The wines of South Africa
The timing of my Family of Twelve scholarship was finally determined by the dates of the International Sauvignon Blanc Celebration which was held in Marlborough on the first three days of February 2016. Fully subscribed at over 300 delegates this brought together speakers and wine makers from around the world with a substantial Kiwi presence. Billed
Sauvignon 2016 insights Read More »
Our local blind tasting group, at my request, focused last night on Merlot. Why? Because I find it more difficult to detect than the Cabernets or even Syrah, which I also find a bit of a puzzle. We had a good line up – seven wines, six of which I would be happy to drink
It’s tough being Chardonnay – on the one hand, you are so popular that you have become a girl’s name; on the other hand, people have tired of you and have moved on to Pinot Grigio and even Moscato. But once you get into quality wines, the real appeal of the grape to the drinker
Chameleon Chardonnay Read More »
The wines of South Africa have a very mixed reputation in the UK. Ordinary consumers only rate them by price; wine lovers will buy the high-end wines as examples of mainly warm climate styles which can compete with the rest of the New World. But we rarely get the chance to explore that middle ground
Stony Brook–artisan quality in Franschhoek Read More »
Andover Wine Friends unusually had a fine wine supper in August … and also, atypically, indulged in a bit of blind tasting masochism. Speaking for myself I normally enjoy the considerable challenge of blind tasting, even though it is a very artificial exercise. This is not just for the rare moments of triumph when you
Blind tasting masochism? Read More »
If seven people were independently to choose a bottle of quality wine from their own collections and bring them to a blind tasting what is the chance of them bringing similar wines? That two people brought Chardonnay was perhaps not surprising, even if both examples were from the new world. But in the same tasting,
Chardonnay and Chinon … twice? Read More »
The noble Riesling grape variety is probably German in origin. According to Wine grapes, the name has many German synonyms and may be mentioned as far back as 1435. Certainly the variety is suited to Germany’s cold winters, hot summers and long dry early autumns. With its hard wood and late budding, it is equipped
Saturday’s Andover Wine Friends’ fine wine supper was based on a six-bottle case sold by the Wine Society as ‘World Class Pinot Noir’. The marketing worked perfectly – I duly bought the case and we enjoyed the wines. It was very good value at just under £140. But ‘world class’? I don’t think so. In
Pinot Noir – home and away Read More »
The Overton based blind-tasting group has long repeated the mantra ‘Can anything this good come out of South Africa?’ This rather patronising remark can now officially be retired after a splendid tasting which had only one rule – not too much Pinotage please. (Even that does not do justice to the best offerings from Kanonkop
Quality in South Africa Read More »
The Bring a Bottle Club was in a rather different format for its late January tasting, or rather a refinement of its format. We already have ‘BBC1’ which is ‘bring an interesting/good bottle of any sort’, while ‘BBC2’ has a theme, on this occasion, white Burgundy. The refinement was that one of our number offered