Fellow Wine\nLovers,<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Feast or\nfamine. You wait for a bus and then\nthree turn up at the same time. It never\nrains but it pours. Then the floodgates\nopen. And all hell breaks loose. At which point it\u2019s too late to lock the\nstable door because the horse has already bolted.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Whilst many\nidioms may not make light work, they do help to define our mood. Weeks, nay, months have passed when we have\nbeen struggling to find anything newsworthy to type about and now we face a\nglut with a very real danger that we might have to leave some perfectly\ninteresting titbits rotting in the fields.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Irritatingly, much\nlike a Times obituary for a famous, but slightly doddery and faded movie star,\nwe have had this week\u2019s missive written for months in draft form, with plenty\nof quotes from other famous people bereaving the end of an era in such tragic\ncircumstances. However, our\ndead-in-a-ditch-do-or-die dear leader has let us down again and as such we have\nno email to write \u2013 or rather it will be moth balled until January, or whenever.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
But hang about,\nas referenced in the first paragraph, so much has been going on this week, the\nloss of one headliner is by no means an issue. \nWe can talk about other politics, we can talk about wine, we can talk\nabout sport.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Politics. \nWhere to start? <\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n We\u2019ve got an\nelection on Alex\u2019s birthday which was definitely not on his gift list. So far, we have more than 50 MP\u2019s declining to\nstand for re-election, with sadly too many of them citing the persistent abuse\nthey get as a determining factor in their decision to step down; this figure is\nyet to match the near 150 who stepped down in 2010 but that was in the wake of\nthe expenses scandal – from which they, for the most part, escaped abuse. Outside of Westminster, Hugh Grant has been\ncalled rude by Sajid Javid over a handshake or in fact a non-handshake and\nMcDonald\u2019s has shown a complete ignorance of Northern Ireland\u2019s history in\ntheir ice cream adverts in Portugal.<\/p>\n\n\n\n On the other\nside of the ditch, The Greatest Witch\nHunt In American History<\/em> turns another page as impeachment gets a bit\ncloser for DT who, in a fashion typical of those whose power is being eroded at\nhome, is in full distraction mode trying to get everyone to focus on events in\nSyria and how he is dealing with ISIS. \nThen his favoured platform, Twitter, announce that they are going to ban\npolitical advertising – his campaign team immediately attacked the decision as\n“very dumb” \u2013 such an erudite and elegant retort could almost have\ncome straight from the POTUS\u2019 mouth\u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n Wine. \nWhere to start?<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n With Gin, of\ncourse. With the increased popularity of\nmulti-coloured fruit infused juniper potions the coffers have been steadily\nswelling and it is threatening to overtake Vodka as #1 spirit. The Gin category, in all its shades and\nshapes has made a net contribution of \u00a32.4bn in both on and off-trades was \u00a32.4\nbillion in the year to June – according to the William Grant & Sons\u2019\nTrending 2020 report. This is an\nincrease of 45%, we\u2019re told. In the same\nperiod the Vodka contribution was down to \u00a33 billion, a drop of 1.5%.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Very exciting\nnews for Gin but can it keep this momentum. \nIt may have increased by 45% but it hasn\u2019t taken much of the vodka share\n\u2013 and such impressive growth is hard to sustain without innovation and I\u2019m not\nsure where they can go next. Meanwhile,\nVodka stands calmly in the corner in a sharp suit and trilby musing \u2013 isn\u2019t Gin just a flavoured version of me\nanyway?!<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n Sport. \nWhere to start?<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n “I don’t know when I last had so much\nfun in a football game.”<\/em> <\/p>\n\n\n\n Thus spake\nJurgen Klopp after the astonishing game against Arsenal. Liverpool did win in the end so he was\nunderstandably happy. However you do feel with Jurgen that he would have said\nthe same even if they\u2019d lost.<\/p>\n\n\n\n And the rugby\nalso got a little more exciting, for some of us at least. The ability of the English to become sporting\npundits at the flick of a switch will never cease to amaze us and this week has\nnot disappointed. From discussing\nlineout technique whilst browsing Prosecco to questioning the South African box\nkick strategy whilst discussing Burgundy, it\u2019s been a lovely week of exchanging\nopinion and gently ribbing the opposition, safe in the knowledge that none of\nus know what will happen in the finals but are all secretly hoping for the\nbest. After the semi-finals last week,\nEddie Jones could easily have used the rugby equivalent of Jurgen\u2019s quote above\nand I don\u2019t think anyone on the planet would have argued. To keep a lid on any over-optimism, I\u2019ll\nrefer to Matt the Stat who pointed out yesterday the following:<\/p>\n\n\n\n Of the 8\nWCs, NZ have lost one final, and won 3. <\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n Of the 4 WCs\nthat the ABs have not won, the team that eliminated them has gone on to win the\ntrophy once (Aus 91). <\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n In three\ncases (99, 03, 07) the team that beat the ABs went out in the next match.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n And no, he\u2019s not South African.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Game on\u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n On the\ntasting table this week<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n As it\u2019s all about D\u00eda de Muertos this weekend we\u2019ll be\nopening all our wines from Mexico.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Correct, we don\u2019t have any. \nWe do however have a delicious red wine from Argentina \u2013 Lazos de Sangre Malbec – \u00a322.49<\/strong> which\nfits the bill well, having sangre in the title and translating as \u2018blood ties\u2019\nwhich, after all, is what Day of the Dead is all about really. Very much alive in the glass, dark and\nbrooding, with a rich, dark fruited nose. \nOn the palate we have the same dark berry fruit, hints of mocha, smooth\nand spicy with exceptional staying power. \nWe wrote \u2018really rather good\u2019 <\/em>which\nnow feels like a bit of an understatement!<\/p>\n\n\n\n After all the disarray of last night, the makeup, the sweets,\nthe spiders webs and the general derring-do we thought the a Czech wine named Palava – \u00a323.99<\/strong>, might be just the\nticket. Located in Moravia, the largest\nCzech winegrowing region, Sonberk is a mid-sized winery that is considered by\nmany to be one of the best in the country, producing elegant and noble\nwines. Established in 2003 but with a\nhistory dating to the 13th century, the Sonberk vineyard is 45 hectares with an\nextraordinary view of the P\u00e1lava Hill \u2013 hence the name of the wine. Crisp and dry but with some wonderful\naromatic notes and a really long finish \u2013 awesome with some Indian spiced\nmussels, we\u2019re told.<\/p>\n\n\n\n That\u2019s about it from us \u2013 4 spaces left on our Wine & Cheese tasting next Thursday 7th<\/sup>\nNovember should the mood take you and you have a spare \u00a320 in your wallet<\/strong>\nand with that we\u2019re gone\u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n Goodnight, and may your God go with you!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Fellow Wine Lovers, Feast or famine. You wait for a bus and then three turn up at the same time. It never rains but it pours. Then the floodgates open. And all hell breaks loose. At which point it\u2019s too late to lock the stable door because the horse has already bolted. Whilst many idioms […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1213","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-general"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/parkvintners.co.uk\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1213","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/parkvintners.co.uk\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/parkvintners.co.uk\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/parkvintners.co.uk\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/parkvintners.co.uk\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1213"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/parkvintners.co.uk\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1213\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1214,"href":"https:\/\/parkvintners.co.uk\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1213\/revisions\/1214"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/parkvintners.co.uk\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1213"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/parkvintners.co.uk\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1213"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/parkvintners.co.uk\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1213"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}