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Jamie's Blog...
continued
Thursday 26th December
 What
did Santa bring you? I got a digital camera. This will make adding
images to the website a slightly more straightforward process—currently it involves
the use of a 35 mm SLR and scanner. Now I can take a
picture, transfer the image to the laptop and run it through
Fireworks, then to the website in less than 15 minutes. I'll probably
still rely on the SLR for foreign trips though, because I'll want to
shoot off lots of high quality images, a process that will be beyond
the storage capacity of the digital camera's memory. The image on the
right (not helped by the direct flash) shows some of the wines
consumed chez Goode this Christmas. Silvio Jermann's normally
impressive Vinnae 1999 was a bit lost on me this time (I've got a
slight cold), but the inexpensive Dourosa 2001 (made for Waitrose by
Quinta de la Rosa in the Douro) worked quite well, with good balance
and some Douro character. Lustau's Old East India Sherry is a rich,
tangy Christmas warmer. The 1995 Passadouro is for later this evening,
and the Domaine Bertagna Hautes Côtes de Nuits 'Les Dames Huguettes'
1999 could be mistaken for a New Zealand Pinot Noir.
Monday 16th December
The British obsession for a bargain is remarkably deeply ingrained,
and slightly depressing. The difference between US wine-lovers and UK
wine lovers is telling here: Americans want to know which are the best
wines; the Brits want to know which the best value wines are.
Indeed, the UK wine market now seems to be moving to a model of almost
exclusively promotion-led sales. The model is to pitch the RRP of branded wines
slightly on the high side, pricing a £4.49 wine at £5.99, for
example. You don’t expect to sell many wines at this price: instead,
you know you are going to shift large volumes when you run it on
promotion at the lower price for a week every two months. Everyone’s
happy, especially the stingy bargain-obsessed shoppers who think
they’ve got a bargain. Virgin wines seem to have a novel slant on
this, which appears to be modelled on the way that Laithwaites
(including the Sunday Times Wine Club, and several other similar
operations) works. Virgin have started producing their own branded
wines, where they stick their own label on wines produced for them.
These Virgin-only brands form the core of their range, and they are
slightly on the pricey side. This allows Virgin to knock £40 or 25%
off a case, for example, and still make money while the British
punters are delighted that they’ve got a bargain. If some people
then buy these wines at full price, even better.
On a visit to Tesco
over the weekend I was stunned by the extent of the price cutting on
the brands, and the extent to which they dominated the wine
department. I suspect producers who aren’t joining the price-cutting
game are going to find shifting their wines a bit of a struggle. Let's
be fair to the brands, though. They do offer reliable, if uniform,
drinking at reasonable prices, and with the discounts going on you can
buy pretty cheaply at the moment. My tip: if you really must drink
branded wines, stick to Australia. They tend to have the edge over
California (the worst),
South Africa, Chile and Argentina. Most European brands
aren't up to scratch yet.
Thursday 5th December
As I write I’m watching the hotel inspector episode of Fawlty
towers. This is the one where Basil Fawlty hears that a hotel
inspector is in town. He assumes that one guest is the hotel inspector
and fawns over him, only to find out that his real business is spoons.
Meanwhile, another guest orders a bottle of 65 Aloxe Corton (bear in
mind that the series was filmed in 1975). He complains that it is
corked, to the bemusement of Fawlty. ‘The cork has reacted with the
wine’, explains the guest, and insists on a replacement. Fawlty
reluctantly agrees. Moments later, he quizzes the guest. ‘Are you
having the lamb or mackerel?’ When the guest replies, ‘The
lamb’, Fawlty’s response is, ‘Oh good, I’ll have one standing
by just in case’. Later, Fawlty approaches the guest, ‘I trust you
enjoyed your Corton?’ Guest replies, ‘More like a 66. Lots of body.’ Fawlty’s
response, ‘Most people in here can’t tell a Bordeaux from a
Claret.’ Brilliant stuff.
My three most recent wine purchases have all been Iberian.
First, a couple of Portuguese wines from Corney & Barrow, both
made by Sandra Tavares: Chocopalha 2000, from her parents’ estate in
Estremadura, and Quinta do Vale D. Maria 2000 from Christiano van
Zeller’s estate in the Douro. The first I'll be drinking soon; the
second I'll hold for a few years to let the oak integrate properly.
