The Weekly Wine

Fellow Wine Lovers,

You’ve got to love a short week, am I right?  4 days off, 4 days on, imagine how quickly we could all get used to it?  Next thing you know, we’ll all be working from home and investing heavily in lairy loungewear, baking our own bread and watching Joe Wicks workouts – no, I know, just joshing, that could never happen….

Anyway, for those of you not dwelling in the past, this weekend is Marathon weekend, for me the watershed weekend that signifies the proper shift into spring even if the clocks did change weeks ago.  All the winter training faces its stiffest test this weekend, when you find out if running around in the dark, wearing multiple layers, gloves, a beanie and a head-torch has really properly prepared you for 23 degrees Celsius and a gentle breeze!  I would also advise that you don’t do it in ski boots, just because that’s already been done… anyway, good luck to anyone embarking on this adventure, get your people to source you a nice bottle of Champagne for the finish line and know that this time next week it’ll all be behind you!

Or perhaps you get them to buy you an alcohol free beer to celebrate you achievements?  Doesn’t quite have the same ring to it, does it?  Although, we read in Drinks Business that now 1 in 15 beers sold in Europe is non-alcoholic, so perhaps I’m just a dinosaur… but hang on a minute, flicking through a few more pages of this magazine, we learn that James Suckling, a renowned wine critic, has over 400 wines available by the glass at his Hong Kong restaurant – James Suckling Wine Central, and they all seem to have an ABV – time to catch a plane!

Elsewhere, we read that Majestic has tightened the screw, post duty reform. and removed a number of wines from its list.  Sadly the big players remain, with their sometimes underwhelming offerings whilst the cull has mainly been of wines from small vineyards with higher ABV who suffer higher administrative costs and comparatively small volumes.  All businesses need to make tough decisions, accepted, but as we feared we may be just at the beginning of a drastic homogenising of wine choice available on the high street.

However, if you looked at the BBC yesterday, they were all about the important news of the day.  Nestled between an article about Harry & Meghan, whoever they may be, and a piece promising a heatwave next week was the important news of the day – and it’s about biscuits!  In a debate that could rank alongside the great scone debate (which actually isn’t really a debate, there’s the right way – jam then cream – and then there’s the other way), we are told that we’ve been eating our Chocolate Digestives wrong – the biscuit should be on the top and the chocolate is the base, according to McVitie’s.  In a follow up press release, Pizza Hut issued a global apology for having spent so many years incorrectly serving their pizzas upside down rather than bread on top and the National Union of Toastmakers issued updated guidelines relating to how to successfully butter the underside of your warmed bread…

We then read that Tom Fletcher from McFly has been signed up to write music and lyrics for a Paddington musical and began to wonder if someone had slipped a Mickey Finn into our lunchtime espresso because, frankly, everything was getting a bit too weird.

So, we strove to pull ourselves together and focus on what wines to open this weekend.  Wayne treated you all to some lovely Albariño and a delicious Lebanese with your lamb last week, so we thought a visit to Italy might be a nice diversion.

Casalfarneto Collequieto Verdicchio dei Castelli Di Jesi Classico – £13.99 comes from a family vineyard, with around 35 hectares between the Apennine Mountains and the Adriatic coast, who we think offer excellent value.  Verdicchio is one of Italy’s noble white varieties and this has delicate hawthorn aromas as well as apple and citrus.  The palate is a little richer with a lovely freshness, some minerality and a touch of nuttiness to the finish.

Casalfarneto Collequieto Montepulciano d’Abruzzo – £12.99 comes, as you may have noticed, from the same winery.  I can now tell you that the vines are at 320 metres above sea level and that, of the 35 hectares of vineyards, 28 are planted with white grape varietals and the remaining 7 with red.  Being somewhat contrarian, it was this red that really caught our attention, before the white!  A warming balanced dry red with lots of red fruit flavour and soft tannins that’d be absolutely bang on with, well, almost everything!

There may be some cycling on this weekend, Wayne hasn’t kept me up to date so I cannot comment and as I normally keep an eye on AFC Wimbledon/Tottenham/Harlequins, there will be no sports coverage today, in an attempt to keep the blood pressure down….

So that’s it from us, have a lovely weekend, have a digestive however which way!

Fellow Wine Lovers,

We’re interrupting your Thursday as tomorrow is Good Friday, or Holy Friday if you prefer. It is certainly a Bank Holiday and many of you may well be away from your emails. Those of you, that is, who haven’t already upped sticks and been away for a few days. It’s been a quiet week; traffic has been light, service in the coffee shop brisk and wait-less.

Out and about in the world, we all now own a tiny bit of a blast furnace or two in Sheffield plus enough coal to keep it going. I learnt something this week and will share it with you. The main product of a blast furnace is carbon dioxide, it seems steel is almost a by-product. Every day’s a school day!

Across the pond the Tango Tariffmeister continues to make the US a safer friendlier place to visit. You can now get much cheaper flights than this time last, though Canada has warned its university teachers against travelling there. On the subject of universities, in a valiant attempt to ensure he is the smartest in the room, Tango Tariffmeister has threatened Harvard University with the removal of its tax exempt status after they had the temerity to decline his instructions to punish its students for exercising their rights to free speech.

He’s not having a great week to be fair. Having spent all that time filling the Supreme Court with judges that he thought would do his bidding; they only gave a unanimous ruling against him over the illegal deportation of a citizen to El Salvador. Ever since I saw that news I have been wondering if his ignoring this makes the US a rogue state, a lawless country or if it’s just another slice off of decency?

