Fellow Wine Lovers,
I’ve never said this before but what a victorious week it’s been to be Welsh!
In the rugby, we (because we’re all Welsh today) thumped the Italians in their own backyard 26-9.
In football, the Swans crossed the border and trounced the extremely dangerous Bradford in the League Cup Final 5-0.
Yesterday David Brailsford, honorary Welshman, fluent welsh speaker and the man behind all of Britain’s cycling success, became Sir Dave.
And today, we round it off by celebrating St. David’s Day, anniversary of his famous victory over the nine foot nutter, Goliath. Okay not strictly true, but when you learn that St David (thank you Wiki) lived his life according to the following, you do start to wish that perhaps there was a little more stone-slinging about him:
The Monastic Rule of David prescribed that monks had to pull the plough themselves without draught animals, must drink only water and eat only bread with salt and herbs, and spend the evenings in prayer, reading and writing. No personal possessions were allowed: even to say “my book” was considered an offence. He lived a simple life and practised asceticism, teaching his followers to refrain from eating meat and drinking beer.
Beer is verboten, but clearly wine is fine in his eyes, so if you want to have something today to go with your leek and daffodil pie then might I suggest Cambria ‘Katherine’s Vineyard’ Chardonnay 2007 (£22.99) or Cambria ‘Julia’s Vineyard’ Pinot Noir 2009 (£24.99). Both come from Santa Maria Valley which is in Santa Barbara, California, both are extremely fine examples of top notch wine production and, of course most importantly, both are called Cambria.
Georgian Wines
Moving away from the valleys, many thanks to all of your who put your palates to the test with the two Georgian wines last weekend – for those of you that didn’t make it down you really don’t know what you missed out on. Really. However, despite all the helpful feedback, I have decided that we won’t be listing either of the wines now, or at any time in the foreseeable future. I know, disappointing….
This weekend
There’s an old, and frankly little used, wine trade adage that states ‘Whilst Wayne is away, Alex will always put a posh bottle on tasting’. In honour of such a tradition, and indeed to honour the valley dwellers, I shall be opening the Cambria Chardonnay this weekend. To complement it on the red side, I will open the Espiritu de Argentina Shiraz 2011 (£9.99) that hails from Mendoza, Argentina (another country with welsh influences). Argentina is commonly associated with Malbec so I thought a Shiraz would make a nice change, and, if we ignore the fact that we had some Argentine samples open last weekend, we haven’t formally tasted anything from here for almost a year!
Birthday
As you are all no doubt aware, it is my daughter’s birthday today. You must be aware because it seems that every conversation for the last week has revolved around this, every person she has seen has been reminded and heavily laden hints have been dropped regarding preferred gifts. Being are resilient/bad father I have failed to provide her with
a) A present
b) A party
c) Any excuse
The trouble is she doesn’t drink wine and I don’t sell birthday cards, but do rest assured she will get everything she deserves!
So if you happen to bump into a little girl with an ‘I am 7’ badge on in the Pig & Whistle tonight, do me a favour – buy her a pint or better still, a hamster!
That’s all from me, Iechyd da – as my mate Morgan would say, look forward to seeing you all for a drop of Cambria Chardy.
Alex (& away Wayne)