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Articoli marcati con tag ‘Pinot Noir’

Unfortunately I could not attend the Bring a bottle club this month due, on this occasion, to a work commitment.  But every cloud has a silver lining: here is a guest blog from Rob: 

For the second notable birthday of the month, attention was focussed on a region known by reputation by all of us and especially by our birthday boy. Through the BBC’s association with Caviste we have a fondness for Australian wines, but more so perhaps for the Barossa. Nonetheless we all felt confident of spotting a cooler climate Margaret River chardonnay or cabernet sauvignon: so how would we fair with all of Western Australia to go at?

Two themes emerged. Firstly, in an interesting twist on the excellent Two Ronnies’ “Mastermind” sketch, an ability to identify the next wine and how wines age differently in Western Australia (and classically the whole of the New World) than the old.

First up, four whites of excellent calibre and unanimity of order of preference from the group.

We started with a lively fresh, limey, just-the-right-amount-of-petrol, well, riesling surely? “Chardonnay” declared one member of the group. Il 2009 Plantagenet, Great Southern, Riesling was a good example of cooler climate new world riesling.

The second wine was as predicted by our Ronnie Barker, a chardonnay. Il Umamu Estate, Margaret River, Chardonnay, was everything we had hoped it would be: creamy, rich, lovely buttery oak well integrated with tropical fruits and, suggested one of us, Greek yoghurt. Everything a well aged Margaret River Chardonnay should be. However, does a 2006 count as “well aged”? The old world would need 10+ years to be as rich; this was lovely at half that age.

The third wine was just as easy to spot: waxy, good palate-weight, lovely balance, tell-tale lanolin. Mid aged semillon surely? “I know what this is!”, one member confidently declared, “McHenry Hohnen’s 3 Amigos”. Il Moss Wood Vineyard, Margaret River, Semillon, 2010 was neither a Rhone blend nor mid aged.

The final white was indeed the McHenry Hohnen, Margaret River, 3 Amigos, marsanne, chardonnay and rousanne blend. Creamy, rich, lovely buttery oak, well integrated (I refer to the previous description!): chardonnay surely, but with even more of that richness of which the old world would be proud. 2000 maybe? No, too old; learning how the whites age, a tad younger, 2004? No, 2008!

The four reds offered a different perspective: do Western Australian reds have a closed phase at the same age as the whites are beautifully showing tertiary characteristics?

The first red was unanimously declared as wonderful. “One of the best wines I have had in quite some time”, thought one. Dense, but feminine: burnt pepper and floral notes of a Coti Rotie; silky but rich; pale cherries and roses. The richness and the density of colour showed the Wignalls, Albany, Pinot Noir, to be some distance from an old world cousin, but unlike the whites, from 2007, it was still an energetic teenager.

Bramble jam! Rich, succulent, sweet, brooding, blackberry, damsons, blackcurrant, tell-tale mint and green leaf. Classic Margaret River cabernet sauvignon. One member spotted the blended merlot in the Cape Mentelle, Margaret River, Cabernet Sauvignon-Merlot. We were even not too far away from 2004.

If the 2004 was showing its fruit wonderfully well, the Cullen, Mangan, Margaret River, 2006, a blend of merlot, petit verdot and malbec, was still relatively closed. The nose was not giving much away, although the palate opened up nicely showing violets again (is this a Western Australia theme?) and pepper against a dark, brooding background of dense red fruit. Lovely, but still young.

The final red was even more impenetrable, but then a 2007, Plantagenet, Great Southern, Cabernet Sauvignon would be expected to be more closed than a pinot noir of the same age. Lovely tannins and suggestions of fruit hinted at more to come with time.

A final sweet concluded the evening and returned to the white aging theme. A lovely rich amber colour, suggesting the wine making processes involved, underlined by the rich orange marmalade balanced by lighter apricot. Mid aged, botrytis semillon? Botrytis semillon sure, but the 2009, Vinelane, Noble Botrytis Semillon followed the theme that at three years it showed a depth which a good Sauternes would envy at six years.

Outside of the New World with its focus on the characteristic qualities of single grape varieties, Alsace has got to be the easiest wine to taste blind.  Aromatic Gewurz, steely Riesling, more neutral but classy Pinot Gris and the odd glass of Pinot Noir (which has the decency to be red), this is going to be a doddle isn’t it?  Let’s see how we got on at the late February Bring a Bottle Club. 

