Category: Wine

All things vino

10 Surprising Wine Pairings: from Pizza & Prosecco to Breakfast & Bordeaux

Written for The Guardian

Popcorn and champagne
This Lady and the Tramp-style pairing might seem strange, but the toasty, buttery goodness of lightly salted popcorn with a well-aged champagne is pure delight. Add truffle butter to pimp your popcorn.

Macaroni cheese and chardonnay
Macaroni cheese is a child’s proud favourite, and an adult’s guilty pleasure. Ramp up the guilt by pairing your mac and cheese with the smooth, buttery chardonnay.

Oysters and beaujolais
Yes, sauvignon blanc is the go-to pairing for oysters, but does that mean red wine lovers don’t get to play? Not anymore. Tread carefully, though. While the tannins of a cabernet sauvignon would send any self-respecting oyster back into its shell, a chilled beaujolais, with its fresh and soft gamay grape, makes a surprisingly delicious partner for oysters.

Mexican tacos and riesling
An age-old rule of wine pairing is match spice with sweet – and that dash of sweetness in an off-dry riesling makes a surprisingly good sidekick to spicy Mexican tacos.

Meat feast pizza and prosecco
Pizza can go with many different wines, but the touch of sweetness in prosecco works wonders with spicy pepperoni.

Sunday roast with sherry
Dad might already have his favourite claret lined up for the family roast, but try asking grandma next time. Sherry is making a comeback and oloroso sherry – with its dry, full body and nutty, zesty and sultana notes – goes perfectly with a roast joint of pork and homemade stuffing.

Seared tuna and pinot noir
Tired of trotting out fish with white wine? What about pairing a cool-climate pinot noir with a well-seasoned tuna steak. The subtle spiciness and fresh acidity also cuts through fatty salmon and works well with a range of marinades or peppery crusts.

Bacon and eggs with bordeaux blends
If you love to eat breakfast at night, keep your corkscrew handy. Eggs are notoriously difficult to pair with wine, but whip up an omelette with smoky bacon, mature cheese and some mushrooms and you’ve got a dish just begging to be served alongside a smooth, well-aged bordeaux.

Strawberry ice-cream and rosé
Who says you can’t drink wine with ice-cream? The light red fruit and berry notes of a fresh, chilled rosé make a perfect summer companion for strawberry ice-cream.

Marmalade sandwiches and sauternes
Paddington Bear didn’t often hold court on his love of wines, but I would bet he would agree with this pairing: rich, orange marmalade with the exquisite sweetness of sauternes. It’s also a great pairing for homemade marmalade cake and (shop-bought) mini-marmalade cakes covered in chocolate.

See the published article on TheGuardian.com

May 16, 2017
Chile fires: 100-year-old vines lost in ‘national catastrophe’

Written for Decanter, January 2017

Century-old vines have been destroyed and up to 100 vineyards damaged in wildfires that Chilean authorities have declared the ‘worst forestry disaster in the nation’s history’.

The viticultural fallout of the forest fires still raging in Chile has begun to emerge, with century-old vineyards burnt to cinders and small producers worst affected.

So far, more than 100 vineyards in Maule have been reportedly damaged by fires and approximately five hectares of vineyards have been destroyed in Colchagua as the fires continue to spread.

Read more here at Decanter.com

January 25, 2017
North America 2016 Harvest, Decanter October 2016

Written for Decanter.com

North America’s 2016 vintage saw advanced harvests across the board, with some of the earliest picking dates on record. Despite the early start many regions experienced cooler ripening periods, and drought was less of a defining characteristic than last year.

California

A warm spring jump-started the Californian season up to a month early, similar to 2015. June was hotter than normal and July looked to follow suit until temperatures peaked mid month, cooling off into August. The temperature drop was especially felt in Napa and Sonoma where locals coin the month ‘Fogust’ due to heavy marine fog.

‘This was my 40th harvest as a Napa winemaker and I can honestly say, one of the easiest with a very steady relaxed pace,’ says winemaker Robert Foley….
Read the full report (including reports on Oregon, Washington, British Columbia, Ontario, New York & Mexico) online at Decanter.

You can also read my 80 Harvests vintage reports with winemaker interviews from around North America at 80harvests.com

November 28, 2016
Chile’s most powerful winemakers? The Top 10 in numbers

Written for The Drinks Business, Sep 2016

What they are making, is most likely what you are drinking. These ten winemakers command two thirds of the bottled Chilean wine exported in the last year. Their daily decisions in the vineyard and winery impact the wine that eventually meets your glass, and for that fact alone these men are some of the most powerful, or influential, winemakers in Chile.

The list is compiled with Wines of Chile statistics on the quantity of bottled wine exported from Chile between June 2015 and May 2016. We opted not to include bulk wine exported as this is a blind spot for the consumer, but it is noteworthy that bulk wine still plays an important role in wine exports.

