Araldica Brachetto d'Acqui 2007

This a new one for me. It sounded interesting enough - an indigenous grape variety (Brachetto) to Piedmont, Italy, one of my favourite wine regions. Pink, slightly sparkling, sweet, and made by a producer I respect.

Unfortunately I didn't really like it. It's what you'd call cloying. Or sickly sweet. I like sweet and off-dry wines, but they are balanced with acidity. This isn't - it's just sweet like a soft-drink. It had good fruit flavours, but not enough to convince me it's any better than bad Lambrusco.

Araldica

Brachetto d'Aqui 2007

Piedmont, Italy

Waitrose

£5.99 (£7.99)

2/5

Lidl Rheinhessen Eiswein

I walked into Lidl the other day to buy some groceries, not really intending to look at the wines. I'd pretty much given up on them as a source of cheap everyday wine - it's just not very good.

However they had this Eiswein (icewine) that day. This was the first German icewine I've tasted. I'm Canadian, and icewine is basically the signature wine of Canada. It has its origins in Germany, and it was first produced in Canada by German and Austrian immigrants. I'm not really an expert in it though - I got into wine after I moved to the UK, and my experiences with Canadian icewine have been limited to mostly what's available in the airport duty-free (it's a cliché Canadian gift, right up there with maple syrup). It's also very expensive.

So, imagine my excitement when I saw this available in my local Lidl for the remarkable price of £6.99. I think it was a one-off because of the 'while supplies last' sign. It was worth a try - Germany knows what it's doing when it comes to icewine. In fact, it was enjoyable. It was concentrated and almost botrytis-like. A couple of glasses in and you could notice a bit of a vegetal finish, and compared to a top-class sweet wine it falls short, but it's certainly not bad for £6.99. I'd buy it again - it would be a good wine to serve with a cheese board when you don't feel like you need to splash out.

Apologies for my incompleteness again (and the crap photo) - I left the bottle at a friend's house, and don't know the producer, vintage or grape variety. I did check the label, and the grape variety definitely wasn't on it. You can draw your own conclusions (i.e. it doesn't matter).

Lidl Eiswein

Rheinhessen, Germany

Lidl

£6.99

3/5

Sainsbury's Taste the Difference Vintage Port 2000

I bought this a couple of weeks ago when it was £5 off (£14.99 from £19.99). I thought it was a decent price for a vintage port - although it's something I know next to nothing about. It's now going for £9.99 which is incredibly good value.

This port is quite good actually. It's a bit raisiny, but it's also complex and powerful. My friend who I was drinking it with remarked that it tasted different every time he took a sip - a good indicator of a wine's complexity. Like I said I'm not that experienced with vintage port, but I found this impressive, unlike 'normal' port or LBV, which I usually find underwhelming.

I reckon it's still quite young - it has a youthful acid core. Maybe another 10 years?

Also - apologies for not identifying the producer, I left the bottle at a friend's house. Will update with more info soon.

UPDATE: This port is what used to be called Martinez Quinta Da Eira Velha Vintage port. Martinez was acquired by Symington in 2006.

Sainsbury's

Taste the Difference Vintage Port 2000

Douro, Portugal

£9.99 (£19.99)

4/5

Samos Grand Cru Esodeias 2007

Samos (Greece) is one of the world's great sweet wine regions... trust me. These wines are only made by the Samos cooperative and are Muscat driven. This wine is a classic example of how delicious the wines from this island can be.

The wine is deep honey golden, almost orange. There are raisons, fruit cake and honey on the nose and an even more complex palate. Here peaches, raisons and fruit cake dominate, along with a well balanced acidity.

This is apparently what is to be expected of these wines when young, but if you have the patience, these wines (coming in different grades) can be aged sometimes up to a hundred years.

I got this in Greece, and there it is readily available for under a tenner. If you go there, bring some back. It might also be available here online but would take searching out.

Samos Wine Cooperative

Samos, Greece

>£10

4/5

Kendermann Rheinhessen Beerenauslese 2006

This was on offer at my local Tesco for £4.49 (half price), which is a silly bargain for a German dessert wine of Prädikatswein quality.

This is from the Rheinhessen region of Germany, which is more famous for Liebfraumilch than for quality late-harvest wines, however that doesn't mean they don't exist.

I'm assuming this particular wine is made from a blend of grapes, because there is no indication of the varieties used on the label or on the producer's website. It doesn't really matter though. The wine is pretty decent, not the richest, most concentrated sweet wine I've ever tried from Germany, but it went well with the cheese platter and I'd certainly recommend it at this price.