The third purchase was one of my wines of the month, the Marqués de Griñón Dominio de Valdepusa Syrah 2000, from
Toledo in Spain. I like to check out my own recommendations. In fact,
I’m drinking this now. It shows a remarkable concentration of pure
raspberry and blackcurrant fruit, with some liquoricey complexity. It
is a striking wine in a modern style; my only slight criticism is that
with its 15% alcohol, it does seem a tiny bit hot and alcoholic. This
is a prime candidate for alcohol
reduction via reverse osmosis: it would be fascinating to do a
sweet-spot tasting of this wine at a range of alcohol levels.
Interestingly, Stephen Spurrier
has also selected this wine as one of his picks in this month’s Decanter.
Surprisingly, though, Spurrier likens this to Hermitage. It’s
nothing like it. This is most definitely a hot-climate expression of
Syrah, and bears little resemblance to anything from the Northern
Rhône. It will be interesting to see how this evolves.
A
total aside. Last weekend we had a family day out to the Christmas
festival at Portsmouth's historical dockyard. This included a tour of
HMS Victory, Nelson's flagship at the battle of Trafalgar. An
atmospheric, history-loaded visit. But the remarkable fact of the day
was learning that each sailor in Nelson's fleet was allotted a daily
drink allocation of 8 pints of beer, or 2 pints of wine, or half a
pint of rum. Which would you choose? Ironically, drunkenness on board
ship was
severely punished.
Thursday 28th November
Another nice press mention today for wineanorak.com, this time in The
Guardian. The article in question can be found here.
Author Louise Ferguson comments, 'Wine
writers offer a good source of information, but make sure you're
dealing with an independent, not a free-sample swigger.' I'd like to
think I was both! It simply wouldn't be possible to do a good job as a
wine writer unless you took advantage of free tasting opportunities,
both in the form of home-delivered samples and more frequently trade
tastings. Having said this, I do purchase quite a bit of wine myself.
Can't help it. I'm a geek. In fact, I think I do a better job of wine
criticism because I do have the perspective of a consumer, as well as
someone peripherally connected to the trade. I find it easier to think
like one of my readers simply because I would be reading this site if
I wasn't writing it. It came as quite a surprise to me to find out
that many people in the wine trade, even some winemakers, aren't all
that interested in wine. To them, it's simply a job. However, I still
have a semi-romantic notion that an individual with a deep passion for
wine will stand a better chance of putting together an interesting
list (if they are selling the stuff) or making a classic wine (if they
are producing it) than someone less hooked by the subject. I've got a
great respect for passionate wine makers and retailers.
Saturday 23rd November
Today I turned 35. That’s halfway to 70. If I were a
professional footballer they’d be calling me a veteran. But I
reassure myself that in terms of writing about wine, I’m just a yoof;
one of the youngsters. What better way to spend a birthday than
tasting wine? So I headed off for this year’s Decanter Fine Wine
Encounter, held in the elegant surrounds of the Landmark hotel,
adjoining Marylebone station (where the rack rate for the cheapest
room is a cool £330 should you wish to stay). I go to a lot of
tastings, but the Decanter event still stands out as one of the
best—and probably the best of the consumer events. The line-up of
producers is very strong, you get to taste out of Riedel Chianti
glasses (much better than the usual ISO glasses used at trade events),
and the crowds are manageable (although one of the rooms was
unbearably busy for a while just before lunch). Unlike last year,
where I crammed in 25 different producers (about a quarter of the
total), this year I managed a more leisurely dozen, including Inama,
Hanzell, Château Beychevelle, Abadia Retuerta, Craggy Range, Mas de
Daumas Gassac, Domaine l’Hortus and Coltubueno. I called it a day at
about 2 pm because I wanted my palate to be fresh enough to appreciate
some birthday wines this evening: after a full day’s tasting the
last thing I usually feel like is more wine. Readers living in
striking distance of London might want to make space in their diaries
for the Decanter Italian Fine Wine Encounter, which will be held at
the same venue on Saturday 17th May 2003.
Friday 22nd November
On Tuesday night I attended a seminar given by Nicolas Joly of Coulée
de Serrant (Savennieres, Loire), one of the leading proponents of
biodynamics (a method of farming with an unusual philosophical basis
that has been adopted by many high profile producers, such as Domaine
Leflaive, Domaine de la Romanée Conti, Domaine Leroy, Kreydenweiss,
Zind Humbrecht and Deiss). After his seminar, I had a chance to ask
him some questions, and found him animated, articulate and likeable,
even if some of his ideas seem a little foreign to someone used to a
more scientific approach. I’m currently writing a feature exploring
biodynamics, so I’ll try to keep my powder dry for now, but I
thought I’d share a few quotes from M. Joly.
