The wines of Spain
It is rare these days for marketing hyperbole to begin to live up to its billing. We don’t have ‘tastings’ or ‘good wines’ any more, we have a constant stream of ‘masterclasses’, ‘iconic wines’ and the world’s greatest this and that. But just occasionally the event or wine lives up to the claim made about
The Overton-based blind tasting group took a new step into the dark last Tuesday. I encouraged it to break the remaining link which can give you some clue as to the identity of the wine – the person who brought it. In the past this has led to some useful clues and some wrong deductions:
November’s Bring a Bottle Club was a somewhat random affair – two French classics (Sancerre and a Loire Cabernet Franc), some good regionally important wines (Friulano from Friuli, Grenache from Roussillon, Treixadura from Ribeiro, a Xarel-lo/ Riesling blend from Penedes) and a brace of New World wines (Californian Merlot, White Bordeaux blend from the Cape).
Classic, regional, new world? Read More »
Martin Hudson MW’s presentation of fortified wines, some of them sweet, was organised by pairings – two Sherry styles, two Madeiras, two Ports, two Vin Doux Naturels and a lonely Rutherglen Muscat at the end. In this way, with some elegant economy, he was able to illustrate the remarkable diversity of the world of fortified
Fortified wines: two by two Read More »
October’s BBC (Bring a Bottle Club) was a straightforward delight – a series of pretty much consistently good to very good wines, some teasers when tasted blind, but an excellent general standard. And not too many complete jokers … Not many thought this sparkling wine was Champagne but plumped for a bottle-fermented sparkling wine perhaps
October excellence Read More »
Ben Llewellyn of local wine merchant Caviste starts in a philosophical mode for the monthly tasting of Andover Wine Friends. His theme is ‘what is a modern classic?’ Is it a meaningful concept or just a piece of wine trade nonsense? We can talk meaningfully about the classics of literature or art or even wine
Ben’s modern classics Read More »
A timely offer from Winedirect gave a perfect theme for a fine wine supper: Critics’ Choice Spain, a half case of bottles of which had received good scores from Robert Parker, Jancis Robinson et al. In the last twenty years or so, the track record of Spanish wine has changed markedly – from the supplier
Critics’ Choice Spain Read More »
The term ‘entry level’ is a very useful marketing and quality phrase, indicating some real quality, affordable price (a relative term itself) and the enticement of something outstanding at a much higher price. It gets around the problem neatly which you have in Italian where the normal term for entry level wine is ‘base’ wine
Entry level grand cru? Read More »
Summer should be a time of relaxation, outdoor parties and pink wine. So far the British summer has been a soggy mess, but rosé / rosato / rosado still has its attractions. Andover Wine Friends’ summer party had to be held indoors for the first time in four years and fortunately we had build a
One of the quirky charms of Overton’s ‘Bring a Bottle Club’ is the practice – usually followed by one of the regular members – of bringing a joker bottle to be tasted blind, like all the wine. There are not many other places where you could taste a 10-year old English rosé, a Maltese red
Mission impossible Read More »