Kendermann
Rheinhessen Beerenauslese 2006
Rheinhessen, Germany
Tesco
£4.49 (£8.99)
3/5

Croix Milhas Rivesaltes Ambré

This is a "Vin Doux Naturel", a sweet fortified wine made in Roussillon, France. It's composed of the white grape varieties Grenache Gris, Grenache Blanc, Macabeu (Macabeo), and Muscat and aged for 3 years in oak. See here for more background info on Vin Doux Naturel.

Over the week following Easter, I was working on a particularly good bottle of Jurancon, and although it's a different style I'm afraid it made this wine seem pretty tame. The vin doux is drier and raisiny, but still pleasant enough, and a bargain at £3.99 (375 ml bottle).

Croix Milhas

Rivesaltes Ambré

Roussillon, France

Tesco

£3.99 (£7.99)

3/5

Taylor's 20 Year Old Tawny Port

I bought this wine a few months ago, before Christmas at some point.  It was a bit of a random discovery.  Usually I stop by the fortified wine section to see if there are any interesting sherries on offer, but this time a small orange label caught my attention in the the port section.  It was the Taylor's 20 year old tawny port on for half price, something like £13.99.  There were only two bottles left, and I should have bought both of them, because after that they were gone, and I haven't seen it at all since, even at regular price.

Tawny port is a variety of port that is barrel aged for years on end.  I find myself at the moment appreciating fortified wines of the oxidized variety.  By this I mean wines that have been aged in barrels for decades, allowing oxygen to interact with the wine and mellow it out, change the colour (from red to a brownish hue), and impart a nutty flavour.   This is all opposed to the other way of ageing wine: in bottle, where interaction with oxygen is more restricted, preserving the fruit flavours and tannin for a much longer time.

What I mean by the previous paragraph is that I was kind of surprised (but shouldn't have been) by how much this port reminded me of Oloroso sherry, which has a similar ageing process: in barrel, unprotected from oxygen (unlike its fino brethren which is protected by a flor of yeast), for decades.  I've only had dry Oloroso, so the port was much sweeter, and I have to say I prefer the drier wine.  Having said that, the port is a much better match for things like blue cheese, where the sweetness is a great foil for the strong flavour of the cheese.

It's a complex drink, starting with dried fruit type flavours, and ending with that delightful toasted nutty taste.  It's also sweet and a bit syrupy.  Great as a dessert on its own I'd say, or with a cheeseboard.

Taylor's

20 Year Old Tawny Port

Douro Valley, Portugal

Sainsbury's

£13.99 (£27.99)

4/5

Domaine Pouderoux Vendange Mise Tardive Maury 2003

Maury is an appellation in the Roussillon region of France specializing in a Port-like fortified red wine. This wine is called "Vin Doux Naturel" and is in fact very similar to Port, the main difference being the strength and volume of grape spirit added in order to halt fermentation. The Wine Doctor has a good article on it here.

Maury, in particular, is supposed to be the wine to have with chocolate, if you're into that sort of thing. So that's what we did. Was it any good? I guess it was OK. It didn't really strike me as a magical flavour combination, but it was good enough.

It's recommended on the bottle that the wine be served at a temperature of 12 - 14 degrees Celsius. I may have had it a bit too cold, because I felt that the low temperature actually masked the flavour of the wine, and I appreciated it more when it warmed up to room temperature.

The wine itself reminded me of a non-vintage or LBV Port. I don't drink a lot of this type of wine, so it would be difficult for me to compare the two, but the Maury is perhaps a bit sweeter and lower in alcohol (15.5% compared to 20% for Port).

All in all a decent bottle, and despite what I said earlier, it is a solution to the "what wine do you serve with chocolate" conundrum.

Domaine Pouderoux

Vendange Mise Tardive Maury 2003

Roussillon, France

Waitrose

£9.99

3/5

Madame de Rayne Sauternes 2005

(as part of a fine wine tasting)

This is the second wine of Chateau de Rayne-Vigneau. There is an excellent write up of this producer here.

This was the final wine of our fine wine tasting (see previous 5 posts). I thought it was a good wine, but it didn't blow me away. There are other, much more affordable dessert wines that I'd recommend before this one, and not just because of the price.

I actually found the shop I bought it in more interesting - The Grape Shop on Northcote Road near Clapham Junction. It's a very small shop and their selection is limited, but I actually chose to buy my wine there instead of the more well-known Philglas & Swiggot down the road. I thought the proprietors at The Grape Shop were very helpful and engaging, in contrast to their counterparts at Philglas & Swiggot, who seemed more interested in hearing about someones recent trip to Hungary than helping their customers. I was in there again today and two of the staff were eating their (smelly) lunch in full view of the rest of the store. A bit of a turn-off.

