British authorities report that it is now cheaper to get your kicks from cocaine than from quality wines or beer. Perhaps this can lead to that those who consider wine to be a hateful drug focus their attention on other substances instead. More on Telegraph.co.uk
Britt’s French wine of the month
Chateau de l’Engarran 2005, Languedoc, Grès de Montpellier
Very nicely balanced with good fruit and good structure and body. Excellent to drink now but can be kept for another few years in the cellar. It is dominated by syrah, but there’s also some grenache, carignan and mourvèdre. Château l’Engarran is a beautiful 18th century chateau just west of Montpellier. It is run by the sisters Constance Rerolle and Diane Losfelt and is a producer of consistently well made Languedoc wines.
Åsa’s Italian wine of the month:
Pojer e Sandri Nosiola 2007, Trentino Alto Adige
Now is perhaps not the right time for white wines, in particular with the cold weather we’ve had. But if you want to brave the climate and have a white, for example as aperitif or a lighter fish dish you can try this wine from Trentino alto Adige in northern Italy: Nosiola 2007. The wine is made from a grape variety with the same name and is very fresh and fruity, light and elegant with aromas of apple. It also has an interesting touch of hazel nut on the finish. Hazel nut is ‘nocciola’ in Italian, which explains the name. The producer I Pojer e Sandri, a name worth taking note of.
- Åsa Johansson, BKWine’s taster in Italy
In the old city in Antibes you find this newly opened restaurant. It is small, nicely and traditionally decorated and the welcome is warm. It is mainly the Mediterranean kitchen that is on the menu of course (mussels, fish, vegetables…) and the kitchen’s ambition seems to be to be well ahead of the average local restaurant. Price levels are moderate and the overall impression is very good. Expect 30-35 euro for a dinner. The wine list is not exceptional but has a few interesting items, reasonably priced.
Click here for address and more recommendations.
Click here for address and more recommendations.
By Åsa Johansson, BKWine’s reporter in Italy
BKWine recently participated in the annual tasting of to-be-released Chianti Classico wines. The tasting is held in Florence in February every year in an ex-railway station called Stazione Leopolda, a beautiful setting for a wine tasting. 148 producers were presenting their wines to the trade and press, showing more than 358 different samples.
The vintages on show were Chianti Classico Reserva 2006 (at least 24 months aging before release), and Chianti Classico 2007 (can be sold after October 1 the year following the harvest). Some 70 producers also brought tank/barrel samples of the 2008. (It will be released at the earliest the coming autumn.)
The 2008s were very promising. The growing season was excellent and very healthy grapes were brought in at the harvest, with good levels of acidity and good quality. What remains is that the winemakers nurture the infant wines to a finished wine before anyone can really declare it to be “an outstanding vintage”.
Here is our pick of producers to look out for:
Castellinuzza e Piuca
A very small winery with only 2 ha at 300 metres altitude not far from Greve in Chianti. Giuliano Coccia, the father, and Simone, the son, stick to the local traditional grape varieties, such as sangiovese, canaiolo and colorino. Winemaking is also traditional indeed, in concrete vats and with no barrel aging. This results in a splendidly drinkable food wine with plenty of fruit that, without being overly complex, will give you pleasure at the table.
Villa di Geggiano
They farm their vines organically. They only make a Chianti Classico in years when they consider the fruit and quality to be sufficiently good and rather skip a vintage than make an average wine. Chianti Classico Geggiano is made from 90-95% sangiovese with a small addition of cabernet. The wine is aged in ‘tonneau’ (500 litre barrels) for 18 months. An elegant and complex wine to drink for example with game or matured cheese.
Fattoria Le Filigare
They make a wide range of wines. Filigare’s Chianti Classico is excellent value for money. The owner, Carlo Burchi, explains that one of his biggest problems is that he has named his wines after all his grand-children and there are more and more of them. He has run out of cuvees and don’t know what to do for the youngest grand-daughter…
-Åsa Johanson, BKWine's reporter in Italy
Click here for address and more recommendations.
Read the whole Brief here!
Last month we suggested that you try a wine from a not so well known wine region every once in a while. So, here are some suggestions for wine regions that can be worth discovering (and that merit more attention from wine lovers):
Chenin blanc, but primarily the dry white wines from the middle Loire Valley (they often have more personality than the South African versions, even if they can be good too). For example: Vouvray, Savennières or quite simply a dry white Anjou. One of the most underrated white grape varieties.
Red wines from the south west of France, le Sud-Ouest, with the two major districts Madiran and Cahors. Powerful wines that in modern winemakers’ hands also has lots of fruit and flavour.
Jurançon. Jura-what? No. Jurançon is a small district on the edge of France towards Spain, not far from the Atlantic Ocean. They make wonderful white wines, quite full-bodied with a very refreshing acidity from the grapes petit manseng and gros manseng. They come in both dry and sweet versions. You must try a dry one. Excellent and original.
Jura. Yes, why not also mention Jura, a mountainous region in eastern France. Know for its vins jaunes (yellow wines) made in an oxidative way reminiscent of sherry (with flor). But they also make “normal” white wines from chardonnay and savagnin. They too often have a hint of the nutty sherry style, but not as much. Perfect with a gruyere cheese or the local comté.