There are of course some familiar brands missing from the list. Perhaps most notably Viña Montes and Viña Errazuriz don’t make it to the top ten in volume, although in export value they figure seventh and eighth respectively. There is also a clear lack of female winemakers on the list. If we took data from 2014, Viña Carta Vieja’s female winemaker Rosario Dominguez Gil would have made ninth position but a drop in exportation this year slides them into eleventh position. So for now it is an all-male line up.

Without further adieu, here’s the Top Ten…

Read the full feature here

September 14, 2016
Uruguay: More than Tannat, Decanter October 2016

A vast array of soils and terroirs gives this diminutive but plucky nation the tools it needs to forge a strong identity of its own, says Amanda Barnes. And it’s the growing reputation of Uruguay’s white wines that’s grabbing the attention…

Read the full article here, Decanter October 2016

Read more on Uruguay on 80 Harvests

The essential guide to Canelones

Wine travel guide to Monteviejo & Canelones

Beyond Tannat: Interview with winemaker Pablo Fallabrino

The Story of Tannat: Interview with winemaker Francisco Carrau

September 1, 2016
Chile Harvest Report 2016

Written for Decanter

April showers hit the Chile 2016 vintage, with some producers describing conditions as more like those on France’s Atlantic coast and overall production down by a fifth versus 2015.

With wine regions spanning over 1000km, the Chile 2016 vintage was always going to have regional variation. But, most areas experienced a cooler and wetter year, with some reporting high humidity. This resulted in lighter wines and a 20% drop in production versus 2015.

Read the full report on Decanter.com

July 15, 2016
El Nino hampers Argentina’s 2016 harvests

Written for Decanter

The El Niño weather cycle saw Argentina report its worst pre-harvest grape losses since 1957, with production in 2016 expected to be 27% smaller than 2015 across the country and 39% down in Mendoza. A cool and wet spring set the harvest back by a month.

April was a wash out with 400% more rainfall than usual over 15 days complicating harvest times and adding botrytis to the list of problems alongside powdery and downy mildew.

Read the full article on Decanter.com

July 15, 2016
And the winner is…

Written for Decanter.

Sleepless nights, thousands of pounds invested in rare bottles, and zero social life are common elements of preparation for the World’s Best Sommelier Competition. Japanese candidate Hiroshi Ishida spent last month living away from his wife and three children, for his final purgatory of preparation.

This year’s competition saw a record 61 candidates enter, and it cost the Argentine Sommelier Association £0.5m to host.

Read the full report on Decanter

July 15, 2016
Is Uruguayan Tannat old hat?

Written for Around the World in 80 Harvests

The tiny South American country is synonymous with this plucky variety that was first brought to its shores by Basque settler Pascual Harriague in 1870. Since then it has dominated Uruguay’s wine scene, accounting for up to 50% of plantations at its peak.

“Why Tannat?”, you might ask. Put simply, it is one of the most resistant varieties. Its roots don’t mind getting soggy and, come rain or shine, you’ll get a wine with colour, acidity and tannins. That’s an important factor to take into consideration for a nation which (unlike its South American brothers Argentina and Chile) receives an average of 1300mm of rain per year. The rest of the New World may produce fruit-bomb wines filled with sunshine and sugar, but Uruguay is an anomaly – more similar in climate to Bordeaux than Barossa. So Tannat triumphed and took over as the wine that delivered every vintage…

Read the full article on 80 Harvests

July 15, 2016
Guide to Vale dos Vinhedos: Brazil’s unexpected wine region

Written for Around the World in 80 Harvests.

Brazil’s main wine region, Vale dos Vinhedos, may well be what you least expect from the country known for its tropical beaches, flamboyant carnival and vast Amazon jungle. The landscape of Serra Gaucha, one of the southernmost states in Brazil, consists of hillsides and forest. It is humid, like all of Brazil, but the cloudy and rainy days make you feel closer to somewhere in northern Europe than the postcard image of Brazil. With 2000mm of rain a year and undulating hillsides, it paints an altogether different landscape to that of Rio de Janeiro.

Many compare it to Italian wine regions like Tuscany, and these comparisons are not as far-fetched as you might first think. This is indeed a little Italy. The location may be far off, but the culture is not.

As you drive around Vale dos Vinhedos, you’ll see small farms beyond the hedgerows, countryside houses in the style of Northern Italy, and signs for pasta and pizza restaurants. You might even hear some conversations in Talian – the old Venetian dialect that locals still speak. But most of all you’ll see vineyards and wineries. This region has the most concentrated number of wine producers in one area of the whole of South America.

So how did this pocket-sized corner of Brazil become such a wine hot spot?

Read the full article on 80 harvests!

July 15, 2016