Everybody needs good neighbours

When I buy wine for my business I often identify a famous wine region and then look next door for a supplier. My rationale is straightforward - the most famous wine towns such as St-Emilion in Bordeaux or Sancerre in the Loire valley have gained their reputation from selling top quality wines. But because these wines are famous they tend to sell at a premium.

If you investigate wines from adjoining villages you can often be rewarded with wines of a very similar style and quality but without the elevated prices. The very famous wine regions probably occupy the prime locations but their immediate neighbours will grow the same grape varieties and benefit from almost identical soil, aspect, climate and rainfall. So it's no surprise that the wines will come very close in quality.

Being next door to a famous wine region tends to have a positive effect on the resident winemakers who aim to emulate the quality of their illustrious neighbours, but set their prices realistically lower. This healthy competition is very good for the consumer as it provides a choice of similar wines at different price points.

Using the examples I mentioned above, next door to St-Emilion you will find the appellation of Cotes de Castillon. Apart from being stunningly beautiful this region makes top quality wines with some vineyards on the  ridge arguably occupying better terroir than some St-Emilion vines. When you visit these wine regions in person the geographic similarities and proximity are very evident.

A good example of how this proximity works in practice is in the way winemakers use expensive oak barrels. The famous wineries of St-Emilion buy them new every year and the Castillon winemakers re-use them when they are one year old. The Castillon wines consequently have a little less structure and ageing potential, but they are excellent value for money and great wines in their own right.

If you find yourself in the Loire valley you may well be drawn to the picturesque town of Sancerre where the pristine tiled streets and chic wine shops remind you you're in an important wine town. Sancerre is lovely and the wine can be great, but I would recommend a short drive south-west to Menetou-Salon. This appellation enjoys a beautiful rural setting and you will find delicious sauvignon blanc wines without the tourist prices.

Sauvignon blanc wines

Vintages

Every day when I speak to friends and customers I am reminded how complex the world of wine is. As I've mentioned in previous posts there are ways to simplify wine and build knowledge, but it strikes me there is one defining aspect to wine that applies universally - its vintage.

Many people assume vintages are complex and don't even try to understand how the date on the bottle can affect its quality or price. Let's clear up the basics. The vintage when describing wine is simply the year the grapes were harvested. Every still wine has a vintage and the year should be displayed somewhere on the label. This is not to be confused with "Vintage" Champagne. Non-vintage Champagne is often blended from several different years' production and so doesn't display a year on the label. In exceptional years some makers will offer prestige Vintage Champagne made of grapes exclusively from that year and this will be labeled accordingly. A similar classification system is used for Vintage Port and both are more expensive than non-vintage.

Back to still wine. If you drink the type of branded wine that can be found in every supermarket it is unlikely to vary from year to year - as this is exactly what the makers are aiming for. Other wines that are more characteristic of their region and grape variety will certainly vary each year and it's worth understanding this. It's probably fair to start with a couple of generalisations. Most white wine can be enjoyed young and will not improve much, if at all with age. Most red wine will improve with a bit of age as this allows time for the sharp tannins to soften. However, all wine goes off eventually.

The next step is to understand that some years provide near perfect conditions for wine growing, while other years can be average or poor. Unfortunately these weather conditions can be quite localised so that a great vintage in France may not be so good in Spain. And the same goes for different regions within the same country.

Once you're aware of vintages you will be amazed at how many restaurants display specific vintages on their wine list but will serve you a younger wine without comment. If I ordered a bottle of 2005 red Bordeaux from a wine list and the waiter arrived with a 2007 I would ask to choose something else - because I happen to know that 2005 was a much better year than 2007. I'm not always that fussy. Wines from warmer climates such as Argentina or southern Italy tend to be more consistent, so the winemaker is arguably more important than the vintage.

Unless you have a savant-like memory for these things it's unlikely you will be able to remember the good, the bad and the ugly vintages for multiple wine regions. So the easy thing to do it to look it up (see link below for a good vintage chart). It might then be worth trying to remember the good recent vintages for your favourite type of red wine so you will be armed with this knowledge next time you are perusing a wine list in a restaurant.

If you want to get more sophisticated you can also layer on the 'approachability' of the vintage. Put simply an approachable vintage is one that reaches its peak reasonably young. For example 2005 was a great year for red Bordeaux but it has taken many years to reach maturity, whereas 2009 is also a great vintage for red Bordeaux but it already tastes good now.

Happy vintage hunting...

www.erobertparker.com/newsearch/vintagechart1.aspx

www.hedonistwines.co.uk

Let's talk about Burgundy

I love wine and I think about it a lot. But there is one type of wine that seems to have a peculiar hold over me that I still don’t quite understand. Red Burgundy is a curious and enigmatic wine made from pinot noir grapes. At the top end of Burdundy - the Cote D’Or, the combination of this delicate grape and the near perfect terroir results in the most expensive wines on earth (they are more reasonably priced if you go a bit south).

But more so than most wines it is very variable – largely because of the weather in Eastern France, so most vintages fail to deliver to their full potential. In the occasional years when the weather is just right the prices sky-rocket and makers sell out in no time. Not a great buyers wine then, especially when there is so much choice out there.

But those who like it never give up on red Burgundy and I have to count myself in that number.  The problem starts when you have a good one. Even very good red Burgundy does not reveal its charms easily. It has a light texture – slightly translucent in the glass, and can often open with pungent aromas of forest floor and wet hay. It needs lots of time to breathe and soften after opening – up to 2 hours in a decanter.  But when it’s ready it releases the purest expression of the grapes from which it is made, and has an intense, luxurious bouquet that reminds me of drinking expensive perfume.

Once you know how good it can be it’s hard to forget. And no other wine can deliver the same experience.  I have a strong liking for many types of wine, but red Burgundy is the only one that haunts my mind.


Buying it is often a gamble because quality and style vary massively from maker to maker, and from one sub-region to the next. Another curious feature of Burgundy is the predominance of cooperatives, who buy grapes from vineyard owners and blend and bottle the wines under their own label. There is nothing wrong with cooperative wine, but I’ve always preferred my wine to come from grower producers – there is something more satisfying about its provenance. So to satisfy my cravings I have sought out a maker I like and I now only buy in good vintages.

Enough from me. I think Miles from the film Sideways explains it better:

“Only somebody who really takes the time to understand Pinot's potential can then coax it into its fullest expression. Then, I mean, oh its flavors, they're just the most haunting and brilliant and thrilling and subtle and - ancient on the planet.”