Did you catch any of Paris Roubaix? Mathieu van der Poel won the men’s race for the 3^rd year in a row, amazing consistency and quite the ride. In the women’s race Pauline Ferrand-Prévot stormed to victory, returning to road racing for her first season since 2018. Her comment about her plan that it was “just a training race for the Tour de France” must have sent ripples of concern through the peloton! I suspect she may well have moved up the bookies list now. This week we have De Brabantse Pijl on Friday and the Amstel Gold race on Sunday.

Opening Hours

Tonight till 7pm

Good Friday 12-5pm

Saturday 12-5pm

Closed on Bank Holiday Monday

Back to normal on Tuesday

If you need a local delivery I can do this evening after 7pm or tomorrow between 5-6pm. Usual six bottle minimum.

Tasting This Weekend

This week we’ll start off in Galicia. There’s a lot of chatter about this region lately and it’s thrilled us for a long while. We’ll open Follas Novas Albariño 2023(£17.99) which comes from Val do Salnés, one of the five distinct sub-regions of Rías Baixas and is the oldest, coolest and wettest part, whilst also being the birth place of Albariño sometime before the 12th century.  The vines for this wine are between 20 and 40 years old and vinified in a state of the art winery completed in 2005.  Fabulously clean and crisp with citrus and floral notes on the nose, tangy stone fruit on the palate and a lovely mineral laden finish.

On the basis that we may be looking for a match with lamb, we’re going to pull the cork on Château Ka ‘Fleur de Ka’ 2008 (£36.99) Château Ka is an extraordinary story of determination and resolve.  Akram Kassatly built his winery in the Bekaa Valley in 1973. Shortly after the first wines were made, Lebanon was engulfed by war.  The winery was forced to close and Akram moved into other businesses.  Finally in 2005 he announced that he was going to try again. Today, Château Ka is the only winery in Lebanon to produce wine entirely from their own vineyards located at 1000m above sea level at the Eastern end of the Bekaa valley.  The owner, Akram, actually trained to become a winemaker in Burgundy in the 1960’s but here he doesn’t try and emulate those wines and in fact the blend is 70% Cabernet Sauvignon, 22% Merlot and 8% Syrah. So, a wine with definite influences of Bordeaux, made by a Lebanese winemaker trained in Burgundy – what’s not to like!?

I’m off to read a dystopian novel before it’s moved to the non-fiction section. Happy Easter!

Fellow Wine Lovers,

We find ourselves in a quandary this week. We were about to announce 55.2% tariffs against the landlord, Merton Council and our energy company. We pay them all money every single month and not one of them has ever purchased a bottle of wine in here. Then we saw that Trump had announced: “This is a GREAT time to move your COMPANY into the United States of America, like Apple, and so many others, in record numbers, are doing. ZERO TARIFFS, and almost immediate Electrical/Energy hook ups and approvals. No Environmental Delays. DON’T WAIT, DO IT NOW!”

Knowing his reputation for speaking the truth, we immediately looked into the cost of flights, a container for our stock and the cost of suitable premises. Then it hit us, those ZERO TARIFFS don’t apply to our stock, the walk from the tube might be a bit far for most of you and the Polo is an unsuitable delivery vehicle for crossing the Atlantic Ocean. So we’re staying put, watching from the side-lines, and wondering whether to laugh, cry or just have another glass of wine.

In the meantime, we all have a 90 day breather of only 10% tariffs unless you’re China. The news arrived a couple of hours after a tweet that stated “THIS IS A GREAT TIME TO BUY!!!DJT” Apparently, it was Trump’s plan all along, and nothing to do with the Bond Market increasing the price of Government Debt. The stock markets all went back up again. If only the newly slimmed down Securities and Exchange Commission had some staff to look into insider trading I suspect there would be stories to tell on both sides of the house!

How have you been enjoying the sunshine? I had a spin on the bike early Tuesday morning and was a little surprised to see pockets of frost! Definitely should have had a warmer top on! The blossom is all rather stunning as well; let’s take those wins where we can get them, eh? I’ve spent half the week letting dozy bees out of the back window!

In the wine world there’s talk of bottles being made from aluminium on the great green frontier. Quick to chill, infinitely recyclable, low weight for shipping all seem to be in its favour. Quick to chill’s obvious flipside is quick to warm up once out of the fridge. Seems a good idea in principle but can you see Domaine Leroy popping their Meursault in an aluminium vessel? Is it a bottle or a bottle shaped can? What about the Appellation rules where they specify bottle shape? So many questions but, on the face of it, a relatively sound idea.

In proper sports this weekend sees the return of the ‘Hell of the North’. The route from Paris to Roubaix with all its terrifying cobbles is, as usual, providing the parcours. Will Tadej Pogačar be the first to enter the velodrome on his debut, will Neilson Powless snaffle it from a group of Visma riders, or will Wout van Aert get his name in the showers at last? Wout almost came off yesterday with a puncture on his recon, so let’s hope that’s got that out of the way! In the women’s race it seems Lotte Kopecky is the nailed on favourite, but Elisa Balsamo, who was second last year, is on some fine form winning midweek. That said, you can’t rule out Alison Jackson repeating her 2023 exploits! There’s a slight chance of some early morning rain, so it could be just a bit slippery on the cobbles.

