Winefriend by David Way

Writing about the wines of Piemonte, Italy and France

David Way

Italian speaking expert on the wines of Italy, especially Piemonte and Toscana. Just published The Wines of Piemonte for the Classic Wine Library. Researcher and writer of wine study materials for the WSET Level 4 Diploma; creator of www.winefriend.org.

The good and the great

One of the endearing features of tasting wines in situ is discovering the range of wines produced.  Most areas will have a wine style that they do really well, occasionally outstandingly. But alongside those wines will be competent wines, sometimes from local grape varieties, sometimes from the well-travelled international brigade.  The Tuscan white Vermentino would

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Fabulous Falanghina

Lunch today with colleagues at The Contented Vine in Pimlico. What a great name for a slightly rambling wine bar cum restaurant on three or even four levels. Well executed, good value food and a well constructed wine list – Champagne, French classics, currently a whole page on Australia. We drank a very good Benevento

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Age does not wither?

In the old fashioned world of gentlemen’s clubs and wine merchants, the ageing of wine, claret in particular, was virtually the essence of wine appreciation.  How the wine scene has changed but there is still a fascination with how wines age, whether they improve, whether people actually like to drink older bottles.   Andover Wine Friends’

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A weekend in Italy: Capezzana

As the saying goes, if Mohammed won’t come to the mountain, then the mountain will have to come to Mohammed.  The past weekend not only offered not only the ending of the English domestic football season with the showpiece of the FA Cup final, but also a Tuscan wine tasting in Hungerford, Berkshire and Decanter’s

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Christian Moreau at Caviste

Rather like 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

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Clos du Marquis dinner

Andover Wine Friends Clos du Marquis, near Stockbridge, Hampshire 21st April 2010  Puisse rappé – Armagnac, white wine, prune – – – Salade Landaise aux truffles Vouvray: Domaine des Aubuisieres, Cuvee de Perruches – – – Mousseline of pike from the Test river Burgundy: Saint Romain 2006, Domain H &G Buisson – – – Roast

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Multi-faceted Vajra

Planning a week’s tasting in a region is a mixture of thorough preparation, chance meetings and recommendations, and sheer persistence.  And there is the question of whether to visit wineries which you already know and whose wines are available in the UK as opposed to those you can only taste in situ.  Our final day

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