Peter Lehmann RIP
28 June 2013
The word ‘legend’ is bandied about with such tiring frequency these days that it is easy to lose sight of its true meaning. But not that easy. Those in the wine world keen to reacquaint themselves with what it really means only have to look at the life of Peter Lehmann, who passed away this week. Read More...
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Brilliant Reputation - Woeful Image
17 May 2013
You may have noticed that World Sherry 'Day' lasts for a week (20th to 26th May). I believe they got that idea from us here in Ireland where St Patrick's Day can last for 10 and, when the Celtic Tiger was roaring loudest, Christmas Day stretched towards three weeks on occasion. Read More...
ANZAC Dinner
25 April 2013
What better way to celebrate ANZAC Day than by organising a themed wine dinner with wines from Australia and New Zealand, and the food giving at least a nod to the Antipodes? That’s precisely what I did last weekend. Read More...
Barbeito Madeira
23 April 2013
For thrilling intensity of flavour there is nothing to beat Madeira. Nothing. So there was no way I was going to miss the Barbeito tasting, hosted in Pearl Brasserie, Dublin yesterday by Ricardo Diogo V Freitas and organised by Ally Alpine of Wines on the Green. Read More...
Bordeaux En Primeur
05 April 2013
The Bordeaux ‘en primeur’ circus is about to swing into action. Here’s my take on it, written earlier this year for publication in the April issue of Food & Wine Magazine:
It might not have made headlines on Sky or CNN but within the cosy little world of fine wine the news last year that Château Latour, one of the superstar names of Bordeaux, was withdrawing from the annual en primeur jamboree set tongues wagging and the twittersphere humming. Read More...
Screwcap - Cork's Saviour?
31 January 2013
The cork industry should welcome the Stelvin screwcap closure as a saviour, not a villain. A bold statement, yes, but picture this: when Food & Wine came on the scene 15 years ago cork ruled the roost; never was a screwcap seen in any of our tastings. But it was a despotic rule Read More...
Oz Shiraz
18 December 2012
The winemaker looked at me: “You don’t want to taste my wine, do you?” “No,” I muttered weakly, wondering what was coming next. “But you’d kill for a cold beer?” “Yes,” I hollered. Read More...
Go West
06 December 2012
When the dark days of January finally show some signs of brightening into spring, and a month of prayer and fasting draws to a close, it is time to go west for some much needed indulgence… Read More...
Show Stoppers
04 December 2012
Last weekend’s Food & Wine Magazine Christmas Show at the RDS attracted great crowds and from my point of view it was certainly the most successful to date. Never before have I had such a wide range of wines from which to choose my matches for the dishes being cooked by a host of Ireland’s leading chefs on the Chefs’ Stage. Read More...
Something for Summer
08 June 2012
With the rain sheeting down outside as I write this, it is hard even to think that there may be some bright days ahead, when a refreshing white or a barbecue-friendly red might need to be pressed into service, preferably outdoors under a blazing sun. A what? Read More...
Mouton '85
01 June 2012
Great claret, indeed all great wine, is about balance – a point made oh-so-memorably by Château Mouton-Rothschild 1985 at a gala wine dinner in Dublin last night. The ‘building blocks’ – fruit, tannin, acid and alcohol – were all there in equal and harmonious measure, and as the wine approaches its 30th birthday they are seamlessly blending together into a whole that is far greater than the sum of its parts. Read More...
Super Semillon
31 May 2012
I had the great pleasure of leading an Australian Semillon masterclass at the recent Wine Australia tasting day in Dublin. It was no hardship, none at all. Ever since visiting the Hunter Valley in 1997 I have been an avid fan of the unique, chalky-dry-in-youth, toasty-in-age Semillons that are produced there. The net was thrown a little wider for this masterclass and, included in the half-dozen wines, were two from the Barossa, three from the Hunter and one sweet number from Riverina. Read More...
Montebello Marvels
15 May 2012
At a wine dinner recently, amidst a host of other treasures, I was lucky to taste a trio of Ridge Montebello, one of California’s best and, shout it from the rooftops, most elegant wines. I have long tired of many of the sunshine state’s most lauded wines, finding their massive concentration and density of flavour too, well, massive. Many of them are like athletes who have been on steroids. Not Ridge. Read More...
Tasting at La Mission
14 May 2012
Last Friday was gloriously sunny in Bordeaux, perfect for a stroll through the vineyards at Château La Mission Haut-Brion where the recent renovations are now complete. Meanwhile, across the road at sister property Château Haut-Brion, a major restoration programme is underway, meaning that it is closed to visitors and the wines of both châteaux are tasted at La Mission. Read More...
