Fellow Wine Lovers,<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Where to start this week\u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n
I hope you all went and exercised your democratic rights to vote. Personally, I feel I\u2019m not able to complain if I haven\u2019t voted and we all know I like to have a moan about how our tax is spent!<\/p>\n\n\n\n
This week started with the government paying someone to get a flight to Rwanda. A free flight and \u00a33000 in the pocket was enough to find a volunteer to go. To me this seemed so symptomatic of how this government has operated and the plan to bribe someone to get on a plane to prove a policy works is certainly getting to the less savoury parts of the barrel. In other, unrelated, news from Rwanda, the leader of the opposition has been banned standing in an election and also from leaving the country to visit her sick husband.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Safe.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
We read this week about people leaving the country because of the closing of the non-doms tax loophole and apparently, the plans are to head to Monte Carlo or Dubai for better treatment. It seemed to us that if it\u2019s the spending of the money they don\u2019t like, Monte Carlo doesn\u2019t come cheap. Perhaps it\u2019s just the idea of paying tax? Wait till they hear of Brazil\u2019s proposal that billionaires pay a 2% tax on their wealth – a French economist, Gabriel Zucman, has been tasked with preparing proposals for the July G20.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Over the pond, freedom of speech seems to be unavailable for many students with scenes similar to 1968 on campuses.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Trumpolina has been fined for repeatedly over exercising his mouth, despite warnings to the contrary from the judge. Now the judge has told him he may face jail if he doesn\u2019t behave. I\u2019m looking forward to seeing how this plays out; I don\u2019t think for a minute that the orange Teletubby will be able to keep quiet.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
We found ourselves flicking through Rolling Stone this week, specifically their article on \u201cThe 250 Greatest Guitarists of all Time\u201d. <\/em>First off, we felt they hadn\u2019t narrowed it down too much given the length of the article, but to be fair, it was including a wide selection of musical genres. What did surprise us was Duane Eddy only coming in at number 239 and George Harrison being above Eric Clapton at 31 and 35 respectively!<\/p>\n\n\n\n In booze news, Campari have completed the purchase of Courvoisier for around $1.2 billion. Smallest of the \u2018big four\u2019 cognac houses, Courvoisier was founded in Jarnac 1828 by F\u00e9lix Courvoisier and Jules Gallois and soon became a favourite of Napoleon III. <\/p>\n\n\n\n In other news, Mo\u00ebt & Chandon have an autonomous robot, YV01 to spray their vineyards. Next in line is an autonomous weeder that we\u2019re assuming might be called YV02. It certainly doesn\u2019t sound to me that they\u2019ll be rushing down the organic route anytime soon.<\/p>\n\n\n\n We\u2019ve read in several places this week that nearly the entire Manchester United squad will be up for sale this summer as Sir Jim Ratcliffe\u2019s changes all start to take effect. Erik ten Hag has, of course, denied this but some of those same reports might have suggested that Erik wouldn\u2019t necessarily be in the loop. I think perhaps some of the football pages are as gossipy as some of our newspapers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n In real sports, the women\u2019s peloton is racing around Spain at the moment in La Vuelta Femenina, whilst tomorrow marks the start of the Giro d\u2019Italia 2024. Tadej Poga\u010dar starts as favourite but let\u2019s face it, anything can happen in those Italian mountains. Day two is a mountain top finish, which seems a bit early and possibly a bit mean on the part of the organisers until you look at the rest of the first week.<\/p>\n\n\n\n We\u2019ve been chatting to Braden this week. You\u2019ll recall he\u2019s the clever chap that makes Renegade Gin and the Baller Chilli Bacon Vodka down in Battersea, We thought it was about time we gave his Doppelganger a bit of shelf space.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Doppelganger (\u00a321.50)<\/strong> is an Italian style aperitivo with that classic bitter-sweet balance. Here it is achieved with citrus and hibiscus which make for perfect summer sipping \u2013 all we need now is some sunshine and those Caf\u00e9 del Mar tunes. <\/p>\n\n\n\n He\u2019s suggesting this Pink Grapefruit Spritz or “Fire Citrus Spritz”<\/strong> as the perfect serve:<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u2022 Add 50ml of Doppelg\u00e4nger Aperitivo into a wine glass<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u2022 Add ice and top with 75ml of Pink Grapefruit Soda<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u2022 Stir through<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u2022 Garnish – Slice of Pink Grapefruit or orange<\/p>\n\n\n\n And we\u2019ve got a few bottles of pink grapefruit soda here that we can move your way should you fancy a crack!<\/p>\n\n\n\n On the table this weekend, we shall start off with Chateau de la Mirande Picpoul de Pinet (\u00a314.99). <\/strong>The estate is just outside Castelnau-de-Guers, overlooking the Bassin de Thau and its oyster and mussel beds. Crisp and dry with citrus and stonefruit character, we think the zippy finish makes it ideal as a partner to most shellfish or maybe a traditional potato salad.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Following up swiftly in the red galoshes will be Glencairn Pinotage (\u00a315.99)<\/strong> from Breedekloof in South Africa. 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. Despite the weather, we\u2019re planning to eat barbecue on Sunday and I don\u2019t think this\u2019ll be a bad partner (to the food not the weather!).<\/p>\n\n\n\n As it\u2019s the first of the May Bank Holidays this Monday we will be closed so that we can start our Morris dancing season.<\/p>\n\n\n\n And with that we\u2019re off!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Fellow Wine Lovers, Where to start this week\u2026 I hope you all went and exercised your democratic rights to vote. Personally, I feel I\u2019m not able to complain if I haven\u2019t voted and we all know I like to have a moan about how our tax is spent! This week started with the government paying […]<\/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-1824","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\/1824","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=1824"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/parkvintners.co.uk\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1824\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1825,"href":"https:\/\/parkvintners.co.uk\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1824\/revisions\/1825"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/parkvintners.co.uk\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1824"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/parkvintners.co.uk\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1824"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/parkvintners.co.uk\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1824"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}