Tasting This Weekend

We thought we’d go with Domaine d’Altugnac ‘Les Turitelles’ Chardonnay 2023 (£15.99) Childhood friends, Christian Collovray and Jean-Luc Terrier each grew up in a family of winemakers and shared a bond from a young age.  They became closer still, when they married sisters, Brigitte and Florence, also from a winemaking family.  They now boast two properties, Domaine des Deux Roches in Mâcon and Domaine Altugnac in Languedoc  which means you’ve got Burgundy winemakers bringing all their skill and experience to their property in Limoux – what’s not to like?!  Bursting with white floral aromatics and a touch of citrus on the palate, followed by a concentrated and lingering finish this is a complete joy, perfect any day of the week!

Côtes du Rhône Villages ‘Les Coteaux’ 2023, Rhône, France (£13.99). Common practice in the Côtes du Rhône is to bottle the best cuvées as a single named Village wine and the rest as basic Rhône Villages.  The philosophy here, on the other hand, is to start with the intention of making the very best Côtes du Rhône Villages possible.  They source wine from the vineyards of named villages and enrich them with a small proportion of barrel-aged wine from Sablet, Séguret and Cairanne.  The results are fabulous, as you can taste here, with well-balanced brambly fruit and soft tannin that is bang on the money.

EASTER OPENING HOURS

Thursday 17^th April – Noon – 7PM

Good Friday 18^th April – Noon – 5PM

Saturday 19^th April – Noon – 5PM

Easter Sunday 20^th April – CLOSED

Easter Monday 21^st April – CLOSED

Tuesday 22^nd April – As you were – Noon – 7pm!

Lastly, F Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby was 100 years old yesterday so we’ll leave you with: “I couldn’t forgive him or like him, but I saw that what he had done was, to him, entirely justified. It was all very careless and confused. They were careless people, Tom and Daisy—they smashed up things and creatures and then retreated back into their money or their vast carelessness, or whatever it was that kept them together, and let other people clean up the mess they had made.”

Cheers!

Fellow Wine Lovers,

So, we looked at the map and eventually we found it.  Two Chimneys Winery is located on the appropriately named Two Chimneys Road, about 5km/10 minutes by car to the north west of Kingston, the capital of one of the oldest territories and most isolated communities in the world and the second oldest town in Australia, apparently.  Welcome to Norfolk Island, lucky benefactor of a 29% TRUMP TARIFF this week.  Having done our research it is hard to imagine why this tiny pacific island is being targeted by the USA government – there is no obvious Chinese influence here, which has been an issue in Laos and Cambodia; there is no aluminium smelting and there is no fentanyl production, even growing medicinal cannabis has been mothballed.  To be fair, they don’t actually have any ports or harbours here so the export of high end automobiles has had to be suspended for now.  They do have cattle and sharks though.  They also have the aforementioned winery that, by looking at their website, doesn’t seem to be producing any wine.

It feels to us that the POTUS doesn’t know anything about Norfolk Island and has got his facts wrong which surely, as the most powerful man in the world, shouldn’t be possible?  Discuss…

Away from the calamities across the pond, we’ve all had a bit of a hit in the pocket this week.  As we watched energy, water, council tax, broadband and mobile phone bills go up at home on Tuesday, we also saw NI and EPR go up at work.  NI you all know about but EPR, who he?  Extended Producer Responsibility, to give him his full title, is the strategy that requires producers to add estimated environmental costs into the original cost of a product – effectively to cover the costs of future waste management.  Paying for plastic bags is an easy example to cite whilst the car and tech industries are obviously heavily scrutinised.  Now the booze trade is being hit, in the bottles.  One of our suppliers sent us this explainer:

‘An EPR fee will apply on all orders placed from 1^st April 2025 in addition to your normal pricing.  This fee will vary by product dependent on the packaging used by the producer and the latest base-fees advised by Defra.  Glass is currently advised at £240/tonne and makes up most of the EPR charge.  The fee ex-VAT for a 75cl bottle of still wine will be between £0.09-£0.12 and £0.22-£0.25 for sparkling.’

We ordered wine from this supplier this week – we were charged EPR of £0.13 on the still wine we bought.  The Spirits Business pointed out on Wednesday that: After last week’s spring budget and the Office for Budget Responsibility’s (OBR) forecast, it was admitted the scheme won’t improve recycling, with Defra revealing that “the policy is unlikely to have a material impact on rates of recycling or packaging waste volumes in the next five years.”

So, to summarise, all wines went up by at least 10 pence this week, depending on the weight of the bottle, some of the heavier Italian and Argentine bottles probably went up by double this.  Meanwhile, our council tax that, amongst other things, pays for our rubbish and recycling to be taken away, also went up – double bubble!

It feels to us that Defra doesn’t know anything about anything and will not have confirmation of exact fees until the summer which surely, as the people in charge, shouldn’t be possible?  Discuss…

But let’s move away from all this and talk about the weather.  The Daily Mirror, which always seems a bit obsessed by gloomy meteorological reports, announced late on Wednesday – All the parts of the UK set for SNOW as the mercury plunges to just -8C whilst the BBC yesterday was happy to tell us – Parts of UK set to be hotter than the Algarve.

As we’ve said before, we really should be in the weather business, you can say what you want and you always get paid!  In this instance though, we’re going with the BBC and will be opening two wines this weekend that we think should be drunk outside, near to a hot griddle…

M & B Talmard Mâcon-Uchizy 2023 – £20.79.  Mallory and Benjamin produce just one cuvée of Mâcon each year from their 20 hectares just north of the Mâcon hills.  Richer and riper than many, it has a generous weight, subtle, almost tropical fruit with aromas of melon, ripe pear, lemon oil and almonds and rich, bready character on the palate from extended lees aging.  A long fresh, finish with hints of apple make this a good all-rounder particularly for those who want to eat steak but don’t like red wine!