Auction Time
13 December 2011
Included in tomorrow’s ‘Wish List’ auction at Adam’s, St Stephen’s Green are a couple of dozen lots of wine, after the jewellery and the fur coats. I cannot speak with any authority on the quality of the gems or the minks but anyone seeking a fine wine bargain would need to tread carefully. There’s some good stuff here, no doubt, but there are some right clunkers too. Read More...
What Price Half Price?
12 December 2011
They’re all at it now. First it was Tesco, now O’Briens have jumped on the Taittinger “half price” bandwagon, offering the champagne at €29.99, down from a notional €59.99. Let’s get one thing straight: nobody has EVER paid €59.99 for a bottle of Taittinger Brut Réserve champagne in an Irish off licence. It was Tesco who first started telling porky pies about the full price and, while I find it perfectly understandable that O’Briens would want to match them on price in the lead-in to Christmas, I don’t understand why they feel it necessary to try and fool their customers into believing that Taittinger once cost €59.99. Just sell it for €29.99 and leave it at that. Read More...
Gold Star Wines
07 December 2011
The National Off Licence Association (NoffLA) runs a tasting every year to select its ‘Gold Star’ wines, which are then heavily promoted in all the members’ stores. The wines are divided into categories such as: ‘New World Red under €8’, ‘Old World White under €14’ and so forth. The resulting selection, which runs to 15 wines this year, can be a bit hit and miss because a selection such as this is only as strong as the best of the wines submitted by suppliers for consideration by the judges. So if there is a weak field in a particular category then the ‘winner’ will be weak also. That said, there can be some real treats as well. Read More...
Shackleton's Whisky
06 December 2011
As a youngster I had a big “Explorers’ Map of the World” on my bedroom wall, with the routes taken by the great explorers traced out in different colours across land and sea. It was also bordered by small pictures of Peary, Scott, Amundsen… and one that caught the eye ahead of all the others: Ernest Shackleton. Square-jawed, purposeful, authoritative. Even the name had a solid, reassuring ring to it and I have always been happy to claim that this native Irishman was the greatest Antarctic explorer of them all. Read More...
Man o' War
05 December 2011
Kiwi fruit, sheep, teak-tough rugby players, great runners… but wine? It is hardly 30 years since that would have been the reaction had you suggested that New Zealand might be capable of producing world-class wine. And then Sauvignon Blanc came along and changed everything. There has been no looking back since then, though I for one have long tired of strident Sauvignons with electric-shock flavours and little else. Not that they are needed any more, for the Kiwi standard is now carried by Pinot Noir and Syrah and it is my prediction that this pair will take the reputation of New Zealand wine to places that no Sauvignon ever could. Read More...
Bonneau du Martray
02 December 2011
The hill of Corton sits, serene and squat, above the villages of Pernand-Vergelesses, Aloxe-Corton and Ladoix-Serrigny in Burgundy’s Côte d’Or. Topped by forest and swaddled by vineyards it rises to a height of 350 metres and is the most distinctive natural feature for miles around. It lends its name to one of Burgundy’s most fabled white wines, Corton-Charlemagne, and also a red, Corton, whose reputation is less assured. The emperor Charlemagne is said to have owned vineyards here but today the most famed proprietor is the Domaine Bonneau du Martray whose holding extends to 11 hectares. Read More...
Adolfo Hurtado: Pinot Master
30 November 2011
I first met Adolfo Hurtado about 10 years ago and the passage of a decade since then has done nothing to curb the boyish, infectious enthusiasm he brings to his job as chief winemaker at Cono Sur in Chile. More recently we cycled through the vineyards as he explained his meticulous viticultural practices, which see flocks of geese marching imperiously around the vineyard and a dazzling blanket of cover crops planted between the rows of vines. Read More...
Graham's Port
15 November 2011
Cussed colonels fulminating from the safe depths of overstuffed leather armchairs may have given port a bad image, with the result that young wine drinkers probably regard a glass with as much suspicion as they would one of hemlock. If so, they are missing out on one of the most glorious transmutations ever achieved with the juice of the grape. A great glass possesses glowing depths of flavour allied to a satin texture and memorable length on the finish. A poor one, like poor wine anywhere, is thin and forgettable. Read More...