Anyways, despite their smaller store, The Grape Shop also manages to stock a few interesting, affordable wines, some of which are personal favourites. This Copertino is one, along with a Barolo from Araldica (who produce affordable Piedmontese wines), and several wines from the Alsace co-op Cave de Turckheim (I picked up a 2005 Grand Cru Gewurztraminer for about £13).

Chateau de Rayne-Vigneau Madame de Rayne Sauternes 2005
Bordeaux, France
The Grape Shop
~£29
3/5

Clos de Nouys Vouvray Demi-Sec 2007

I do like a good off-dry white, and this IS a good one, made from hand-picked Loire valley Chenin Blanc grapes. I typically drink these kinds of wines with Asian food, and tonight it was chicken with black bean sauce (made by myself from scratch, not that rubbish from a jar).

I think it was probably a bit too sweet though, for this and might have been better off serving it with a dessert of some sort.

I can't remember exactly what I paid, but I think it was around £7 on offer, and it normally goes for about £9.

Clos de Nouys
Vouvray Demi-Sec 2007
Vouvray, Loire Valley, France
Waitrose
~£7 (~£9)
3.5/5

Quady Elysium Black Muscat

This is a dark, very sweet dessert wine made from the dark-skinned black Muscat grape. It is an intense wine, and went well with the Christmas pudding. This post will not do it justice, however, as I forgot to put it in the fridge before dinner, and had to do with a few minutes in the freezer. It wasn't chilled enough, and hence had a bit of an alcoholic heat to it, which overpowered any subtleties it might have had. Either way, it's worth a mention and I'll look out for this variety again.

This looks like an interesting winery actually. It's located in California, and they do a variety of sweet and fortified wines, including a sherry-style wine. Interesting...

Quady Winery
Elysium Black Muscat
Central Valley, California, USA
Majestic
~£8 (375 ml)
3/5

Domaine de l'Ancienne Cure Monbazillac 2005

The day I bought this I really fancied a dessert wine. We were going over to a friend's place for dinner that night, and I usually bring something such as a sparkling wine or a dessert wine, because the host usually has the dinner wine covered.

Anyways, I noticed Bedales in Spitalfields because I work in the area, and to be honest what I noticed about it wasn't the wine, but the food. They serve these fantastic looking platters of cold meats and cheese, and I've always wanted to go in there and order one along with a bottle of something. Looking over the wines, however, my enthusiasm waned a little. A lot of lesser known wines for sure, but pricey. Also a few big names, older vintage clarets, Burgundys, Barolos, etc. I wouldn't shop there without doing my research first.

Ignoring my own advice, I walked straight in and asked the (helpful) merchant for a dessert wine. Nothing interesting was on show, but he disappeared for a moment and then produced this Monbazillac. Monbazillac is part of the Bergerac region of France. It produces sweet wines of high quality from botritized Semillion, Sauvignon Blanc, and Muscadelle grapes. Perfect, just what I was looking for, and it was only £8.99.

It was a nice wine. I'd say it was good. I wasn't bowled over by it, but it was all the things it should be. Sweet without being cloying, some depth (not a lot) and a good finish. A good effort. I think this is an up and coming region, and I'll be looking out for more Monbazillac.

Domaine de l'Ancienne Cure
Monbazillac 2005
Bedales
£8.99
3/5

Brown Brothers Moscato 2007

I wanted to try this for three main reasons:

• it was recommended by Matt Skinner
• it's only 5.5% alcohol
• it's cheap

I don't worship Matt Skinner, but I figure any wine recommended by these types of guys is worth a try (I've actually tried others that Mr. Skinner has recommended and disliked them).
I picked last Sunday afternoon to try this, as I was planning to watch the final race of the 2008 Formula One season. My guest for the afternoon is also a big wine fan, and we also had to supervise our toddler sons, so something low alcohol was in order.

So was it any good? I liked it. It was light, tasty, and refreshing, with a bit of effervescence left over from the partial fermentation (similar to a Portuguese Vinho Verde). It's also sweet, so if you are one of those people who thinks "sweet = bad", then you may want to avoid it. It's perfect for lunchtime or afternoon, or just if you want something that's not going to go to your head.

Brown Brothers
Moscato 2007
South Eastern Australia
Tesco
£5.19
3/5

Chateau Jolys Cuvee Jean 2004, Jurançon

This is a remarkable wine that is worthy of the award stickers plastered to the bottle. A Decanter World Wine Awards trophy winner, this sweet dessert wine is a bargain at just over £10 (for a 750 ml bottle). Rich and concentrated with a delicious, lingering finish this is one that I'll definitely be having again.



Chateau Jolys Cuvee Jean 2004
Jurançon, France
Appelation Jurançon Controllee
Waitrose
£10.99
4/5