Sherry. Let’s jump to sherry then. A hidden gem. Above all the magnificent dry fino and manzanilla, and the somewhat more full-bodied amontillado. Make sure you serve it very dry and well chilled, to, for example appetizers (tapas, of course) or perhaps a flavoursome starter, say smoked salmon or gravlax. (Or have it on its own a sunny summer afternoon.)
Greece, but forget the resiny retsinas and look for one of the small and ambitious quality producers. You can even find excellent white wines (albeit reds are more common) from e.g. the assyrtiko grape. We’ve written about them before here.
Austria: Supposedly a very trendy wine country at the moment but wine lovers seem not yet to have discovered it. A great pity since they make excellent whites from gruner veltliner and other grapes. (see more further down)
Lombardy: a neighbouring district to Piedmont, not at all as well known. They also make splendid reds from for example the nebbiolo grape.
Galicia in north-west Spain, which is virtually the origin of the albariño grape, producing interesting and refreshing whites (see more on the grape further down).
Or if you prefer to be more classic and less exotic:
“Petits châteaux” in Bordeaux: Put the “great” châteaux, costing a fortune, to the side and look for smaller, less well known producers. There are many that make excellent wines, both reds and indeed whites that are good value for money in the range of €5-20. E.g. in Premières Côtes de Bordeaux, Entre-deux-Mers, Graves (not Péssac-L), Côtes de Bourg etc.
The southern Rhône Valley: “simple” Côtes du Rhône is a big district and there is a wealth of good producers making wine at a fraction of the price of the famous Rhône appellations (forget Cote Rotie, Hermitage, Chateauneuf... for the moment). You can also try some of the lesser-known appellations such as Vacqueyras, Gigondas and Costières de Nîmes, or simply the Cotes du Rhones.
And this is just a few suggestions. There are many more.
The only challenge with this is that you need to know which producers to choose. Not all wine producers in (for example) Greece are worth your attention. You have to choose your supplier/wine producer with care. But you already read the BKWine Brief (and no doubt other recommendations) so you’re well on your way to finding new discoveries. We try and help you find the most interesting wines instead of the run-of-the-mill producers.
We also try and help you find the best producers more literally, which leads me to our wine tours. We put a great deal of attention into choosing which producers to include on our tours. (And we’re there on the tours ourselves, and we certainly don’t want to go to any not-so-interesting places.) It’s easy to find a producer to visit but it’s not obvious that it will be a good visit (just like it’s easy to buy a bottle of wine, but requires a bit more of attention to make sure it’s good). We visit both of us (both Britt and Per) some 200 wineries each every year. (We sat down and counted and, yes, that’s about the right number.) And then we meet perhaps as many other producers on wine fairs, tastings etc. And we taste perhaps some 3-4000 wines in a year. So we have a bit of research to lean on when we plan our tours.
Take a look on the autumn program further down.
Britt & Per
Read the whole Brief here!
-39 kr: 0.1 %
40-49 kr: 5.1 %
50-59 kr: 24.1 %
60-69 kr: 26.7 %
70-79 kr: 17.6 %
80-89 kr: 10.5 %
90-99 kr: 6.8 %
100 kr - : 9.1 %
This is the top list of wine origins, from the sales statistics from the Swedish government owned monopoly retailer Systembolaget. The stats concern wine :
1. South Africa, 16.6% market share (change: +10.7 %)
2. Italy, 16.3 % (+10.9 %)
3. Australia, 15.5 % (-1.9 %)
4. Spain, 13.7 % (-1.7 %)
5. France, 9.4 % (+1 %)
6. Chile, 7.1 % (+3.8 %)
7. USA, 4.8% (-0.7 %)
8. Germany, 4.6 % (-0.2 %)
9. Argentina, 3.4 % (+41.8 %)
10. Hungary, 3.1 % (-5.1 %)
1. V&S Vin & Sprit Group, 20%
2. Fondberg, 7.6 %
3. Oenoforos, 5.9 %
4. Bibendum, 4.5 %
5. Hjo Grosshandel, 3.9 %
6. Vinunic, 3.7 %
7. Enjoy Wine & Spirits, 3.5 %
8. Pernod Ricard, 3.4 %
9. Giertz Vinimport, 3.4 %
10. Tegnér Hermansson, 3.2 %
11. Other, 40.7 %
In 2009 Pernod Ricard will move into first place, having bought V&S Vin & Sprit.
Wine Australia, a government financed promotional organisation, has launched a new web site that includes a very ambitious wine course. It contains thirty modules where you can learn (not quite) all about grape varieties, wine making, regions etc. With a focus on Australia of course. Here’s the course: www.wineaustralia.com
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Vine Growing and Wine Making
The original Swedish title is "Ett vin blir till" meaning A Wine is Born. It is a unique description of the work in the vineyard and in the wine cellar. Published in 2009. More info on the web site for A Wine is Born.
Languedoc
Wines, vineyards and winemakers in Languedoc in the south of France, one of the most dynamic wine regions in France, and in the world. Published in 2007. More info on the site of the Languedoc book.
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