“Different artists paint the same landscapes in
different ways. It is the same with vines expressing terroir. This is
why it is absurd to have created clones: the repetition of one
specific vine a million times. Clones are a lie to the diversity that
each specific vine expresses. Taking the ‘best’ clone and
producing millions of samples is absurd. This understanding of the
‘best’ is absurd.”
“Chenin Blanc is like a difficult child: they will go on
to be either a genius or a terrorist. Too often we see the terrorist
version of Chenin.”
“Europe is full of fabulous musical instruments, which
are the sites where the vine is planted. The musician is the wine
grower. The acoustics are the farming practices, and these are
essential. The more your farming kills life the worse your acoustics
are. Let’s play our musical instruments; let’s rediscover the
value of farming.”
“The more you help the vine to do its job, by means of a
live soil, proper vine selection, and avoiding poisonous treatments,
the more harmony there is. If the wine catches this harmony well you
have nothing to do in the cellar: potentially it is all there.”
“Reinventing complexity through technology is a lie to
the consumer.”
“Re-yeasting [using yeast cultures] is absurd. Natural
yeast is marked by all the subtleties of the year. If you have been
dumb enough to kill your yeast you have lost something from that year.
“
“There is an enormous wisdom in the shape of a barrel.
Ask your dog. Put a barrel beside the kennel and in 12 hours the dog
will have chosen to sleep in the barrel. The barrel is in the shape of
an egg, and has the shape of life forces.”
“I am experimenting with replacing wood by clay. Clay
can cure; it is strongly linked to the sun. Amphorae can be an
alternative to oak barrels.”
Tuesday 12th November
As I write I’m sitting on a train carriage painted with the
‘Think red, think Côtes du Rhône’ message. The French are
finally fighting back against the almost irrepressible tide of new
world branded wines, but I’m not sure that entire appellations can
be used effectively as a coherent marketing entity, especially not
appellations as disparate as Côtes du Rhône. Savvy wine buyers know
that the best way to buy wine is not by the appellation, but by the
grower or producer. This applies whether the appellation in question
is Côte Rôtie, Gevrey Chambertin, Chablis or Vouvray. This isn’t
to say that appellations don’t matter – they have played a crucial
role in ensuring the continued diversity of French wines – just that
they are not a guarantee of quality that they are widely held up to
be. [For an extended treatment of these issues, see an article I wrote
a few months ago on appellations
as brands.]
My latest foray into the world of consumer magazines is now
out: for an overview of Portugal’s red wine styles, nip down to your
newsagent and pick up a copy of this month’s Wine magazine, which
comes complete with a Portuguese supplement that I was asked to
contribute to.
A number of non-wine-geek friends have recently commented
that they’ve been following this blog. Even my family, who despair
that I’m so bad at phoning them, use the blog as a way to follow
what’s going on in my life. I imagine they get a pretty distorted
picture of life chez Goode from this. In an effort to redress the lack
of non-wine related material appearing here, I’d like to spend a few
moments looking back at the past weekend. It was a significant one,
because for the first time in 13 years Manchester
City (my team) beat local rivals Manchester United. In fact they
hammered them. United were dreadful, and it was a joy to watch. City
have had a terrible time in the last decade while United have enjoyed
global domination, so it’s nice to see the balance shift a little.
It is now almost 30 years since City were consistently better than
their neighbours, but I live in hope that the circle will turn once
more.
Thursday 7th November
Had a good experience the other day at Waitrose’s Canary Wharf
branch. This new flagship store has a number of bar-style food points
including a sushi bar and a steak and oyster bar: nothing terribly
remarkable about this but the good news for wine lovers is that you
can pick a wine from their extensive selection -- including some
choice bottles from their Inner Cellar -- and drink them with your
food for a modest corkage charge of just £5. Since I’d heard this
was opening I’d been itching for an excuse to visit, so I arranged
to meet up for lunch with a good friend, Mike Rigby, who works for the
Telegraph group in Canary Wharf. [Incidentally, it was Mike who
introduced me to wine for the first time, a decade ago.] With our
competently prepared fillet steaks we enjoyed a bottle of the Wither
Hills Pinot Noir 2001. Over the last vintage or two this has proved to
be one of the best New Zealand Pinot Noirs, with some savoury, meaty
complexity underlying the sweet, ripe berry fruit. The 2001 seemed a
little too sweetly fruited to match the steaks well, but it’s still
a lovely wine. Congratulations to Waitrose for this inspired,
wine-lover-friendly initiative.
