Taking the world one wine at a time.
Grapes 100% Chardonnay Facts The opening of this bottle of De Venoge 1993 Grand Vin des Princes was a last minute decision i.e. 30 minutes before I popped the cork. Usually, you would reserve opening a wine of this magnitude for the birth of your first-born child; instead, I/we decided that my wife’s “half-birthday” (August 7th) was a good enough reason! She’s an only child, and so she celebrates things like that… De Venoge…
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Grapes 40% Gamay, 30% Malbec, 20% Cabernet Franc, 10% Pinot Noir Facts If you were to make a list of the red wines coming out of France, Loire Valley reds would certainly come near the bottom; not because of quality, but for the fact it’s one of the more overlooked wine regions. Loire reds have a tendency to be overshadowed by the whites from famed Sancerre, Vouvray, Pouilly Fume and Muscadet regions, and certainly…
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Grapes 60% Cabernet, 40% Shiraz Facts I’d never seen this wine before, so I was over the moon when I received it as a gift on Tuesday! I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: “Keep your friends close, and your wine-drinker friends closer!” The name Duel comes from the blend of Cabernet and Shiraz, and is illustrated on the front label by the dueling lion and bull. The idea is that the…
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Grapes 100% Pinot Gris Facts It’s very rare that you’ll stumble across single-vineyard, “estate-grown” wines for under $15, but if you do, you should jump at the chance to pickup a bottle! The simple reason is that the more specific a wine gets (with its place of origin), the more expensive it usually gets. Not with Willow Crest though, as most of their wines completely annihilate the competition in the price-to-quality ratio game. Even…
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Grapes 100% Syrah Facts I’ve had this bottle laying around my office for a few months now, and I finally decided (late last night) that it should probably get a review. Normally I wouldn’t review a “cold weather wine” such as the Barnard Griffin Syrah Port in the middle of summer, but I’ve always been of the opinion that fortified wines don’t get the recognition they deserve. Instead, they unfortunately seem to get pigeonholed…
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Grapes 97% Pinot Noir 3% Syrah Facts If it’s good enough for the President of the Philippines and Hillary Clinton, it’s good enough for you! What am I talking about? Well, the Primarius Pinot Noir was recently served at a June luncheon at the Department of State in Washington DC. Check-out the full menu at the bottom of this post. It’s only been in the last 2 years that I’ve started to grow…
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Grapes 100% Chenin Blanc Facts Chenin Blanc! Not exactly the first grape that springs to mind when you think of California! Some people may even say that, as a winemaker, you would have to be CRAZY to bother with a grape which has a relatively low level of consumer recognition. This, when you could much more easily make/market Cab or Chard etc. This leads nicely to my next point… The founder of the Rendez-vous…
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Grapes 100% Petite Sirah (sometimes written as Petit Syrah, although it refers to the same grape). Facts Petite Sirah is a wine you can’t take lightly. You to be in the mood for it. That’s because Petite Sirah typically has about as much subtlety and restraint as being awoken in the morning to a 300lb man in a dark purple suit, jumping up-and-down on your bed, singing Bohemian Rhapsody, while he simultaneously throws…
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Grapes 100% Primitivo (aka Zinfandel) Facts First-things-first, I think the best idea that brands such as Layer Cake, ever did when marketing their own Primitivo was to put “AKA Zinfandel” on the front label. No-one knows what Primitivo is (at least the vast majority of consumers don’t), and as much resistance as I’m sure Italian winemakers have to it, it would behoove them to follow this example! This is the part where I usually…
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Grapes 35% Touriga Nacional, 35% Tinta Roriz, 28% Touriga Franca and 2% Tinta Francisca Facts I don’t think there’s any argument as to how Portugal made its name in the wine world, but I’d like to go on record and say that I honestly believe the future of Portugal lies not in its Port, but in-fact in its red table wines. It will be interesting to see over the coming years how Portugal copes…
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Grapes 85% Grenache, 15% Syrah Facts You’ve probably read countless times that “…you should never choose a wine based on the label!” Well, I call BS on that! If anything, France needs to step-up their wine label game (as is beautifully demonstrated here) and start getting more creative if they plan on rising from the ashes! To me, a great label and overall good packaging are sometimes the only way a producer is going…
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“What’s with all the recipes you’ve been making with peas? You know I hate peas!” said Mrs Chislett. This was news to me. Or maybe not! Maybe it’s just been that long since I actually used peas in cooking, that it completely slipped my mind! Peas always remind me of school dinners, with the only reason that I find myself using them again here is I had a bag leftover from the…
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