Beaujolais Noveau
14 November 2011
In all of recorded history has there ever been invented a more effective two-edged sword than Beaujolais Nouveau? Beaujolais’ image was plumped up into the stratosphere while its reputation had the legs cuts from under it. The result was that, yes, the whole wide world got to know of a wine called Beaujolais – while also learning that it was cheerful quaffing plonk and no more. And sometimes not that cheerful either. Read More...
Natural Wines II
28 October 2011
Here follow my tasting notes from last week’s Le Caveau tasting of a selection of ‘natural’ wines, the weakest part of which was the use of the term ‘natural’. Someone is going to have to come up with a better descriptor than this. ‘Real’ isn’t great but I think it is better than ‘natural’, with all its touchy, feely baggage. But it is the wine in the bottle that counts most and these were gloriously characterful expressions of the winemaker’s art, about as far removed as they could be from the endless parade of Sauvignon Blancs, Pinot Grigios and their ilk that the world is swamped with at present. If they had one thing in common it was a fresh texture allied to a commendable lack of ‘weight’ or density of flavour and, in the case of the reds, a generally lighter colour than the inky purple-black that seems to be all the rage these days. Read More...
Natural Wines
25 October 2011
My faith in wine has been restored. For weeks now, since the start of the tasting ‘season’ in September I have attended tasting after tasting, approaching them with dread and leaving them with boredom. Why do so many wines have to be so safe, so bland, so boring and so technically ‘perfect’ that they hardly warrant a single-word tasting note? There are some that could have their note written in advance and would need no more than a five per cent adjustment after tasting. I wrote of one recently: “Featureless wine, no character.” Is this what wine has come to? Read More...
Bonjour Aligoté
14 July 2011
Aligoté is a rubbish grape – correct? That is a point of view to which I largely subscribed for many years, until I had the chance to taste and drink numerous examples more recently. As with everything Burgundian the mantra when searching for good Aligoté is: ‘Producer, Producer, Producer.’ (Just like the equivalent phrase from the property world.) Three of the best are Pierre Morey, Bernard Moreau and Marc Morey and I have never failed to be satisfied with the wines they produce from this humble grape. Read More...
Grüner Veltliner
27 June 2011
After a troubled childhood and adolescence, marked by temper tantrums and some impressively deep sulks, it can be reliably reported that Grüner Veltliner has now come of age. Only a fading echo remains of the querulous individual upon whom graciousness had to be forced and now we can rejoice in a well-rounded personality, which includes a welcome ‘edge’ where once it was completely dominated by it. A host of winemakers can take credit for the transformation but none more so than Laurenz Maria Moser, on whose shoulders the title ‘Grüner King’ would sit easily. Read More...
Value Bordeaux
22 June 2011
If the term ‘Value Bordeaux’ does not sound like an oxymoron in the current climate then I don’t know what does. The usual mad whirlwind of the en primeur campaign is in full, if slightly faltering, swing and, as ever, the prices set (demanded?) for the top wines are causing outrage and angst amongst the commentators. But it is easy to be dazzled by the fireworks and to lose sight of the big picture. Bordeaux is a vast wine-producing region and the châteaux that garner all the attention account for a minuscule percentage of the total output. There is still plenty of value to be had from Bordeaux, as I discovered at a recent tasting in Dublin. Read More...
Torres in Chile
16 June 2011
To Dunne & Crescenzi in Sandymount last Monday to meet Fernando Olmeda Ollé, Technical Director of the Torres winery in Chile. Founded in 1979, which is prehistoric in terms of the modern Chilean wine industry, Torres is of course linked to the ‘mother ship’ in Spain and their other outpost in California. I think it was 1998 when I first visited the Chilean operation and I was back again about 10 years later. This time around the mountain came to Mohamed (ahem) and, as ever, I found the Cordillera to be head and shoulders above the other wines. Read More...
M is for Malbec
13 June 2011
Malbec has had an unfair, or at least a one-dimensional, press in recent years and I have been as much to blame for that as any other wine scribe. The common, and understandable, perception is that in its adopted home of Argentina it makes rugged wines that rely on strength and structure to make an impression, hewn as it were from the same block as some of her more robust rugby forwards. That is the stereotype and like all stereotypes it has only a passing acquaintance with the truth. Read More...
Best Bubbles
08 June 2011
Confusing ‘good value’ with ‘cheap’ is a common error that we all fall prey to, with wines as much as any other consumer good. A bottle of wine at €27.99, even if it is sparkling wine, could certainly not be classed as cheap, but in the case of the Ridgeview Cavendish 2008 from England, now stocked by O’Briens, it represents superbly good value. What makes it so is the cast iron quality, the gorgeous rush of citrus flavours and the absence of any acidic harshness on the finish. Made from the classic champagne trio of Chardonnay, Pinot Noir and Pinot Meunier this sparkler is a stable mate of the sparkling rosé served recently at Buckingham Place when the queen was entertaining Barack Obama. Read More...