I opened another bottle of the Grande Cassagne ‘La Civette’
2000 last night. This is the second bottle in a row that has begun to
referment: it is slightly cloudy, with an unusually exaggerated earthy
character on the nose, a prickly, spritzy edge to the palate and just
a few fine bubbles at the bottom of the glass. I’m not going to
return the remaining bottles, though. Why? Because it would send the
wrong message back to the producer. I am assuming they have taken a
small risk by not filtering the wine, and this time it has not paid
off. But if as consumers we want living wines that haven’t been
stripped of a lot of their character by excessive filtration, then I
think we have to share a bit of that risk. Besides, La Vigneronne sold
the wine cheaply, at £4, and at this price I’d rather be quaffing
the rest of my case of La Civette with the odd bottle showing a little
bit of refermentation than a bland industrial concoction with no soul.
Thursday 31st October
A few interesting wines in recent days. First, another bottle of
the super Vin de Pays des Collines Rhodaniennes 2001 from Jamet.
I bought several of these from my local Majestic -- credit to them for
stocking this, because it’s not widely available. Why do I like it?
It’s not a blockbuster of a wine; rather, it is a wine with
‘edges’, as Ernst Loosen puts it. Behind the bright, peppery
raspberry fruit there’s some meaty richness: not a lot, but just
enough to add complexity. It wins you over slowly, with its almost
Burgundian weight and acidity. There’s some genuine Northern Rhône
character here, which is rare even in much more expensive wines (this
cost just £5.49). France produces a lot of interesting inexpensive
wines, and it’s a shame that we so rarely see them over here: the
supermarkets here can’t really deal with small parcels of wine, and
instead have to rely on the big negociants and the branders. Sticking
with France, a completely different but equally interesting tipple is
the Chante Coucou 1999 from Elain da Ros. It’s from
the Côtes du Marmandais in the South West of France (further inland
and south a bit from Bordeaux, I believe), and this is a big, inky,
dense wine. It’s a little austere at the moment, with taut savoury
plum and berry fruit, and massive tannic structure, but with food it
works really well. Again, not a wine to win you over immediately, but
there’s lots of interest in this personality-filled monster. A
serious effort, and I’m glad that I have another 10 of these left,
bought from La Vigneronne for a ridiculously low price in one of their
sales. Finally, last night I turned to Portugal, and the 1996 Douro
Reserva from Quinta do Crasto. The dominant feature here is
a roasted, tarry edge to the herby fruit, but I can’t work out
whether this is a Douro character, or a result of the American oak.
It’s shed most of its fleshy ripeness, and the acidity is beginning
to take hold: it is anyone’s guess as to how this will develop
further, but I’ll be drinking my remaining couple of bottles up
soon. Still, satisfying drinking, and I think of Crasto's
spectacular vineyards as I sip it.
Friday 25th October
On a recent trip to Baltimore I managed to hook up for an
offline wine dinner with Wayne Hicks. I’d met Wayne on a previous
visit to the USA – that time Madison – when he responded to an
offline invitation posted on the Wine Lover’s Discussion Group, so
it was nice to get a chance to drink wine with him again. We met at
Corks, a small, reasonably upmarket restaurant in the Federal Hill
area: as well as boasting an impressive, nicely annotated list of
sensibly priced US wines, Corks allow you to bring your own wine for a
modest corkage of US$10. We enjoyed two contrasting European wines.
Wayne brought the 1994 Léoville Barton. This classically structured
wine seemed a tiny bit closed at first, but after decanting it opened
up quite nicely. With brilliant balance between the slightly spicy,
minerally fruit and cedary complexity, this is an elegant wine that
embodies many of the qualities of great Bordeaux. The second wine,
which I picked up at Berry Bros’ Heathrow branch on the way out, was
a completely different beast, the 1997 Mouchão from Portugal’s
Alentejo region*. But ‘beast’ is the right descriptor for
this wine. It’s inky dark, with an intriguing, savoury dark-fruit
character and a pleasant bitter tang on the finish. Like the Bordeaux,
however, this wine changes dramatically in the glass, exhibiting much
more pronounced chocolatey, spicy richness on the nose after half an
hour or so. It’s a brilliantly poised wine: not too modern, not too
old fashioned. Both wines demonstrate that you can miss a lot from
just a quick taste – the longer you spend with a decent wine, the
more you understand it. It’s akin to the difference between just
shaking someone’s hand and having a lengthy conversation with them.
Moral of the story: you need to ‘drink’ regularly as well as just
‘taste’. Critics take note.
*Evidently,
at £16 the Mouchão is a less expensive wine than the Léoville
Barton: lest my loyal readers think I’m being cheap, I should
explain that the offline arrangements were only made once I was in the
USA, hence this was the only wine I had available. Just thought I’d
clarify this one…
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