Fellow Wine Lovers,<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Welcome to July, hottest month of the year apparently?!<\/p>\n\n\n\n
It\u2019s a month full of celebrations \u2013 today Canadians around the world are blowing the froth off a cold Labatt\u2019 Blue in celebration of 155 years of Confederation and political autonomy. Then, on Monday, the Americans have their turn whilst they de-ice a Coors Light and revel in 246 years of Independence from British Rule. Ten days later it\u2019s the turn of the French to decapitate a chilled Desperado as they celebrate the storming of the Bastille, the symbolic start of the French Revolution.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
In fact, after further research, it looks like July is quite a busy month for Independence days: alongside those mentioned above we have Burundi, Rwanda, Somalia, Belarus, Algeria, Cape Verde, Venezuela, Comoros, Malawi, Solomon Islands, Argentina, South Sudan, The Bahamas, Kiribati, S\u00e3o Tom\u00e9 and Pr\u00edncipe, Slovakia, Colombia, Belgium, Egypt, Liberia, Maldives, Netherlands, Peru and Vanuatu. Quite a few of these gained their freedom from the Spanish Empire, a couple from Belgium, however the majority were escaping the grips of the United Kingdom \u2013 god bless our imperial past and all its many injustices!<\/p>\n\n\n\n
When do we add Scotland to this list I wonder?<\/p>\n\n\n\n
As you can no doubt tell from the aimless meanderings above, we\u2019ve not been given much support by world news once again this week. The news is filled with awful people going to prison for 30 years; it\u2019s filled with reports of the demise of modern, free society in the USA; it\u2019s filled with articles about the Met police being not fit for purpose whilst they are simultaneously given more powers to stop and search anyone they want and arrest peaceful protesters outside parliament.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Not many jokes to be made there.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Sport has given us a bit of succour though. The cricket produced a thriller once again as England triumphed over New Zealand. Ireland\u2019s best cricketer retired, having realised his work here is done. Tennis is getting a bit more exciting too, now that we don\u2019t have to slavishly watch every grimace Mr Murray makes and Ms Raducanu can take some time out of the spotlight and regroup. We can now just watch it for fun and support the others, like local Putney lad Cameron Norrie (born in South Africa, parents Scottish and Welsh, grew up in New Zealand before going to Uni in Texas\u2026.)<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Elsewhere, Wayne nearly spat his Cheerios across the kitchen when he discovered that Mark Cavendish hadn\u2019t been picked for the Tour de France. Even to me it seems a bit bonkers that someone who is in the form of their life and who won the Green jersey last year hasn\u2019t been given the nod. Almost, feels a bit disrespectful to the Tour itself that he hasn\u2019t been given the opportunity to defend his title \u2013 however we won\u2019t be boycotting this epic adventure and will watch it on TV of course \u2013 it starts today in Copenhagen (obviously!)<\/p>\n\n\n\n
In the world of wine where we choose to spend many of our waking hours not much is going on \u2013 grapes are growing, fears of thunderstorms are increasing as always happens at this time of year and prices are going up, again. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Sadly, nothing new there really. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
We did discover, via a recently revised report on Alcohol Consumption in different countries by Our World In Data,<\/em> that we don\u2019t even make the Top Ten. The Seychelles top the table with average alcohol consumption per person, whilst we come 20th<\/sup> in the list, after Germany, Ireland, Spain, France, Portugal and Switzerland. Of course, this isn\u2019t a reason to up our levels but it is quite nice to know that we\u2019re not as bad as we are often painted by the media!<\/p>\n\n\n\n So, let\u2019s have a drink to celebrate. We don\u2019t have anything Canadian, sorry Francis. How about we open something from the US of A and then something from Argentina who will also be celebrating their Independence on 9th<\/sup> July? I know that\u2019s next Saturday but, according to Paula, it\u2019s never too early to start the party\u2026.<\/p>\n\n\n\n For the white we\u2019ll go with a massively underrated white from Argentina: Manos Negras Torront\u00e9s 2019 – \u00a314.99. <\/strong>Alejandro Sejanovich is probably Argentina’s most knowledgeable viticulturist. As vineyard director for Bodega Catena Zapata for 16 years, he pioneered high altitude vineyard planting which is where this wine comes in. Torront\u00e9s is Argentina’s signature white grape, and this one is from the vineyards of the Calchaqu\u00ed Valleys at altitudes ranging between 1700 and 3100 meters above sea level. The large diurnal temperature range the altitude brings is key to the freshness as we are on the same latitude as the Kalahari Desert (26\u02da). Torront\u00e9s grown at these extremes gives us a wine of light yellow colour, with explosive floral aromas, citrus fruit flavours and a crisp, clean finish.<\/p>\n\n\n\n For the red, I think the Vina Robles Cabernet Sauvignon 2018 – \u00a324.99<\/strong> will be just the ticket. Growers and makers of expressive, approachable estate wines from Paso Robles, California, this offering is a blend of 85% Cabernet Sauvignon and 15% Petit Verdot matured for 20 months in oak barrels. Cassis, blueberries, cedar and anise dominate with hints of black olives and juniper berry. The palate is full-bodied with the same cassis and blueberries, spicy notes and a rich structured finish.<\/p>\n\n\n\n That\u2019s all from us for this week; we\u2019re off on our skidoos to the Maple Leaf in Maiden Lane followed by a swim on Trafalgar Square, who\u2019s with us? Oh year, probably about 18 policemen\u2026.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Cheers!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Fellow Wine Lovers, Welcome to July, hottest month of the year apparently?! It\u2019s a month full of celebrations \u2013 today Canadians around the world are blowing the froth off a cold Labatt\u2019 Blue in celebration of 155 years of Confederation and political autonomy. Then, on Monday, the Americans have their turn whilst they de-ice a […]<\/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-1568","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\/1568","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=1568"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/parkvintners.co.uk\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1568\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1569,"href":"https:\/\/parkvintners.co.uk\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1568\/revisions\/1569"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/parkvintners.co.uk\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1568"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/parkvintners.co.uk\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1568"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/parkvintners.co.uk\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1568"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}