For the red, we’ll venture to South Africa and open the Idun Syrah 2019 – £26.99.  A complex wine from 3 different vineyard sites in the Elgin Valley.  These parcels are situated 200 m above sea level caressed by the cooling sea breezes from the Atlantic a few kilometres away.  Due to COVID, the wine was matured for longer than usual (16 months) using 30% new French oak barrels.  A lovely savoury bouquet of black olive, spicy fruit and white pepper on the nose.  On the palate we have berry fruits joining in the fun finishing with fine ripe tannins giving us a very elegant drop perfect for those who want to eat steak and do like red wine!

With that, I think we’re done.  The last words this week will be from Jim Morrison:

“Some of the worst mistakes of my life have been haircuts”

Valete, Val Kilmer.

Fellow Wine Lovers,

So that’s it, Winter done, time to get the shorts on and the garden chairs out – BST starts on Sunday and we fully expect wall to wall sunshine until late September, thank you very much.  We can then have a month of autumnal colours and crisp mornings before the clocks change back and we hurtle towards Christmas and 2026 – any questions?

Whilst we’re enjoying the hottest summer since the last hot one, we can reflect on other things that have been going on.  Thankfully, because the weather is so nice, we won’t need to get on a plane.  This comes as a relief after the Heathrow debacle last week, which we think proved that, if there is a need for an extra runway anywhere, this west London transit hub is not the best location if we cite the ‘too many eggs in one basket’ theory.

Wayne observed the other day that the weather of late has been a bit reminiscent of that which we experienced in 2020, which could be a great omen, without the Covid bit.  He also pointed out that this time 5 years ago he was under quarantine.  Having been an early adopter of the worldwide pandemic and, as a keen observer of anniversaries, he then let me know that he intended to celebrate this milestone properly, so he’d see me in a fortnight!

And we celebrate other, lesser milestones.  The Chancellor’s spring statement failed to lighten our step, whilst we can raise a glass of bubbly (because it’s significantly cheaper) to Thames Water for their 31% increase in charges, starting on Tuesday.

In amongst all this, we also have Mother’s Day on Sunday, another great opportunity to raise a glass of bubbles and have a nice lunch.  Gentlemen, as we suggest every year, don’t imagine that your young children will have arranged anything for their mother and they certainly will not have bought champagne or booked a table, so you have been warned – the frosty reception when you attempt to nip out for a round of golf at 8.30 on Sunday morning is not worth risking.  Don’t forget.

Sadly, we may also be coming to the end of an era.  It seems likely that Bharat, the hardest working man in Wimbledon and the ruler of the newsagent at Wimbledon Park Station, will be closing at the end of the month.  It’s not his choice, it doesn’t seem fair and if he does go, a very important part of the fabric of Arthur Road goes with him.  ITV interviewed him the other day – here is the link: https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=&cad=rja&uact=8&ved=2ahUKEwj2tM29zqqMAxXNWUEAHSUUBDcQtwJ6BAgMEAI&url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.youtube.com%2Fwatch%3Fv%3DiStS3Br6fqA&usg=AOvVaw1r5gF0qbWheGLe9FuMzOCn&opi=89978449

The world of booze continues to spin, as you might imagine.  The well-worn adage stating that the best way to make a small fortune in the drinks business is to start with a big one is still very true.  There’s not a huge amount of splash to share once you’ve paid the taxman and his pals, so there is little likelihood of anyone getting rich quick.  Equally, as with everything, if it seems too good to be true then it probably is.  Once again we read of con artists fiddling punters out of thousands and thousands of pounds by selling them shares in casks of whisky, promising huge returns in years to come.  The likelihood of the staggering rewards that were promised was low to nothing, particularly as it appears that the casks didn’t even exist and if they did, certainly didn’t belong to the man selling them.  It’s truly horrible for the victims but as there’s no real regulation, there’s no real comeback.  Would you buy a car on Gumtree?  Use the same rules for your wine and spirit investments – deal with trusted entities.  Or go to Bill Hill and put £1,000 on the 4.40 at Kempton, you’ll likely do just as well…

Sorry, rant over, the sun’s out right now; let’s be more positive shall we.  There’s not much else to report – the only new listing this week is Hepple Wheat Vodka – £33 – here’s what they tell us about it:

Pure, Refined, Exceptional

At Hepple, we believe that simplicity can be extraordinary. Vodka, often likened to water for its clarity and purity, is the foundation of countless classic and modern cocktails. But not all vodkas are created equal.

We chose wheat as our base for its naturally high starch content, which yields a spirit that is smooth, subtly sweet, and effortlessly drinkable. Our Hepple Wheat Vodka is crafted through meticulous redistillation in our copper pot still, where impurities are removed, and delicate flavours are refined through our patented Aromat® system. The result? A creamy, clean vodka that elevates cocktails and stands beautifully on its own.

Originally developed for Kocktail, our vodka quickly proved its excellence—helping their Espresso Martini win two Taste Stars and top the Good Housekeeping RTD Drinks Awards. Now, we bring this award-worthy spirit to you.

Made with the finest English wheat grain spirit and the wild, pure water of Hepple, this is vodka, redefined.

As with all things Hepple, it is exquisitely packaged and tastes delicious – come and try a tot to double check!