	We started with a little flight of three whites. First up was something quite floral and then there were two wines with marked similarities. A great debate followed on whether this was one or two grape varieties or different wine makers’ approaches or vintage difference.  Light began to dawn when we were challenged to re-taste glass number one and just concentrate on the aromas and taste of this one wine.
In a rare triumph …  I got the muted tones of orange blossom and grapey notes of … Muscat! A young Muscat is normally an easy spot but rounded out, with some subtle ageing notes and less obvious primary fruit after five years in the bottle it is not so easy. But this was indeed Muscat 2006, Julien Rieffel. On then being told that wines 2 e 3 were in fact two varieties, we
	agreed that one was Pinot Blanc and one Pinot Gris and even got them the right way around with Pinot Blanc’s honeyed tone and quality Pinot Gris’s spiciness and exotic fruit: Pinot Blanc 2006, Josmeyer e Pinot Gris 2005 Trimbach.   All three were excellent wines, subtle, complex and harmonious – and mannered partners for food.
An unintended pair of wines followed. I was supposed to be bringing a Grand Cru Gewurztraminer … but it turned out to be a GC Riesling, obviously a late night pick out of the cellar.  But Grand Cru or not, the wine was in any case badly oxidised with a poor, crumbly cork.  You can see something is wrong from the colour alone (right): Brand GC, Riesling 2001, Zind Humbrecht – we missed you!
	By contrast, the more basic wine was everything it should be: a classic nose of green apples, mineral and petrol notes well to the fore, and sharp acidity.  A huge contrast to the baked apples and caramel notes which just about survived under the oxidised version of big brother.  Riesling, Tradition, 2005, Hugel.  And of course this did live up to the promise of being easily to spot tasted blind.
On to the final dry or dryish white wine:  pronounced honey notes on the nose, barley sugar and a touch of tangerine.  This wine had a lot of quality about it but there was no consensus on what it was: more practice needed: Herrenweg de Turckheim, Pinot Gris, 2002, Zind Humbrecht. Given the fate of the other two wines from this company, it was good that this was in top condition.
	Sadly the label was the best thing about this corked bottle of Zind Humbrecht’s  excellent Pinot Noir 2005.  I tasted this in October 2009: ‘a brilliant example of Pinot, fragrant, a clarity of fruit and balanced acidity presumably reflecting its northern latitude. Not cheap but a fine accompaniment to pork and prunes.’
On to the sweeties:  marked aged notes, not either very sweet or luscious, this showed good balance, some chiselled fruit, and was excellent with cheese:  Riesling, Furstentum Grand Cru, Vendanges Tardives, 1989, Paul Blanck.  Easy to identify but not as easy as the final wine:
	A dull label but a classic wine: pronounced aromas of lychee and rose water … do I need to go on: obviously Gewurztraminer … rich on the palate and again the sweetness modified by age, very good indeed: Gewurztraminer, Sélection de Grains Nobles, 2000, Henri Ehrhardt.  A fitting climax to the evening – and once we were past the first three white wines tasted together a relatively straightforward evening as promised … it won’t last!

With the whole world of wine to choose from, which three grape varieties would you group together for a focused red wine tasting where there is noticeable relationship between the varieties? The two Cabs and Merlot would be one obvious choice – but the range of styles around the world might lead to a loss of focus and what would you do about blends?  Grenache, Syrah, Mourvèdre typically make a better blend than a comparison based on single varietal wines.  Lea & Sandeman made an excellent choice with Pinot Noir, Nebbiolo and Sangiovese.  This worked really well for two reasons. First, all three varieties make relatively pale wines which rely more on perfume, elegance and balance than just sheer power.  Second, they are (probably!) my three favourite varieties of all – think sublime red Burgundy, evolving, long-lived, tannic Barolo and Barbaresco and finally, complex, herby, acidic Chianti and Brunello.  How could it go wrong?  With this quality of wines, it couldn’t.

The tasting offered a superb example to compare the styles of the three varieties, mostly in their classic regions.  The Pinot from Burgundy, which travels the best of the three, was joined by a few choice examples from New Zealand and Argentina (yes).  The Nebbiolo came from the Langhe in Piemonte, that is from its unsurpassed home territory.  The Sangiovese came in its Brunello form only from Montalcino, one of its classic Tuscan expressions.  The bulk of the tasting – in fact the two sides of the table you can see – was Pinot and Nebbiolo, with the Brunello an interesting side show with the producers present. 

While these varieties all show marked, if subtle, variation from one vineyard to the next (thereby keeping wine writers in business), there are generalisations to be made. The Pinot at these levels (from generic red Burgundy up to some premier cru) were pale in colour, with fresh and attractive raspberry  and strawberry fruit, moderate oak notes, relatively light in the mouth, around 13% of alcohol, present if unobtrusive tannins; in short, elegant and refreshing.  They compliment food with their moderate flavours, refreshing acidity and poise.   Of the many excellent examples, I would pick Domaine Theulot Juillot, Mercurey Premier Cru Les Combins 2009 for its perfume and elegance, the combination of lightness in the mouth and depth of fruit, and its length (£15.60 plus VAT).  Great quality and value from a less exalted area. 

