generally the bigger styles of both whites and reds will stand up better with the foods (generally from hotter new world countries) while fresher, more acidic wines from cooler countries will work as aperitifs or revivers!!
I do think a decent annual bottle of Port is worthwhile though - look for LBV (late bottled vintage) on the label and add a slab of English blue cheese, a cox's apple and a Digestive biscuit. Only for Father Christmas of course...
HAPPY CHRISTMAS. FESTIVE DRINKING!!
19-10-2011
First frost of the season and suddenly I don't want any more cold whites or refreshing rosé... No it's definitely time to BRING OUT THE BIG REDS. Think bonfires and smokiness and my vineous thoughts are all oaky Shiraz, chunky Argentinian Malbecs and perhaps soft Italian Nero d'Avola or Primitivo (aka Zinfandel).
A big warming glass of this style of red and a good plate of sausages with buttery mash will banish all thoughts of the recent Indian summer. Welcome back comfort wines.....
18-10-2011
So the summer never happened then (and you probably drank all the cold pinks back in April's heatwave) and those nights are drawing in... what to savour now? Returning holidaying friends have really enjoyed Greek wines and some are appearing on our high street shelves, the whites from Cephalonia are great food wines while generally the big soft reds remind me of decent Rioja. Definitely worth a try and the Greek economy could do with the help right now too.
Meanwhile, I have been teaching groups of restaurant staff recently and part of the training involves sampling many different food styles with different wine styles (I know, it's a job!). One of the most surprising results has been the great combination of decent hard cheeses (think mature Cheddar, good Edam, Emmental that sort of style) with many white wines. We tend to think red wines always fit the bill here (and it may be all that is left on the table) but give it a go, I was pleasantly surprised.
And something for the future - a red Chinese wine has just been awarded a Trophy at the Decanter annual competition. Great potential and with enough investment many more to come - watch out!
18-10-2011
Pimms is a nice change, adding one of those new alcoholic ginger beers really gives it a kick and visually a few borage flowers makes it very pretty too...
Accidentally left a bottle of Italian red Montepulciano in the fridge and finished it cold with some Italian treats like olives, salami, parmesan and breadsticks - very nice on a warm evening. Just make sure your red isn't a huge Merlot or Shiraz and isn't really oaky either and chilling should work nicely.
Lovely tangy cold fino sherry as an aperitif, anytime...
Home made lemonade. My 11 year old daughter makes a mean version - just juice and bits of 2 lemons, caster sugar to taste, sparkling water and loads of ice. Job done (although a 6 o'clock dash of good gin takes it to another level!).
Wine, almost forgot to keep drinking dry rosé. There are so many around now it seems rude not to. Avoiding any weird, cheap blush styles, I have recently had good English ones (Waitrose) and chunkier tapas-friendly Spanish from the Somontano region using Tempranillo (the red Rioja) grape. Also had a really good (i.e. not too eye wateringly fresh) Sauvignon Blanc from Slovenia which makes a change to N.Z.
Not forgetting chilled English ales - any of the bottle conditioned ones really, lump of cheddar, pork pie, cricket on the radio...
Happy days - enjoy the sun!!