If you don’t fancy hard liquor this weekend, we’ll also be opening these two delights:

Teliani Valley Kakhuri No 8 Amber Wine 2022 – £15.99 – a proper amber wine, Kakhuri No.8 is a blend of 4 Georgian indigenous grape varieties – Rkatsiteli, Kakhuri Mtsvane, Khikhvi and Kisi, harvested in Kakheti, east Georgia.  It’s not just the grape names that are a mouthful, this is really rather a splendid wine.  Fermented on the skins for 7 days, then aged on the skins for a further six months, it has a lovely dried fruit and nut character with a dry citrusy finish.

Château de Paraza ‘Cuvée Spéciale’ 2020 – £19.99 – hailing from Minervois, Syrah, Grenache Noir & Mourvèdre are the grapes here.  They give us a deep red, garnet coloured wine with cherry and raspberry compote notes, red liquorice string in the background and a lovely juicy acidity.  A great all-rounder of a wine, with red flowers and mineral notes entwining themselves with rich fruit into a great finish.

That’s it for now, apologies for the slightly sombre tone to this week’s epistle – imagine how jolly and uplifting it could have been if we’d looked across the Atlantic for our inspiration!

Fellow Wine Lovers,

Much like most of the US civil servants fired by Elon Musk’s teenagers, I have been rehired. Alex has found that two weeks doing all the work on his own was more than enough and has now rehired me. Fortunately, with these actions we have not crashed either the stock market or the economy and had no near misses on the runway.

In the meantime, the worst American President since the last President Trump is still swinging the wrecking ball through the US economy, International relations and world peace. All this from a man who really wants to be given a Nobel Peace Prize!

The latest idea is signing an Executive Order to close the Department of Education. The future of the USA clearly doesn’t need educated children!

We’ve also had Howard Lutnick, the Commerce Secretary, suggesting to viewers of Fox News:  “I think if you want to learn something on this show tonight, buy Tesla. It’s unbelievable that this guy’s stock is this cheap. It’ll never be this cheap again.” I have to say, in my view, it is not the Commerce Secretary’s job to pump individual stocks. I thought there might have even been laws against it, but what do I know?

Following the success of the tariffs introduced so far, the good news is that there are more on the way!

One of the more absurd things we read this week was a little disheartening. Thousands of acres of protected Amazon rain forest have been felled to build a four lane highway to the city of Belém in Brazil for the COP30 Summit in November.  COP30 is, of course, the United Nations Conference on Climate Change. You couldn’t make it up!

But that’s enough of all that.

The sun is shining, the temperature has risen and spring starts tomorrow. Tree pollen is a bit high though, so don’t forget your allergy medications!

Also, The World Happiness Report 2024 finds that “benevolence bump” of kindness that the world experienced during the Covid-19 pandemic has remained, with generous acts more than 10% above pre-pandemic levels. Acts such as volunteering and donating were more frequent in all generations and most regions, with Finland topping the chart for the eighth successive year. Perhaps saunas are a happiness superpower?

You knew if you persisted we’d get there: welcome to the wine section!

You’ve been very patient with our nipping out to tastings here and there the last month or so and the fruits of those tastings are starting to appear on the shelves. Have a look out for a new Nerello Mascalese from Sicily, a bargain from the Douro in Portugal, a Bobal/Tempranillo blend from Spain and Pinot Noirs from both France and New Zealand’s Nelson plus the return of one of Greece’s rarest reds.

Tasting This Weekend

We’ll swing by Austria for a sample of Funkstille Grüner Veltliner 2023 (£14.49). Niederösterreich is Austria’s largest Qualitätswein wine-growing region and home to the excellent Grüner Veltliner grape.  As with many Austrian producers, quality and sustainability are top of the agenda here – they produce their own fertilizer, hand harvest the grapes whilst their winery is energy neutral, and their biogas plant actually produces more energy than is required.  Oh, and the wine is vegan too, but how does it taste?  Excellent, is the answer; dry with ripe pear and fresh citrus aromas and a palate rich with melon and grapefruit and a refreshingly zippy finish.

For the red, we’ll be in Spain for one of the newbies. Rippa Dorii Crianza 2021 (£17.99) is a wonderful Tinta Del País (or Tempranillo if you prefer) grown at 900m altitude in Ribera Del Duero. Lovely bramble fruit character with a touch of vanilla character on the nose follow through nicely on the palate with some lovely ripe tannin keeping everything together rather nicely.

Lastly, we’ll be late on Tuesday as we have another of those tastings to attend. We’ll be back by 4PM.

Fellow Wine Lovers,

How was your summer?  I’m sure I remember them being longer and usually later in the year but, in fairness, I also remember when my Dad was taller than me and Donald Trump was a bit part actor in children’s movies.

The sun was out, the rosé was flowing and the mercury hit 17 degrees a number of times last week.  Yesterday, we had hail and the temperature struggled to stay above zero overnight, time to put the cover back on the barbecue and retrieve that tartiflette recipe.

In the meantime, in the great big wide world, the POTUS has finally over-reached.  I have been trying to avoid talk of the carrot coloured caricature but when he comes into my house, the wine house, and starts throwing his weight around, well, it can’t be ignored:

The European Union, one of the most hostile and abusive taxing and tariffing authorities in the World, which was formed for the sole purpose of taking advantage of the United States, has just put a nasty 50% Tariff on Whisky. If this Tariff is not removed immediately, the U.S. will shortly place a 200% Tariff on all WINES, CHAMPAGNES, & ALCOHOLIC PRODUCTS COMING OUT OF FRANCE AND OTHER E.U. REPRESENTED COUNTRIES. This will be great for the Wine and Champagne businesses in the U.S.