Recession Busting Wines
07 June 2011
The frantic rush of trade wine tastings, many of them ‘satellite’ events held to coincide with the London Wine Trade Fair, continued right to the end of last month with Dunnes Stores holding a slickly organised affair on Tuesday 31st. The theme was Mediterranean and featured wines from the ‘big three’ of the wine world: France, Italy and Spain. There was some stunning value to be had – indeed the paradox was that as the prices increased the ‘better’ wines struggled to justify their (relatively) heftier price tags. Read More...
Wine Australia Tasting
27 May 2011
In order to ‘prepare’ as fully as possible for last Monday’s mammoth annual Australian tasting I opened our penultimate bottle of Peter Lehmann Stonewell Shiraz 1993 and drank it with lunch the day before. In the days when you still could carry wine in your hand luggage my wife had brought home a couple of bottles, after playing at the Barossa Valley Music Festival about 15 years ago. Stonewell sits at the top of the Lehmann portfolio but a big vertical tasting conducted in Dublin last year by winemaker Andrew Wigan left some doubts as to how well it ages. Read More...
JC Boisset 2009
25 May 2011
If there is one thing worth remembering about Burgundy it is this: despite appearances to the contrary it is always changing, like a slowly rotating kaleidoscope, as I am fond of saying far too often. Thus you should never let your opinions about vintages, producers, vineyards, or anything else for that matter, get too entrenched. A case in point is the house of JC Boisset where change (in the right direction) has been in the air for a couple of years now. Read More...
Waterkloof at Thornton's
17 May 2011
There was a time, just a few years ago, when I had completely given up on South African Sauvignon Blanc, not because it had turned into a grassy green caricature of itself, like some of its Kiwi cousins, no, it had gone in the other direction. In the process it became a lumbering flabby monster, drenched with alcohol and possessing not one whit of the freshness one wants from this grape. Then last week at a wine dinner in Thornton’s Restaurant, Dublin I tasted the Waterkloof ‘Circumstance’ Sauvignon Blanc 2010 and my healthy, well fed prejudice had to be thrown out the window. Read More...
Whisky Live - Dublin
15 May 2011
From the ashes of a chaotic opening hour at yesterday’s Whisky Live event in Dublin I managed to pluck a few Phoenixes in the shape of some wonderful Irish whiskeys. I started at the Mitchell’s stand where the ever-genial Peter Dunne was pouring Green Spot from the new, slightly dumpy, bottle. The label has changed too, and I am not sure if it is for the better, but the whiskey remains delightful, honeyed and spicy, clean and comforting. Read More...
Oz Shiraz at WGS, Singapore
01 May 2011
James Halliday had them chuckling at yesterday’s Australian Shiraz tasting when he announced, shortly after it got underway and the first flight was being scrutinised: “I should say, I heartily disagree with some of my own tasting notes.” (These had been printed in advance on the tasting sheets.) This happens to wine tasters all the time and, far from being seen as a sign of inconsistency, it simply reinforces the fact that a tasting note reflects how a wine tasted at a particular place and time and no more than that. Tasting notes should not be treated as judgements written in stone. Wines change and so do people. Context, as they say, is everything. Read More...
Domaine de Chevalier
30 April 2011
As expected, Olivier Bernard gave rare value for money at yesterday’s tutored tasting here at the World Gourmet Summit in Singapore. Not for him the safe haven of techno-babble, with reams of tinder dry facts, figures and statistics. That sort of winemaking by numbers is for less spirited individuals. His style of presentation relies on pithy comments and memorable anecdotes, but nobody should be fooled: great passion, commitment and expertise lurk just below the surface. Read More...
Richter Riesling at l'Ecrivain
28 April 2011
The Riesling grape reaches its apogee in Germany’s Mosel Valley where, when handled skilfully, it produces wines of unparalleled excellence. Their signature is a thrilling electric charge of acidity that keeps even the sweetest nectars free of saccharine cloy, and bestows on all styles the ability to age and develop for decades. A noted master of the Mosel is Dirk Richter of Weingut Max Ferd Richter and he will be presenting a selection of his wines, matched to appropriate dishes from the able hand of Derry Clarke, at l’Ecrivain Restaurant, Dublin on Tuesday, 10th May. Read More...