Having worked up the rue de Pinot Noir, you take a 180 degree turn and head down the strada di Nebbiolo.  It would be far to simple to state that you head down ‘tannin street’, but obviously this is the most marked change.  These wines made from Nebbiolo have an noticeable structure which comes from a combination of higher alcohol levels, typically 14% though right up to 15%, and that wonderful tannic rasp which, if the fruit is ripe and it is well handled, makes for great, long lived wines. To be fair to these examples, the alcohol was not at all obtrusive but was balanced by fruit and acidity.  The flavour and textural profile is rather different too:  the red fruit is there (sour cherry) but is held together with the effects of ageing in, mainly, older and larger barrels. The wine has a steely tautness.  This time two choices: an entry level wine of great quality: Nebbiolo, Langhe, Andrea Oberto, 2010 (£11.50 plus VAT) and a fine expression, Barbaresco from the Fausoni vineyard, Andrea Sottimano, 2008 (£29 plus VAT). 

And finally ‘the brown one’, ie the type of Sangiovese grown on the Montalcino plateau, at 450m above sea level which increases the day/night temperature difference and gives a longer growing season, concentrating flavours.  Most Sangiovese is not as pale as either of the other grape varieties in this line up and Brunello, with its long ageing in large oak barrels, is certainly the darkest of these three wines.  Unfortunately there was no Rosso di Montalcino on show as that would have made a better comparison with the basic Pinot and Nebbiolo; but fortunately there were seven Brunello to be tasted!  These wines (apart from the very best) do not jump out of the glass at you like some of those above – but they have a solidity, a lasting structure in the mouth which makes up for that.  Interestingly, they were refined, not bold and rustic, with subtle sour cherry and sharp black plum fruit, restrained old oak, a full palate, with weight in the mouth with refined tannins and real length.  The one that showed most promise for the future was Collemattoni, Brunello di Montalcino, 2007 (£22.25 plus VAT) with splendid refreshing sharpness; the current star, Fuligni, 2004 riserva with fabulous depth of fruit and complexity, the aromas now coming out of the glass … simultaneously rounded and demanding (£46.75 plus VAT). 

Congratulations to Lea & Sandeman for this study in pale (mostly), red and elegant. 

That there is a competitive streak among many men is hardly an earth-shattering observation.  Wine tasting can be social, relaxed, erudite and many other things but it also can be competitive.  Ben Llewellyn, MD of Caviste set up Thursday evening’s tasting as a competition – between two of Europe’s best established and prestigious regions.  Burgundy and Piedmont just happen to be among my favourite regions. The tasting focused helpfully on the two most important grape varieties (with apologies to Chardonnay of course): Pinot Noir and Nebbiolo, from Burgundy and Piedmont, respectively.  Ben has been talking for months about having secured some exceptional bottles of Nebbiolo without a thought for the cost, while Mark was assigned Burgundy within a budget … Not that there was any suggestion that this was a fix. 

The idea was to taste six Pinot’s and six Nebbiolo side by side, by category – best wine by a cooperative, from a single vineyard, etc.  This was an excellent approach, made better by the fact that the two varieties share some similarities: pale colour, red fruit (if raspberry v. cherry), medium to high acidity, producing full bodied wines in cool climates and, perhaps above all, ability to develop in very subtle ways with age.  And there are only 225 miles between Beaune and Alba – plus the Alps! – so the climate is not that different. There is one huge difference of course: Pinot is only moderately astringent while Nebbiolo is the king of (pale) tannic wines! 

So how did the competition work out?  Each wine was scored out of twenty and all the scores were totalled.  This ensured a high level of participation on the evening, not to mention the occasional outbreak of barracking.  Janet refused to score on ideological grounds, while I did the same for another reason which will become clear shortly.  But the outcome was interesting. Despite the Burgundies being on the whole much cheaper, they only lost by the smallest margin – less than 2%.   Why was this? Two guesses: people are much more familiar with Pinot Noir than with Nebbiolo and, further, the latter is seriously tannic, even in good examples. One could say that Ben needed much better, more expensive, wines than Mark to make it a contest! 

My aversion to scoring has nothing to do with disapproval of competitive sports.  Scoring has its uses – but only in my view if the wines are in flights of similar wines.  It makes no sense at all to try to score an off-dry ethereally light German Riesling on the same scale as a massive Californian Cabernet.  It is difficult to score Pinot against Nebbiolo – even if we disregard the point that the samples of the former cost 50% less on average than those of the latter.

Let’s ask a completely different question: how good were the wines? There were many good wines in the line up and some really outstanding ones.  G D Vajra’s village level Barolo 2005, £32, from an ordinary year, now has fine balsam, fruit, the smell of cloves from old wood on the nose and fine complexity. Domaine Sylvie Esmonin Gevrey-Chambertin, Vielles Vignes, 2007, £35,  is already singing – again great complexity in the the red and black fruit, superb.  And, I am pleased to say, the great Barolo examples were just that: the 2003 from Monprivato Mascarello and the special treat – though sadly one bottle was corked –  from Giorgio Rivetti.  The name of this wine is so complicated it needs a sentence of its own: Giorgio Rivetti, La Spinetta Campè Vürsù, Barolo Campè, 2000, now just under £100.  The family name is Rivetti (expert makers of Moscato), the company is called La Spinetta Campè and the wine is Barolo from the Campè vineyard near Grinzane Cavour, with the added name Vürsù – which I am guessing is going to be a bit of Piedmontese dialect as 30 minutes of research has not revealed anything!   To all the usual  Barolo qualities this adds rich, developed fruit, probably due to its very modern wine making process – in rotofermenters, which extract a great deal of fruit quickly, and then French barriques. Superb.   

