Grape Expectations
POSTED ON 18/01/2014If you came across the encyclopaedic Wine Grapes (Allen Lane) in 2013, you could be forgiven for thinking that the reason for the astonishing complexity of wine lies in its vast storehouse of grape varieties with their myriad aromas and flavours: no fewer than 1,368 at the last count of Jancis Robinson MW and her co-authors José Vouillamoz and Julia Harding MW.
Big Malbec
POSTED ON 11/01/2014Such has been the success of Argentina’s malbec over the past two decades that it seems astonishing that growers were once tearing out their malbec vines, and their hair, for lack of demand for red wine. Thanks to pioneers such as Catena and Weinert and investment from overseas companies, malbec was saved for the nation, but it’s only today that we’re really seeing its true potential.
Burgundy on a Roll, Bordeaux a Rollercoaster
POSTED ON 04/01/2014Burgundy is on a roll, Bordeaux a roller-coaster. In 2013, Bordeaux failed to deliver a good enough vintage to make it worth buying early. Next spring, that is, when the 2013 vintage is sold en primeur, or, as futures, before being bottled and delivered two years later. My crocodile tears are for the fact that Bordeaux had its fat years in the noughties, not least with great vintages of 2009 and 2010 and extravagant prices to match.
Ningxia Wine Competition
POSTED ON 01/01/2014The Ningxia Wine Competition
‘It’s going to be quite cold during the tasting in the Cave. Please wear a warm coat’. Despite the warning from Revue du Vin de France China, the judges of the 2013 a Ning Xia Wine Tasting Competition were taken aback at the numbing cold of the cellar in the mountains in which the competition took place. Perhaps they had been lulled into a false sense of security. When I arrived after the two-hour flight from Beijing two days before, it was a balmy late September 21C at 8pm in Ningxia’s capital of Yinchuan.