Cognac Quartet
14 April 2011
Mid-morning cognac tasting is not something I do every day but when Maurice-Richard Hennessy is in town to present a selection of Hennessy cognacs I am prepared to abandon my ‘elevenses’ for a drop of eau de vie. He is a direct descendant of Richard Hennessy who departed these shores for France in the 18th century and there must still be a trickle of Irish blood in his veins, for he can talk at impressive length on the subject of cognac, only pausing for the odd sip. Read More...
Elizabeth Semillon 1994
13 April 2011
At the risk of being branded an ‘Elizabeth-phile’ I am going to write about this wine once more. This was my last bottle from a case bought about a decade ago and was opened over the weekend in anticipation of a forthcoming visit to Dublin by the Mount Pleasant winemaker, Phil Ryan. It is fair to say that it was on its last legs but it was a fascinating drink all the same. Read More...
Wine at Kelly's
05 April 2011
For many people Kelly’s Hotel in Rosslare is Ireland’s premier resort hotel offering, as it does, a huge range of activities for every member of the family. I take a narrower view and return year after year with just one purpose in mind – to meet the roster of top-notch winemakers that proprietor Bill Kelly (above) brings over from France in the spring and autumn to present a week’s worth of wine tastings. Read More...
Wine Sale at Dunnes
27 March 2011
Running until 12th April is the Spring Wine Festival at Dunnes Stores and included in it is a whole raft of wines at €5 per bottle, with another tranche at €6. Never, however, would the advice to ‘trade up’ be more apt than here, for by spending just another euro some tasty new world wines come onto the radar. Read More...
Pichon '29
27 March 2011
The Wall Street crash was just around the corner when the grapes for this wine were being harvested almost 82 years ago, so it seems fitting that it should be consumed with the world still staggering from the effects of the latest economic crisis. It was superb, so fine in fact, that it could have buoyed up the most troubled of spirits and banished, for a few moments at least, all fiscal woes. Read More...
Mount Pleasant Mystery Solved
23 March 2011
Thanks to a swift response from the winery in Australia, delivered through Tesco, so thanks to them also, I am now able to clear up the confusion surrounding the labelling of the Hunter Valley Semillon that remains one of my favourite Australian wines, no matter what they call it. For the record it is now labelled as: McWilliam’s Mount Pleasant Elizabeth Semillon 2005. The text of the message reads: Read More...
Sale! Sale! Sale!
23 March 2011
Spring has definitely sprung and, to celebrate, Ireland’s wine retailers are falling over themselves to attract custom by means of an enticing array of offers. First out of the traps is Mitchell & Son, Ireland’s oldest wine merchant, where everything is reduced by 20% until the end of this month. Read More...
Double Identity?
21 March 2011
I had a great response to my recommendation of the Mount Pleasant Elizabeth Semillon 2005 last week, so much so that a number of people contacted me to say that their local Tesco store was sold out of the wine. All I could say by way of consolation was, “So was mine!” But that’s not all.
Read More...Margaux Quartet
21 March 2011
Thanks to the outstanding generosity of a friend myself and a small group of fellow wine nuts enjoyed a stunning quartet of vintages from Château Margaux last Saturday evening: 1990, ’89, ’86 & ’83. All four were in excellent condition and, while each taster had his or her own favourite, there was no question of trying to agree on a ‘winner’. That would be to miss the point altogether. Read More...
A Busy Bordeaux Lady
18 March 2011
Charming, articulate and very capable are just three descriptors that sit easily on the shoulders of Sylvie Cazes-Regimbeau, recently appointed as managing director of all the Louis Roederer properties in Bordeaux. This, in addition to her other role as president of the Union des Grand Crus de Bordeaux, will make her a busy lady indeed. Read More...
Allez Chambolle-Musigny
18 March 2011
Yesterday being the feast of Saint Patrick I dug deep into the cellar and came up with a gem that a friend had given me some five years ago. It was a Chambolle-Musigny, Les Cras 2002, Domaine Michèle & Patrice Rion (13%). Read More...
Best Value Ever
12 March 2011
Hurry! Hurry! Hurry! Very probably the best value wine offer I have ever come across lasts for only a few more days at Tesco. Read More...
Tasty Trio
28 February 2011
Sometimes you hit a winning streak, when a succession of bottles, drunk over the course of a week or two, all deliver complete satisfaction. Such was my luck in recent days and here are three that were particularly memorable. Read More...