Ok, Donald, that’s a step too far.  First of all, whilst I wasn’t at the meeting over 30 years ago, I would be willing to bet the house on the fact that at no point did Helmut Kohl turn to François Mitterand and say ‘thank god we’ve finally got a mechanism to take full advantage of the US, it’ll take years for some genius to uncover our dastardly plot!’

Secondly, you are already expecting your fellow country folk to tighten their belts in the name of MAGA, for the greater good, and to put up with expensive maple syrup from the north and fresh vegetables from the south.  However, when you threaten the Friday Fizz market you’re angering a whole different type of voter.  The Champagne drinkers are not the ones living hand to mouth, the ones who’ve had support taken away and who will, through no fault of their own, suffer the most at the hands of tariffs.  The Champagne drinkers are the middle classes, the people who previously were prepared to suck up higher grocery bills without it affecting their lives to greatly but when a $30 bottle of house Champagne gets closer to $100 and a Bollinger Special Cuvée totters towards $200 then you’ll have poked the bear, you numpty.

In better news, if France decides to cut exports of Champagne to the US, there’ll be more for us here, as the second biggest export market, so perhaps our prices might get keener.  Donald, you’re a genius!

Speaking of genius, it looks like Peter Crouch got saddled with a 1,000 pint Guinness bill.  We like to misspend our adulthood as much as we misspent our youth and thus have been glued to Cheltenham all week.  Before the racing began yesterday, we watched Peter Crouch being interviewed by Oli Bell and, having embarrassed himself with an unwitting innuendo, he then got punked by Paddy Power on live TV.  Apparently, they had already had a pint bet over the winner of the Stayer’s Hurdle – if an Irish horse won Peter was buying, if a British horse won then Paddy was paying.  However, Paddy upped the ante by suggesting that the loser bought 1,000 pints for all the punters in the Guinness Village.  Rachael Blackmore won, we won money on her and Peter bought the pints!

In other news from Cheltenham, punters have been moaning about the high costs of drinks… accusations of profiteering being flung around.  I’m a bit bemused about what they expected – Lidl prices? – but as someone once said, there are cheaper places to drink but you might not like them!

Talking of prices, in the spare moments between races we have been to more tastings this week and frankly, having looked at some of the new lists, we really don’t want further tariffs to appear anywhere.  We were tasting some top end kit, granted, but with Ornellaia and Cristal both nudging £300 per bottle for the newest vintages we yearned for the days when our Dads were taller than us and you really couldn’t buy wine for over £100.  I know all about inflation but that’s not the only thing responsible for these high prices…. now imagine them with 200% added!

Anyway, enough of that, let’s focus on the weekend.  Last round of the rugby, England hopes being overstretched in the press and we have to think that France, at home, with such a points difference, should edge it.  Although we thought Ireland would fare better last week and clearly we still have to go to the cauldron in Cardiff.  Either way, we’ll be supping some wine whilst we watch, wines with no connection to the rugby, just good, mid-month quaffers:

Novas Gran Reserva Riesling 2023 – £13.99 – A cracking drop of grog this one.  Chile’s Bío-Bío valley is home to some increasingly fine aromatic varieties, as demonstrated here. Lifted aromas of lime juice, grapefruit, with perhaps a touch of honeysuckle.  Medium-bodied with a seam of minerality in the middle palate giving us a nice backbone to hang the freshness on, fab apéritif but also great with varied cuisines.

We were astonished to learn that we haven’t opened Barton Rouge 2019 – £10.99 since October 2023, which is weird as it is a firm favourite of ours.  A juicy blend of Cabernet Sauvignon, Shiraz and Merlot, gives us a rich and fruit driven wine with dark brambly fruits and a touch of spice, yet without too much tannin to get in the way of the fun. Another food all-rounder too….

That’s all from us for now, time to get back to the racing…

Fellow Wine Lovers,

So, it appears that the email we sent last Friday might have caused a bit of a kafuffle. 

By completely failing to read the room, we wrote a sad note about a couple of very successful small businesses that were having to close down (which was at no point meant to be a warning about our own situation) and then to follow this up we were then closed on Friday evening which apparently sent out all the wrong sorts of messages regarding our imminent demise, which was not at all the message we were trying to send.  However, in an unwittingly masterful stroke of marketing, I then saw a number of customers in the farmers market on Saturday morning who, having forgiven me for being closed the previous evening, promised to come in and give us a hug and buy a bottle of wine.  There you go Mary Portas, that’s how to boost sales!

To quell other rumours circulating, Wayne has not left the building to ‘spend more time with his family’; he has just gone on holiday for a couple of weeks, with his wife.  So yes, he is actually spending more time with his family right now but not in the euphemistic way.  God, how did I make such a simple explanation so complicated?!

Anyway, what’s been going on since we last spoke?  Not a lot, if I continue to avoid Trump rants and ignore the USA, Russia, Ukraine, Europe, China, Mexico & Canada.  The sun has been shining most of the week and, by all accounts, this weekend could be the opening of the barbecue season as the mercury threatens to hit 16 degrees at 3pm on Sunday, all of which puts a smile on my face.  Another thing that made me smile wryly was a quick trawl through the archives – today in 2020 we were in the midst of an international loo roll crisis, little did we know what was to come next, which from memory was a long, hot summer and not much else.  And in the same week in 2019, Wayne had banned me from reading the news because ‘by all accounts it makes me ranty’.  That ban should probably still be in place.