If this is the standard of wines we can expect at Caviste’s future tastings, we will look forward to more – with or without the competitiveness! 

Saturday evening saw an opportunity to taste the wines of one of California’s most famous names: Jim Clenenden of Au Bon Climat, Santa Barbara. ‘Wild boy Jim’ – this is California after all – has been making wine for nearly 25 years, concentrating on Chardonnay and Pinot Noir. These two grape varieties tell you that this wine maker is in love with Burgundy, but of course has a very different climate to work with. So what are the wines like? 

We tasted seven from a large range of bottlings.  The whites split our tasting group. There was no doubt about the quality – substantial, aromatic wines, lots of oak, intense citrus notes, quite a high level of acidity.  Our Italian visitors were deeply puzzled by the style – ‘it’s not like a wine’! That of course is understandable if you mainly drink wines from the Veneto or Tuscany. White wines in Europe on the whole are not this big, oaked or substantial.  Others liked the style, noting that by Californian standards it is quite restrained.  Il Sandford and Benedict Vineyard Chardonnay 2008 gave off waves of caramel and toffee and then those lemon and grapefruit notes. Il Los Alamos Vineyard Chardonnay 2008 was less oaked, rather sharper and full of edgy fruit.  Finally, we had the chance to compare these young wines with the Sandford and Benedict Vineyard Chardonnay 2006 – after a further too years in the bottle, there was much better integration of the oak effects and fruit, a long creamy after taste, mushroom and toast throughout. The wine was slightly puzzling as while the oak had settled down the fruit also seemed not just more rounded but less prominent, giving a rather long-aged effect for a wine that was only five year old wine.  I was pleased to try these wines but I’m not sure I will be buying them – too big, chunky and oaky for my taste.

By contrast the Pinot Noir was met with universal acclaim.  These wines had a better balance between clove-laden wood and red fruits. Of the four we tasted, the two stars were the instantly attractive Los Alamos Pinot Noir 2007 with its excellent raspberry fruit, savoury notes and complexity and the more structured and profound Isabelle Pinot Noir 2007.  Also very good were Sandford and Benedict Vineyard Pinot Noir 2006 e La Bauge Pinot Noir 2007. 

This was a splendid evening of transatlantic exploration and Anglo-Italian friendship. To celebrate we ate Ribollita, the classic Tuscan soup of white beans and Cavolo Nero, a nearly black cabbage.

The relative merits of buying everyday wines from the supermarket or from an independent wine merchant in the UK are worth rehearsing. As I see it, they are:

Supermarket

Independent

Andover Wine Friends’ summer party put this comparison to the test with a blind tasting of pairs of similar wines from Asda’s ‘Extra Special’ range and Andover’s very own Grape Expectations.  Billed as Philippa v. Tim (ie Philippa Carr MW, Asda’s chief wine buyer, v. Tim Pearce of Grape Expectations) the tasting showed interesting issues about price and that most people can spot the difference between supermarket and independent’s wines.  Of the six pairs a majority called it right on four out of six times, with one dead heat (for a very good reason!)  The underlying assumption was voiced by one member: ‘I assumed that the better wine was from the independent and voted accordingly’. 

The wines

Cava: Codorníu Teresa non-vintage, £9, v. Mas Miralda 2009 Asda Extra Special £10  – people voted correctly for the more aged, yeasty style of the Codorníu over the refined fruit palate of the latter. 

Viognier: Aristocrate 2009, £6.50 v. J C Mas 2010 Asda Extra Special £7 – people overwhelmingly preferred the subtle palate of the former, though they like both wines, and the independent’s wines was cheaper too!

Riesling: Foxes Island, 2008, Marlborough, New Zealand, £12.50 v. Clare Valley 2008, Asda Extra Special £8.70.  People got this right by a two to one majority – but they also noted the substantial extra cost of the independent’s wine. 

Rosé: Trasquanello Rosato Toscano 2010 £10 v. Portuguese Rose Wine, Bebidas Portugal, non vintage, £3.28. A bit of a curve ball!  Asda doesn’t appear to have a rosé in their Extra Special range so I chose the latter of these two as it had won a silver medal in a big competition, while the unusual Sangiovese rosé is trading on its name, ie its relation to Chianti.  A large majority guessed right – the inexpensive rosé had a slight fizz and came in a traditional squat bottle.  But the quality difference was not that great – and one was three times the price of the other!

