He’s the total star of Sancerre. François Cotat (note, there’s a relation, cousin Pascal Cotat, and the wines of the two shouldn’t be confused) is one of the Loire’s most revered…
The Portuguese Pinot Noir, Quinta de Sant’Ana
Pinot Noir? From Portugal? With so many of its own grape varieties to focus on, you’d think Portugal has little to gain from trying to make Pinot Noir. But why…
Coates & Seely’s remarkable La Perfide
This is one of the UK’s best sparkling wines yet, I reckon. It’s a newly released vintage bottling from Coates & Seely, and is a blend of 60% Pinot Noir/40%…
Three Languedoc wines from Calmel & Joseph
Laurent Calmel and Jérôme Joseph are negociants working in the Languedoc-Roussillon. They work with 20 different producer partners and make around 450 000 bottles each year, the vast majority of…
A couple of wines from Jane Eyre, an Aussie in Burgundy
Jane Eyre is an Australian winemaker who first did vintage in Burgundy back in 1998 as a bit of work experience. It’s an interesting story. She was working as a…
Massolino Barolo 2010
One of my many themes of 2014 was an attempt to get to grips with Nebbiolo, which I’ve always found one of the trickiest of grape varieties to love, as…
Joe Wadsack makes his debut on Series 3 of BBC’s Food and Drink
So, tonight: good buddy Joe Wadsack makes his debut on the first episode of series 3 of Food and Drink, the BBC’s flagship food/drink programme. We’d been waiting to see…
The Sixth New Year Blind Champagne/Sparkling Wine Tasting Video
So here it is. The sixth annual blind Champagne tasting video. It was, as usual, really interesting to see the results. Lots of surprises here. The wines were, in order…
2014 in pictures (3)
So, the final part of my review of the year, in pictures… July saw a visit to South Africa to take part in the Standard Bank Top 10 Chenin Blanc…