I am still allowed to read news about the drinks business and one piece that caught my eye this week was the new crime against beer being committed by Molson Coors.  They have a long history of dulling our tastebuds via Carling, Coors and Pravha but perhaps one of their biggest sins has been the creation of Madrí – El Alma de Madrid, a lager that doesn’t exist in Spain, has no connection to Madrid and is brewed in Yorkshire, alongside the superstars mentioned above.  But now it gets worse.  They announced this week that they were launching a 0% ABV version – so we can now enjoy a ‘Spanish’ beer, not from Spain and now without any booze in it – not sure I can see the point!

To be honest, as often discussed in the shop, there are some decent alcohol free beers out there and probably the most popular is Guinness version.  Perhaps it’s because Guinness has such a unique flavour, perhaps it’s because the full fat version is only 4.2%, perhaps it’s to do with texture, who knows; I’m sure many of you will have a glass of the black stuff in your hands this weekend, so you can let me know.  Because, yes, the men’s 6 nations rolls back into town this weekend with England hosting the Italians on Sunday in a match that they need to win, in the French style, to stand any chance in the final weekend.  Of course, what happens in Dublin on Saturday has huge significance – given the inconsistent nature of French rugby at the moment, it should be amazing for the neutrals.  Meanwhile, Marcus Smith has been benched, something that would never have been considered 6 months ago – if his Cipriani-esque descent down the pecking order continues, at what point does he look at a couple of years playing in France to fill his coffers?  Generational talent, who needs it.

Enough of all that though, what about wine?  I went to a couple of tastings on Tuesday and have another to go to next Tuesday too – lots of interesting wines out there, lots of price increases, lots of alcohol reductions.  Some funky stuff from Austria raised my spirits and hopefully I can get some on the shelf soon.

More immediately, what shall I open this weekend?  Looking at recent and not so recent emails I notice that the two wines I have chosen haven’t been opened for far too long – that changes today.

Domaine Jouan Menetou Salon 2023 – £19.99.  Menetou-Salon is a small appellation of around 300 hectares right next to Sancerre to the south-west.  Here, the Sauvignon Blanc vines are planted on Kimmeridgian limestone soils, very similar to those of Chablis, and similar minerally notes can be detected in the wines.  It has always been the case you can find real gems that rival it’s more famous neighbour in the quality stakes.  This is a fine example of that: fresh and floral with aromas of citrus and blackcurrant leaves and elegant mineral tones with a long finish.

Glencairn Pinotage 2021 – £15.99 – This is made by Bruce Jack, one of South Africa wines larger than life characters.  My tasting note says Pinot Noir-like fruits, red cherry and strawberry on the nose, a fresh palate with ripe tannin and vanillin notes followed by strawberry all the through to the finish.  We’re having it with some barbecue, if the weather forecast holds firm!

Ok, that’s it from us for now – enjoy your weekend, enjoy the sunshine, ignore the news and see how much that makes you smile!

Fellow Wine Lovers,

Before we go any further, a bit of admin to follow up the brief email we scrambled out mid-week.

Today, Friday 28^th February, we will be shutting at the earlier time of 5pm. 

As some of you may be aware, in fact some of you may even benefit from this, every year we help with the Kings College Quiz Night.  By helping out, what we really mean is that we run the bars and sell wine to the local masterminds whilst providing a steady, overly confident stream of wrong answers to anyone who will listen…

Suffice to say, we apologise for any inconvenience this causes and we hope to remedy our absence by being here from noon on Saturday.

Admin done.

We’ll start with some quotes:

After more than 25 years in Wimbledon, we have made the heart wrenching decision to close…  We have loved serving you, creating many wonderful memories…  Thank you for being part of our amazing journey.

This was from the email sent out by The Lighthouse restaurant, on the Ridgeway, that closed its doors just over a week ago.

From our first shop on Northcote Road in 1991 to our Marylebone location and beyond, it has been an absolute joy to serve London’s wine lovers—whether in-store, online, or through our private client and En Primeur services…  Sadly, increasingly challenging trading conditions and the additional complexities of Brexit have made it impossible for us to continue… It has truly been an unforgettable journey.

Another journey almost over, as one of the ‘original’ independents, Philglas & Swiggot, announced that it would close its doors in two weeks’ time.

Meanwhile, reports from the hospitality industry show that year on year sales in January were down 1.3% compared to January 2024.  The comment from the consumer intelligence company providing these figures went:

…it shows many consumers remain hesitant about their spending, and while inflation has eased in some areas, business costs remain very high across the sector… energy price rises and the government’s planned changes to National Insurance thresholds and rates could hardly be coming at a worse time. Hospitality’s outlook is positive in the long run, but it deserves much better support than it is currently getting

Is there a point I’m trying to make here?  Probably.  I last went to The Lighthouse in July and had a wonderful evening remarking, as often one does, that we should go there more often and why hadn’t we been there for so long.  And now we can’t.  As the gym rats might say, if you don’t use it, you lose it.

Regarding Philglas & Swiggot, if you lived in Southwest London in the 1990’s it was the destination for any interesting wine.  There was Vingt across the road for a few years, with the jeroboam of d’Yquem in the window (fake?) run by Attila, who eventually decided to deal solely with private clients and then there was Mike and Karen, on a one shop mission to gentrify Northcote Road.  The road in the late 90’s and early 00’s didn’t resemble the Nappy Valley it has now become but P & S could definitely lay claim to being the first movers to see it’s potential.  And now they’re closing, a sad end of an era….

So, go and give your local wine merchant a hug, even if he does decide to close at 5pm on a random Friday!