Barbera d’Asti: ‘Ceppi Storici’ (‘historic stems [of vines']’), Araldica 2007, Piemonte, £7.45 v. Asda Extra Special, 2009, £5. The second curve ball of the evening. Both these wines are made by the very good Araldica cooperative and admirably there was a tie in the vote for independent v. supermarket. The vintage difference was not that marked.  So they both showed attractive brambly fruit, some mild smoky oak notes, decent acidity, good colour, easily drinkable because of the low tannins, but one was £2 less than the other. 

Pinot Noir: Chilensis Reserva 2009, Maule, Chile £6.95 v. Marlborough, New Zealand, Asda Extra Special 2008, £10.18.  A big majority got this right, guessing that the second wine was from the supermarket. But everyone was amazed at the price difference and the excellent quality of the £7 Chilean Pinot from Chilensis.  Wine in an independent wine merchant can be a great bargain!

This was a very instructive tasting … and lots of fun. It shows, I think, that the quality/price ratio is a not one way street between supermarkets and independents, especially if you keep away from the big, overly promoted, supermarket wines and look out for the ones they have put some personal investment into.  Conversely, independent wine shops are not necessarily expensive – though in fairness Grape Expectations really specializes in quality at a reasonable price.  And it was a great evening, as the pictures show – including the very fine new wood floor in the extension which we were also celebrating.

If you are of a certain age you will have a very clear memory of German wines – inexpensive, sweet brands (Blue Nun, Black Tower). And then suddenly these wines became deeply unfashionable – our tastes moved South to the sunshine of Spain, Italy and the New World.   Liebfraumilch became the least cool drink on the planet and with it was lost a whole tranche of highly individual wines which are genuinely different and which can be of the highest quality.  And because they are not widely appreciated these wines can be very good value. So, at one level, selfishly, we don’t want too much of a revival! 

Andrea Bulcock has a lifelong love of these wines and has worked in wineries in Germany.  Her presentation for Andover Wine Friends concentrated on a handful of top producers – Wolf, Loosen, Leitz, Donnholf – but gave a Cook’s tour both of key areas and styles.  She brought out the diversity of the contemporary German wine scene.  The traditional styles of various weights and sweetness of Riesling have been joined by the new style dry Riesling and by Pinot Noir reds and even Rosé.  And that’s before you get to local grape varieties such as Lemberger or Dornfelder,

Of the ten wines shown, the range of styles was best exemplified by:

Villa Wolf Pinot Noir Rosé 2009 Rheinpfalz – J L Wolf is the second estate of Loosen but in the Rheinpfalz, not the Mosel, and so warmer and allowing a different range of wines to be produced.  Although still pretty far North in terms of growing vines (similar to Alsace), it is protected by the Haardt mountains and like many vine growing areas benefits from the warmer micro climate produced by the river Rhine.  This wine, with its pretty salmon pink colour is a very creditable rosé from Pinot Noir: quite a modest nose but a lovely, surprisingly assertive palate. The trick is that it is off-dry, the small amount of residual sugar adding a lot of impact to the flavour.  At less than £8 it’s very good value.   

Villa Noir Gewürztraminer 2009 Rheinpfalz – same winery, same area, completely different grape variety.  Nice and very typical nose of lychees and rose water, this Gewurz is distinctive from the versions you find in nearby Alsace by virtue of being leaner and less alcoholic, only 11.5°.  I like the big Alsace style but this is different and perhaps more food-friendly. And of course it shows that not all whites in Germany are Riesling or medium sweet.  Again, good value at under £8. 

Johannes Leitz, Rudesheimer Bischofsberg Dry Riesling Spätlese Trocken, Rheingau, 2009.   Ok, it’s a long name in the old German manner: Rudesheim is the village name of the wine region, Rheingau, while Bischofsberg is the vineyard name, like a Premier Cru if we were in Burgundy.  And Spätlese just means late picked for richness, trocken = dry.   From a top site in one of the  most picturesque parts of the Rhine, this is the new face of Riesling in Germany – dry in style, in response to the numerous good dry Rieslings being made now in the New World and the trend towards uniformly dry wines. At the moment the nose is subtle rather than powerful or exotic, but this probably needs time in the bottle, while the palate is good, fruit balanced with characteristic acidity.  At around the £15 mark it’s going to have a lot of competition.

