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April 8, 2014
Bordeaux Days 5 & 6 – Right Bank – Saint-Émilion and Pomerol
Our last two days were spent on the right bank. Friday started off rather grey and gloomy but with a cracker of a schedule. There is a palpable sense of achievement in the bus that we have now tasted a lot of wines and are at the business end of...
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April 7, 2014
Bordeaux Day 4 – St Estephe, Joanne, Carmes Haut-Brion
Rain. It started last night at dinner - we were unprepared and got mercilessly drenched on the walk home. This morning is a little better, in a drizzly, foggy sort of way. The new tour bus game is spotting vineyard workers rising eerily from the mist as we drive past.
Another...
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April 4, 2014
Bordeaux Day 3 – UGCs, Phelan Segur, Haut-Brion, Mission Haut-Brion
Having been consistently late yesterday, we have turned over a new leaf and were so early for the St Julien Union des Grands Crus tasting that they were still setting up when we arrived. There is a distinct nip in the spring air today, but it started sunny and crisp...
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April 2, 2014
Bordeaux Day 2 – Pauillac, Margaux, Sauternes (mostly)
Just as we were dozily watching the sun come up over the Medoc from the comfort of our executive VW minibus, we hit traffic. Someone had gone off one of the notoriously narrow Medoc back roads into a ditch. Fortunately the pompiers were on hand and the only damage appeared...
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April 1, 2014
Bordeaux 2013 tasting – Day 1
Some brief impressions from the road on our first day tasting the Bordeaux 2013 vintage. The first thing to say is that this is nothing like as bad as we have been led to believe. Yes, the fruit concentration is lighter than in the top years, and yes there are...
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March 31, 2014
Bordeaux 2009, Mouton IMW tastings
While we are gearing up for Bordeaux 2013, it is tempting to revisit two recent Bordeaux tastings as a reminder of how untouchable this region can be when it hits its stride. Both tastings were courtesy of the Institute of Masters of Wine; the first an exhaustive stock-take of the...
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March 13, 2014
The Great Claret Tasting at Southwold, 22nd – 24th January 2014
The annual Claret Tasting, held every year in the seaside town of Southwold since the early 1980’s, was this year tasting the much heralded 2010 vintage. The 20 tasters, including Jancis Robinson MW, Neal Martin and Stephen Spurrier, tasted over 300 wines in 24 flights, all served blind.
2010 is of...
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January 28, 2014
Oxford University Wine Circle tasting with Andrea Franchetti
On Thursday just gone I was delighted to join Andrea Franchetti in a tasting given for the Oxford University Wine Circle. The tasting was, two trios of the great estate but ten years apart. The wines were in magnum and had been sent to Oxford one week prior to the...
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August 7, 2013
Dining on Domaine de la Romanée-Conti
It was a very balmy evening when I was on the way to the restaurant L‘Etranger on Gloucester Road in South Kensington a few weeks ago. A fantastic restaurant creating great dishes of French and Japanese influence, I highly recommend you to go.
Excited about the dinner ahead yet nervous about...
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July 30, 2013
Tasting and dinner with Roberto Conterno of Cantina Giacomo Conterno
For the last three years it has been a real privilege to travel out to Piedmont and taste with Roberto Conterno of Cantina Giacomo Conterno, in many ways my favourite estate in the world of wine, not that one needs to have a favourite. I look forward to it like...
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