Changing Cairanne

Wine really does have a life of its own. Even in the bottle it changes over time. And once released it continues to develop new characteristics. Take this Cairanne.

I really like the various Cote Du Rhone villages. Each has its own personality and they can be better value and more interesting than many of the well-known Rhone appelations. But I have had problems with Cairanne before. To my palette it can be a bit leaden, almost steely combined with a rather jammy, full-blown fruitiness. One of the few times I have ever left a bottle undrunk (apart from it being off) was a Cairanne.

So it was when I first tasted this a couple of years ago. But when opened this week, it had taken on a more velvety, less full-blooded body. And when left open in the bottle and glass for an hour or two, it became a very civilised, quite rich wine. Even one mouthful seemed to have quite a different finish to the first impact on the nose.

I just don't know enough about wine [as you will have gathered from this blog] to work this out. But I am looking forward to opening another bottle of this in a couple of years to find out what happens next.

Better Than Coal

I confess my real wine cellar is nothing like the one in the background of this blog. It's actually a very narrow coal hole that runs under the hallway of our Victorian terrace house. It isn't ideal as the temperature is not constant and the underground tributaries of the Fleet River are just inches below in the London clay. But it holds my collection of wine bought en primeur over the last decade or so that we've lived here. This bottle is something I dragged out in the last week past the tool boxes and the ladder, up the four steps into daylight.

After a decade of rest it's a wonderfully fruity but full and quite subtle wine from that most mixed wine region of France, the south-west. It's a beautiful part of the country, where the hills start to rise away from the Med, heading off into deeper Languedoc.

I am delighted to say that this will happily rest a couple of more years in the coal cellar and, I think, improve. The 2005 and the 2007 also awaits.

Wild Wine

 

Orford is famous for the legend of the 'wild man', a kind of hybrid merman/green man legend. It feels entirely in keeping with the deep historic feel of the place, a strange corner of Suffolk hanging onto the edge of some very watery landscape right next to the north sea. This wine is also a bit of an odd mix, but no monster.

This five year old English white made of German grapes has, perhaps, too much going on. It is quite full-bodied, with all sorts of notes such as a sweet peach, a sharper lemon and when well-chilled, enough minerality to compliment the Butley oysters we were enjoying. Both the wine and seafood were local to within a few miles of Orford.

Tunisia Needs A Red Revolution

Tunisia needs another revolution. Nothing wrong with the democratic developments, but the wine could do with a coup.

There I am with ancient historian son in a bar in El Kef - at the furthest reaches of the Empire (Roman) watching Esperance Tunis FC win the African Champions League while tucking into some rather lovely herby crispy pastries, curried chicken etc.

The mood is liberated in every sense, less than a fortnight after their elections. The drive from the capital out west has taken us past a vast swathe of fertile farmland with vines here and there.

Then the wine. Well the rose was worse which made this red seem adequate. Smooth, rounded, pleasant but entirely characterless. Certainly not Grand Cru.

Still, who's complaining at the price and the setting of the hillside medina and the context of new-found freedom.

Maybe the climate isn't perfect and perhaps the soil doesn't offer much in the way of mineral input. But with the French influence and the Lebanese example surely Tunisia can have a wine to match the glorious evocation of Carthage?

Go to the fabulous mosaics of the Bardo Museum and there's lots of evidence that Bacchus has a fantastic history here, now it needs some investment in the future.

Appalachian Autumn

This was one of the better Virginian wines that I tasted on a very brief trip down the Blue Ridge mountains. Most of the good wine is on the east of the Shenandoah national park, especially around Charlottesville. But this winery is a bit further south near Roanoke.

Their wines are mainly Italian but this one is, of course, a French grape varietal and so not suprisingly it evoked Claret rather than Chianti.

A soft, smokey texture and nose, fruity but not over-powering. 

I actually drank this with a very good dinner at the charming and very hospitable Gristmill Inn in Warm Springs. As the name suggests, this lovely village in a valley of the Appalachian Hills has wonderful bathing in America's oldest spa pool. 

So all round it made for a day of real liquid refreshment.

The cocktail now arriving on platform three

I know this is a wine blog and this is a cocktail but there's sparkling wine in there. Plus Russian vodka, peach schnapps and some 24 carat gold.

We were celebrating with friends over from Australia at 'Europe's Longest Champagne Bar' at the St Pancras Eurostar terminal. Their kids were due back from a visit to Paris with Aunties.

The cocktail looked rather better than it tasted. Much too sweet. But it is a civilised joy to booze in a great modern station set within one of my favourite London buildings.

She's Forever Blowing Bubbles

This is not about the wine, it's about the moment. Champagne is for celebration and what more joy than a good friend who cheats serious illness?
And location and timing helps. In the middle of the Black Mountains near Hay On Wye, in the warm glow of a quite extraordinarily sunny early July weekend. Half way up Tympa.
This was a relatively inexpensive bubbly picked up from the very lovely Corks of Cotham independent wine merchants in Bristol en route to Wales. I am not a huge champagne fan, but this was dryish, with a nice biscuity flavour. Not too sharp or too fizzy.
Cheers to one of my oldest and dearest friends.