Loosen Estate Riesling 2008 Mosel

Loosen Urzinger Wurzgarten Riesling Kabinett 2009 Mosel

Donnholf Riesling Leistenberg Kabinett 2009 Nahe

Although it is slightly heretical, in a way you can take your pick from these three, all of which represent versions of the classic German style, two from the Mosel and one from the Nahe: pale in colour, refreshingly low in alcohol (8°), off dry to medium sweet but with excellent acidity, long lasting and will develop in the bottle for years or even decades.   (Kabinett is the first rung of the German quality wine ladder, Prädikat, the lightest and sometimes driest in style.) These wines have been consistently praised by wine lovers and professionals and ignored by consumers.  The first is the ideal summer drink (£8); the second two more substantial and serious, the Urzinger comes out of the glass at you, the Leistenberg is more mineral in style.  Leitz Riesling Magdalenenkreuz Spatlese Rheingau 2009 is another top quality single vineyard variation on this theme, if from the Rheingau.  These really need to be tasted side by side to appreciate properly the subtle differences of depth of flavour, mineral v. fruit, length.  What this post does really not do justice to is the range of terroir – the spectacular Mosel valley, the majestic Rhine and the flatter territories of the Pfalz – which largely determine the variations. 

Leitz Riesling Klosterlay Auslese Rheingau 2006

Loosen Riesling Beerenauslese Mosel 2006

 If the ‘crisp and off-dry’ is quintessentially German, so is wine made in a medium to sweet style with correspondingly high acidity, from late picked Riesling.  Auslese just means ‘picked out’, ie wine made from bunches of late picked grapes, some or all some of which have been affected by botrytis. Similarly, Beerenauslese is the next category up the quality ladder, ie picked out individual grapes often affected by botrytis.  These are fantastic wines, even the Auslese showing honey, orange, apricot and herbaceous notes.  The Beerenauslese has a whacking 150g/litre of residual sugar  and comes in quarter bottles, which is perfect for this style. 

Villa Wolf Pinot Noir 2008 Rheinpfalz.  It was a surprise to me but Germany is the third biggest grower of Pinot Noir in the world.  This grape, which is what creates red Burgundy, has a devoted band of followers, including me, who trace it down to every corner of the earth in search of its elusive qualities – an earthy, farmyardy nose, sweet raspberry fruit, eventually a savoury perfume.  This was quite fragrant, in quite a light style, some savoury notes, good and, if you have got the bug for Pinot, excellent value at £8.75. 

Many thanks to Andrea for  an excellent tasting which broaden our horizons and to Tim of Grape Expectations where you can buy the wines – and currently a special offer of a magnum of Villa Wolf’s Pinot Gris for under a tenner!  We will now look at German wines in a new way.

I can remember being told years ago that there are basically two schools of thought about the importance of the right glass for individual wines.  There are those who think that reaching for the right glass – the size and shape, the quality of glass ware and the feel of the stem – is part of the art of wine.  And then there are others who say that the only thing that matters is that the glass has a hole at the top and not at the bottom …  The Austrian glass-making firm, here represented by CEO Maximillian Riedel, grandson of Georg, has done an amazing job of persuading dedicated wine drinkers of the merits of attention to glass ware.   There is now a glass for all the world’s main grape varieties, three quality levels of crystal and a range of spectacular decanters to go with your glasses. Probably enough stuff to keep the wine lover in birthday presents for a few years and to lead to one enormous storage problem.

I started this Riedel demonstration as something of a fan.  Janet and I have Bordeaux glasses (for claret and most Italian reds, used all the time), red Burgundy (which elevate what should be a great treat anyway), a couple of Grand Cru Chardonnay (not used enough for obvious reasons), Chablis (which do service for most whites and light reds), and Champagne flutes.   For the wine group, we have the excellent, all-purpose (sorry Maximillian) Riesling/Sangiovese glass in the tough and inexpensive Restaurant range – how could I not buy a glass named after two of my all time favourite grape varieties?  So it’s quite a modest collection of glasses by Riedel standards, but the joke is still that we had to move house to accommodate the glasses.  Having moved we have now filled up again, so we are planning an extension for a new tasting room …  Our glasses are all machine blown.  The hand blown ones are incredibly beautiful but I prefer my bottle of wine to cost more than the glass I am drinking from.  But you can’t deny the joy of drinking out of beautiful, fine, glasses and we should try to think about the total wine experience and not segment it.  Even the machine blown glasses are a joy to hold: satisfyingly substantial, a piece of engineering, a thing of translucent beauty.  They announce that this drink is something special, to be attended to; it is something to be celebrated, savoured and thought about.

But the big question is: do these glasses really make a difference?  The Riedel tasting I attended, on this occasion for invited wine bloggers,  was set up to demonstrate this.  There were just two main wines, an excellent mature Chardonnay and a Cabernet Sauvignon, both new world.  Unusually the actual wine details on this occasion were not the point.  Maximillian talked us through the exercise.  Swirl, smell, taste, savour … the same wine was tasted first in its dedicated glass, then in a contrasting glass, then in a plastic throw away beaker (a glass beaker would be better to eliminate the feeling that the plastic makes a difference), then back to the dedicated glass.  You can do this at home … in fact it’s better done at home as you can exercise your own judgement in a more neutral space and have the same amount of wine in each glass simultaneously.   I was politely but firmly discouraged from splitting my wine between two glasses at this tasting … Riedel is a very powerful brand and Maximillian wanted us to do it his way.