Elsewhere, I’m still serving the self-imposed ban on rattling on about the state of world politics and am even trying not to mention cycling too much.  In other sports, we have rediscovered our ability to lose to everyone in the cricket and, whilst we did manage a win against Scotland in the rugby, the real question is did we win or did Finn Russell lose?  Meanwhile, the our friends across the Severn Bridge have two things to celebrate tomorrow – the Feast of Saint David and a weekend without a 6 Nations defeat!

Back in our world of wine, it seems we’ve hit a bit of a low alcohol glitch.  We rang our alcohol free sparkling supplier to discover they have delisted Belle & Co Brut but have kept the sweeter, less appealing, Rosé whilst our alcohol free beer, Loah, when we contacted them told us that they hadn’t brewed any beer so far this year and were:

currently perfecting our recipes and aim to brew in early spring, we don’t have a set date yet but happy to keep you updated on when our new range will go live

Looks like we’ll all have to drink full-fat then for a bit then, sorry.  We do have an alcohol free red and white though, Contraseña, from Spain which ticks all the boxes…

However, this weekend (well Saturday mainly, sorry), we’ll be going full-fat, with a couple of old favourites from the USA, which is not a phrase that trips off the lips very often these days:

Vina Robles Viognier 2021 – £23.49 – this hails from Paso Robles in California, where the Pacific coastline unfolds into rugged ranch-lands and cowboy ambiance (and who doesn’t love a story with cowboy ambience?).  This Viognier is planted in the highest part of the Huerhuero Vineyard benefitting from the cooling afternoon pacific breeze.  Crisp and medium-bodied with peach and mandarin fruit with a long lively finish – really rather fabulous.

Vina Robles Cabernet Sauvignon 2020 – £26.99 – ‘Black cherry, mocha and vanilla cream aromas make for a satisfyingly lush nose on this estate bottling. A firm structure frames a very pure palate of roasted red fruit, vanilla cookie and toasty oak flavors, as generous spices push into the finish’ – Matt Kettmann – Wine Enthusiast

So, I think that’s it from us, it’s March tomorrow, the sun is out today, I think we’re going to make it!

Fellow Wine Lovers,

There is a film, from the early 1980’s, called “The Gods Must Be Crazy”; it’s a slightly bonkers film that my wife is rather fond of. In essence, a pilot throws an empty Coca-Cola bottle out of his airplane window and it lands, unbroken, in front of the chief of a nomadic tribe in the Kalahari Desert. The chief believes it to be a gift from the gods and promptly picks it up. Throughout the film a series of chaotic mishaps befalls him, which quite possibly created the title. Spoiler alert- he ditches the bottle at the end of the film. That said, there was a sequel!

I’m not really sure where I’m going with this, other than the sense of chaos that pervades the film is what made me think of it. This week, we read of enormous sinkholes that appear to be trying to consume Godstone High Street, its houses and cars. A burst water main could be the culprit, apparently.  That very same day we discovered 2024 YR4 which is an asteroid of around 40-90 metres in size scheduled to hit the earth in December 2032. Thankfully, that’s not as big as the one that caused all the problems for the dinosaurs. Well that’s a relief!

Talking of chaos, much of it centred on Spacehopper 47, who, trying to achieve peace in Ukraine, has decided that President Zelenskyy is the dictator who started the war. Even a modestly successful comedian elected President should not have pointed out the one thing that nobody says aloud but everybody knows. He said that Spacehopper 47 was “Trapped in a disinformation bubble”, which rather upset the apple cart.

Still pushing for a Nobel Peace prize, the White House hosted Tiger Woods and a number of members of the PGA Tour along with members of the Saudi Public Investment fund to try and broker a peace deal between LIV and the PGA.

Meanwhile, Musk and his DOGE team have continued to fire government employees and remove funding from institutions without any wonder about the consequences. Seems the $36 billion that goes to Space-X hasn’t been cut yet, or even the alleged $10.7 million that Trump has spent on golf trips since his re-election!

Having touched upon golf and Russia, we find ourselves pondering the likely outcomes of Amazon assuming “creative control” of the James Bond franchise. Will Bond get around London in a transit van that stops every 10m blocking all traffic? Will those parcel boxes be renamed dead drops? Will Amazon sell you a pack of Penfold Hearts golf balls? Will they just suggest Spectre has been misunderstood? So many questions…

Talking of questions, Six Nations Rugby is back this week. Will Wales score any points against Ireland? Will Italy make France’s trip to Rome a miserable one? Will England finally wrestle the Calcutta Cup back from the Scots who’ve won it the last four times?

The real question is, what are we going to have in our glass whilst we ponder upon all of this?

France will be represented by Domaine de Vedilhan Viognier 2023 – £11.49.  This Languedoc estate, belonging to the Fayet family, is based in the village of Moussan, close to Narbonne. The property has a small brook running around the outskirts which provides natural irrigation to give much needed water. This gives the wines their freshness and appeal; keeping the vines cool in a very hot climate. A flirty Viognier: shimmering hay and peaches with a lush viscous texture give way to a sensual palate of roses, pineapples and mangoes. A delicious partner to Thai or fusion food.

At the other end, Italy will be represented by Urban Park Appassimento 2020 – £14.99 is from our chums at Montresor and is made from grapes dried for around 30 days before being made into wine. A mini Amarone, if you will. We’re quite excited about it, so come and tell us what you think. We’ve got a mushroom stroganoff against this one, how about you?

That’s all from us – Ireland, England and France all playing in the same shade this weekend, will it be a whitewash?!