Quite why the province of La Rioja and its most famous wine take their names from the River – Rio in Spanish – Oja is something of a mystery. This so-called river is actually little more than a stream, rising in the Sierra de la Demanda and flowing north until it joins the River Tirón, in turn meeting the River Ebro near Haro.
Read MoreGiven that most non-Americans are unaware that New York is a state as well as a city, imagine how few people know that New York State is producing some really exciting wines.
Read MoreAll fifty American states now produce wine, but 95% of it comes from only four of them. California is by far the most prolific state and it is responsible for five times more wine than the output of the next three combined: Washington, Oregon and New York. Of the other states, Texas and then Virginia are the fifth and sixth largest wine producers respectively.
Read MoreUntil a few weeks ago when an invitation to a tasting landed in my inbox, I’m sorry to say that I hadn’t actually heard of Folding Hill vineyard in Central Otago. To their immense credit, Kate and her team at Reserve Wines have stocked Folding Hill’s wines ever since the release of its very first vintage, and I for one know better than to question the judgement of Kate’s palate.
Read MoreAfter working your way through my last blog post, you’ve possibly heard enough about the Veneto and its wines from me for the time being. I’m sorry for any repetition, but I wasn’t going to pass up the recent opportunity to taste the wines of Azienda Agricola Cecilia Beretta; particularly as I only had to travel as far as Hanging Ditch to do it.
Read MoreThe importance of Marchesi Piero Antinori’s contribution to Tuscan wine specifically, to Italian wine generally and to the standing of both in the wider world of wine cannot easily be overstated. The figures make impressive enough reading on their own: Piero is the 26th generation of a family whose unbroken winemaking provenance dates back to 1385…
Read MoreIt took my dad literally seconds to decide where he would like to spend his 65th birthday weekend; it didn’t take him very much longer to rustle up a few Ryanair tickets and to book a hire car. Eventually the weekend rolled around and we hopped on a plane to Bergamo before following the autostrada right into the heart of the Valpolicella region.
Read MoreThanks to Ben and Mark at the award winning Hanging Ditch Wine Merchants for organising a very enjoyable and interesting Bordeaux tasting dinner earlier this month at the St. James’s Club. Given their ethos of quality being paramount I knew that the wines on offer would not disappoint, but the objective of keeping the wines affordable was going to be more of a challenge.
Read MoreI know it’s hard to believe, but this job isn’t always as glamorous as my writings would have you think. It’s not all plain sailing, you know. Only my dedication to the public service that is this blog enables me to cope with the good, the bad, and the ugly faces of the wine world with such impunity.
Read MoreI always try my best to support tastings up here in the north west, even if I have to pay for a ticket so to do! A recent, and rather high profile, event caught my eye and I thought that I should pop along to see what it was all about. This was the second in a series of three tastings hosted by the Three Wine Men: Oz Clarke, Tim Atkin MW and Olly Smith, all of whom are perfectly charming and frighteningly knowledgeable.
Read MoreI played hooky on Tuesday to attend Decanter’s Great Winemakers of Italy tasting in London. I suspect that the Istituto Del Vino Italiano Di Qualità Grandi Marchi is little more than a good excuse for many of the great and good of Italian wine to get together, pat themselves on their backs and come up with new ways of inflating their prices, but if it means more tastings of this calibre then I can’t complain too much.
Read More“We take you now to Kermit the frog with another fast breaking news story…”
Read MoreAn interesting one ce soir, a 2010 old vine Grenache Blanc by Domaine du Clos des Fées (14.5% ABV). I’ve been a big fan of this estate’s reds for ten years or more, but for some reason I never got round to trying its sole white. It always seemed rather pricey, even when Oddbins (R.I.P.) was interesting enough to stock it, and, at €18 from the cellar door, I couldn’t help but wonder if I’d feel the same today.
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