There are two key bits of theory, one which we spend some time on, the other which is implied but is worth stating first:

1. The aromas of wine are released more powerfully if you swirl the glass and there is potential for greater aeration with a good sized volume of air in the glass.  The ‘volumes’ point is made visually – Riedel glasses having been getting bigger in order to do justice to the fruitier, more alcoholic, wines now being produced.  The glasses we tasted from were in the Vinum XL range, which is obviously a bigger version of the standard Vinum line. Incidentally, the experienced wine educator I sat next to is of the ‘non swirling’ school of tasters, but that’s another story.  It’s a good reminder that virtually every ‘rule’ relating to taste and smell is contested.  You simply have to test the rules yourself.
2. The shape of the bowl of the glass, particularly as it reaches the rim, affects which parts of your mouth and tongue first meets the wine and therefore your experience of the wine.  You can clearly see the different shape of approach in the two glasses below, on the left the rounded Chardonnay glass and on the right in a new style Pinor Noir glass with a sharp cone of wine.  The theory is that that the rounded approach of the Grand Cru Chardonnay glass delivers the wine in a way that avoids the tip of the tongue (sweetness), bringing out the balance of fruit and its acidity.  Meanwhile the Cabernet is best in its own glass which emphasises the sweetness of the fruit; if served in the new style, pointed Pinot Noir glass, you are more aware of the alcohol and the spice but not the fruit.

As it happens, the ‘tongue map’ theory about tasting wine (sweet at the tip of the tongue, bitter at the back, salty and sour at the sides) is itself strongly criticised nowadays, for example, by Linda Bartoshuk of Yale. Critics now say that you can perceive  the four tastes anywhere in the mouth where there are taste buds, with the differences being small around the mouth.  For a summary by Jordan Ross, click here.  Be that as it may, we are there to try the glasses in our experience.

We try the Chardonnay in the various glasses and the results are clear enough.  The wine is much more expressive in its Chardonnay glass.  In the tall and thin Riesling glass there are less aromatics, with a loss of the creaminess you get in good Chardonnay.  In the plastic cup, the wine dies. According to our guide this is nothing to do with the material the beaker is made from but all to do with its shape and size.  Pour the same sample of wine back into the Chardonnay glass and all is restored – it’s like magic.  We try the big 15º Cabernet in its designated glass and then in the Pinot Noir shape, then in the rounded Chardonnay glass, then in the much ridiculed plastic cup.  It does taste less balanced in the Pinot glass, drier and more bitter; and rather dumb in the Chardonnay. The powerful fruit does survive the plastic cup but the wine tastes green and tannic.  So there are real differences.

Perhaps the most interesting outcome – apart from needing yet more space to store more glasses – is the way that initial perception affects the whole experience.  The standard theory is that our ability to smell is far more developed that the four basic ‘tastes’ and that, therefore, what we call taste is really a combination of smell and taste.  From this it would follow that the initial perception of aroma on the nose could affect the taste in the mouth.  What was surprising is that the initial perception also appears to affect the aftertaste. This is the case even if you swill the wine around your mouth.  I had assumed that the experience of having wine in the mouth would lead to the aftertaste being perceived in the same way irrespective of the glass it had been in. But not so: the initial aroma and the way that the wine initially meets the palate has a real affect not only on the taste in general but on the aftertaste.

This was a fascinating experience of the best sort – that is, it raised more questions than it answered.  As usual the only way forward is more research and, in this case, more research means more glasses and more bottles …

Grant Phelps, chief wine maker of Casas del Bosque, Chile, summarizes the amazing list of advantages which that country enjoys. He himself is not in the best of shapes, having flown in from the other side of the world and picked up some sort of bug on the way.  But he quickly warms to his task of describing a country which is close to a wine maker’s paradise:

• great range of possible vineyard sites in this vastly long and thin country, a strip of land between the Andes and the ocean
• some areas with ancient soils because of the lack of rivers in the valleys, enabling wine producers to chose between rich, tropical styles on new soils and more mineral, reserved styles on the old soils
• highly reliable climate with virtually no rain in the growing season but plenty of water available from the snow melt of the Andes
• the lack of rain means very dry conditions and therefore virtually no disease; the country could easily go organic if it put its mind to it
• season-long sunshine, with a particularly high level of luminosity, which leads to good photosynthesis and excellent ripening conditions
• no phylloxera and very old Cabernet vines: 50 year old vines, producing beautifully concentrated fruit, are common for wines that cost well under £10
• inexpensive labour

There is one disadvantage: you have to budget for the winery to be destroyed by an earthquake perhaps every twenty five years, but he doesn’t seem too concerned.  His brief is to produce the best possible wine without bankrupting the company.

