Wednesday was one hell of a day. With the Eyjafjallajokull eruption leaving most of the chateau owners & winemakers stranded in Bordeaux it was left to Team Bibendum to hold the fort at home of cricket (you can insert your own Ashes and Lord’s gag here). A few hardy Bordelais did make it, including Christian Seely of AXA Millesime and our hero of the hour, Anthony Barton, who flew in by private jet. Mr Barton …
Sommeliers Corner
Apr
23
Pinot Noir harvest at Huia, Marlborough
By the Huia Crew, http://www.huia.net.nz/
Huia winery
Vintage at Huia has been its usual hectic pace. Every year begins for us at pruning with expectation and anticipation building over the next 11 months. The weather during this past season has been unusual. Spring brought us a mix of very hot and sunny days, with some long cold wet periods in between. Flowering …
Apr
20
Bordeaux 2009: Thomas Duroux & Veronique Sanders
After a brief hiatus, it’s back to Bordeaux 2009.
Our tasting takes place on Lord’s tomorrow, and as I write we still don’t know if the Bordelais will be able to fly from Bordeaux to London tomorrow. Fingers crossed flights will be back up and running.
Even if the flights are cancelled, the show will go on. The wine is already here, the team are ready and raring to go and we are expecting a lot of …
Apr
13
Bordeaux 2009: Visiting the First Growths
One of the great things about primeurs week is the chance to go behind the scenes at some of the most famous names in wine. Visiting and tasting at the First Growths is brilliant fun, partly because the wines are usually amazing and partly because one gets to experience how each chateau presents itself. These visits are one of the best bits of my job and something I know is a privilege very few wine …
Apr
09
Bruno Paillard Blanc de Blancs 1996: An exceedingly good Champagne
Enough about Bordeaux 2009 (for now). Time for some bubbles…
1996 was a fantastic vintage in Champagne producing ripe, powerful, intense wines with one notable feature: incredibly high acidity. When the first wines were released on to the market four or five years ago, they were generally impressive but some could be difficult and taciturn. Top Champagne writer Tom Stevenson memorably wrote that Lanson 1996 was akin “to gargling razor blades” – and that was a …
Apr
08
Bordeaux 2009: Quotes from the critics
It is over a week since we touched down at Luton Airport following our trip to Bordeaux, and I’ve spent most of that time writing up the notes. How time flies when you are having fun. I’ve just handed a whopping 12,500 words over to our designers to put our offer brochure together and will start loading up the copy up to our website tomorrow.
I’m not the only one who has been writing up notes …
Mar
29
Bordeaux 2009: Dinner at Pichon Baron
After all the hype we are actually here. The official kick off is tomorrow morning but we have had a sneak preview of a few wines at Pichon Baron, in the company of the Chateau’s legendary winemaker Jean Rene Matignon and our favourite pastel-pink-pullover-wearing negociant Edouard Andre.
Four wines is no basis on which to judge a vintage but …
Mar
19
The flying sommelier part 4
By Olivier Gasselin
View of Walker Bay from Hamilton Russell’s property
We’re excited to publish a series of extracts from Olivier’s wine rambling in South Africa. This time he visits Hermanus. Olivier is the Head Sommelier at the Bluebird in Chelsea.
We are still in Hermanus and our next mission: to visit Anthony Hamilton Russell. I have …
Mar
08
The flying sommelier, part 3
By Olivier Gasselin
Barto's vineyards
We’re excited to publish a series of extracts from Olivier’s wine rambling in South Africa. This time he visits Franschhoek & Hermanus. Olivier is the Head Sommelier at the Bluebird in Chelsea.
Next destination: Franschhoek (the French Quarter in Afrikaan). This is where French protestant immigrants arrived after leaving their country during the religious war.
Our first stop was …
Feb
24
India, change & wine
Bu Gal Zohar
Harvest at Grover
Wine is all about change. Like any worthy thing in life it is dynamic and never ceases to surprise. The bottles that lie in our cellars provide the obvious example. Wine ageing is beautiful yet mostly mysterious. We know it happens but we’re not entirely sure why, how …