Grant is pretty new in his current job, though he has made wines from the grapes of this estate before, as well as having previous experience in Chile, Argentina and his native New Zealand. What really inspires him are the possibilities for cool climate wines in Chile.  In this part of the Casablanca valley they are between the coastal mountains and the Andes but the critical point is that they are only 18 kilometres from the sea.  As he drives to work in the morning it is typically misty, again cooling the vineyards, though the reliable sunshine soon burns that off. The Humboldt current brings cold water up from the Antarctic and cools the areas close to the sea.  It’s great for winemaking if not for swimmers.   In the hottest month, January, he has measured a maximum of 30º and a minimum of nearly 1º.  As a result the biggest challenge is actually frost.  24 giant windmills have been built to mix up the layers of air, preventing the coldest air settling on the vines and killing buds in spring and leaves in autumn. They are expensive to run at about £13,000 per night and you might need them for 25 nights a year but they are essential.

The resulting wines of the Casas del Bosque estate are classy and great value.  They typically show excellent, if reserved, fruit, are very clean in the modern manner and are balanced. They are all around the 13 or 13.5º alcohol mark but have good counterbalancing acidity. Grant helpfully explain that the reserva, gran reserva, etc designation in Chile means simply what the individual estate wants it to mean.  So all their entry level wines, available at Grape Expectations for about £8, are ‘reserva’.  This may point to a problem about the meaning of words but there is no doubt that the wines are special.  We tasted:

from the Casablanca Valley:

plus from the warmer Rapel Valley, two and a half hours away:

Of these I particularly enjoyed the Pinot Noir with its good cherry fruit and some complexity and the Gran Reserva Chardonnay – a fine combination of moderate oak and lively citrusy fruit.  The Cabernet, as with all the reservas, is exceptional value for money. The Syrah is unusual being grown at the limits of temperature tolerance – yes, it is genuinely cool in parts of Chile.   But the point is they are all good.

Thanks to Grant and to Tim Pearce of Grape Expectations for putting on this excellent and highly informative tasting.  You couldn’t really have more information, short of going to the winery itself. And that is high praise.

Rather like the the first cuckoo of the spring or the changing of leaf colour in the autumn, the spring tastings of the new wines are a marker of the time of year.   Caviste’s Burgundy festival is an opportunity to taste the latest offerings, in this case from the 2008 vintage.   Eight growers, nearly all there in person, showed 37 wines in the comfort of the splendid games room at Ashe Park.  I say comfort because Caviste had taken the wise step of cancelling the marquee and sheltering from the unseasonably cold spell indoors.

In contrast to the enormous trade tasting at Lord’s which I attended in January, at this smaller sample it was the whites which really stood out. Bruno Colin’s St Aubin is an excellent value white, 100% Chardonnay like all the rest.  The Premier Cru La Charmois, at £140 per 6 bottles (all prices per 6 bottles duty paid), shows the continuing value of this appellation.  Vincent Bouzereau’s wines also shone: simple, unoaked Bourgogne Blanc shows lovely, lively and quite complex fruit with a bit of minerality at a very reasonable £78 per 6 bottles. The village level Meursault has a great balance between freshness and richness (£145), while the two Premier Cru, Les Gouttes d’Or (amazing concentration, the density of fruit currently only showing in the after taste) e Charmes, both £225 are correspondingly grander.

But the highlight of the day was undoubtedly meeting Christian Moreau himself and of course tasting his great wines from Chablis.  The family firm which carries his name is now run by his son, Fabian, but Christian genially presides over the wines as though they were his own grandchildren.  His seems a happy lot. After many years of putting his name on the map, he can simultaneously take pride in the wine which continues to be of the highest quality and have the relaxed look of a man who knows that somebody else is reliably doing the hard work.

Having tasted the 2007s at the London Chablis trade tasting earlier in the year, this was a chance to check out the 2008s.  Both are very good vintages in the whites, 2008 if anything even better than 2007, certainly more approachable and so can be drunk earlier.  Four quality and price levels:

• ‘basic’ (but floral and mildly mineral) Chablis, £80 (all prices per 6 bottles duty paid)
• more restrained, dense fruit in Premier Cru Vaillons, oak aged, needs time, £118
• lemon and lime fruit, great minerality and length in Grand Cru Valmur, 40% vinified in oak barrels of which only 2% is new, £195
• similarly Grand Cru Les Clos, more rounded, oak more evident, £195
• and from the historic heart of Les Clos, Grand Cru Clos de Hospises, rich, exotic, floral and fruit notes on the nose, gorgeous fruit, so complex, £260

And yes, there were some reds, but not that many.  The wine to drink now is Lignier- Michelot’s Gevrey Chambertin with wonderful accessible fruit (Cuvée Bertin, £178).  And then there was the chance to taste the otherwise unreachable. Although it seems a shame to reduce the already tiny numbers of bottles of Grand Cru wines by tasting them years before they hit their prime, few are going to turn down the opportunity to try Clos de la Roche (Lignier-Michelot, superb texture, sweet ripe fruit, £450) or indeed the white, Lequin-Colin, Batard Montrachet (very closed but with an amazing rich texture, £615).   The 2008s are well and truly launched.