Christmas Wine Tasting
As Christmas time drew near, and Cliff Richard gets his
annual slug of royalties for “Mistletoe and Wine”, so the Wine on Wednesday
crowd got together and, throwing caution to the wind, met on a TUESDAY, for a
pre Christmas tasting, ostensibly with the theme of wines to go with Christmas
leftovers – this meant the preparation of leftovers, including cold turkey (a
symptom that, by the way, I may have to endure in the new year after my
Christmas imbibing), roast potatoes and roast vegetables, enough cheese to make
a dent in the EU cheese mountain (if this still exists) and of course mince
pies (including some extraordinary glittery ones from Giles).
Despite the many emails and the multiple optimisation
spreadsheets, not everyone was able to make it, but we had a few guests to
swell the numbers, and most importantly Pam and Jude from Hannibal Brown wines
to lead the tasting. Hannibal Brown is a
new online wine company for “explorers of great wine” that launched last month
(November 2012). They aim to provide
both a personal service but also a choice of wines that is distinctly different
from that in the supermarkets. They will
be stocking about 100 wines in the range, from across the globe.
Having Pam leading the tasting meant that it was genuinely a
blind tasting for everyone (including Darren the host). She led us through 9 wines from the range
(plus a special seasonal extra from Darren’s “cellar” – otherwise known as
under the stairs), in a series of paired tastings – helping us understand the
different characteristics of grape varieties and cool versus hot climates – all
of which was very informative and may even help us in future tastings (if we
can remember).
Anyway, enough preamble and on to the wines (almost all of
which can be bought at www.hannibalbrown.com). All the tasting notes are also copied from
Hannibal Brown.
A pleasant, reasonably light Prosecco and a great way to get
the party started. The tasting notes
state “Zingy, delicate and mouthwatering.
Pale in colour with a soft tingly fizz.
Whiffs of apple blossom, smooth and rounded with good length and
acidity”.
Another wine from Vini Fabiano, who are Veneto
based (near Lake Garda ) family winery, started
initially in 1912 by a Venetian wine merchant.
This wine was very nice – quite delicate (although that might have been
partly due to its wine pair –see below).
Greg, with his encyclopaedic knowledge, identified it as Italian, after
the rest of us had guessed Reisling and about half a dozen other grapes. It is in fact 100% Turbiana (?????) and is
described as “a very well structured wine with a fruity and delicate
aroma. Soft and harmonious in taste with
hints of vanilla.” Pam recommended it
with oysters or asparagus wrapped in parma
ham.
Wow – this wine was incredibly floral on the nose, with
fantastic rose petal aromas and honey, yet actually quite dry in the
mouth. This was one of the wines of the
evening for me (helped of course by my success in identifying the grape and the
fact it was a Southern Hemisphere wine).
It needs to be well chilled. I drank
it again as an aperitif on Christmas Day when it wasn’t that cold and while
still good, the aromas overwhelmed the wine slightly. The notes sum it up “a punchy wine with
mouthfilling flavours of tropical fruits and spices. The finish shows firm tannins and soft
acidity. Time to get the chilli out! Try
it with a spicy red Thai curry.” Yum!!!
We then moved onto the second pair of whites, helped by the
wonderful Jude and some slightly saucy glass tabs, to ensure we knew which was
wine 1 and which was wine 2.
This was deceptive wine – it took a long time to get to the
fact that it was Sauvignon (regular readers will know about my – Darren –
aversion to Sauvignon, whose acidity regularly allows me to make comparisons to
the Devil’s bile). This wine, in
contrast, was fruity and dry with very muted hints of the dreaded
gooseberry. Kintu apparently comes from
an ancient Chilean tribal dialect meaning 'fine view'. The tasting notes read “Intense citrus aroma
with pleasant herbal notes. It is crisp and bubbly on the palate with a long
and flavourful finish. Delicious served
with Moules Marinieres.”
This was another stand out wine for me, and exactly the sort
of wine to give to people who turn their noses up at Chardonnay. This unoaked wine was full of flavour and had
none of the mouthfilling butteriness that puts many off Chardonnay. This is a bio-dynamic wine, made by a vintner
with over 30 years experience who believes in minimal intervention and that
good wines are “made in the vineyard.” To the tasting notes again: “Made
following entirely bio-dynamic principles, this fancy Chardonnay blend offers a
nose dive of tropical fruits, lime and orange blossom. Full of citrus, spice, melon and nectarine,
great length and crisp acidity. Walter Clappis really does stand head and shoulders above for his consistently elegant
wines.”
At this point we were only half way through the evening, so
to avoid flagging there was a brief stop for the Christmas themed food, to
re-taste the white wines we liked the most and then move onto the reds.
This was a bit of an interesting wine – we quickly
identified it as a Pinot Noir because of the characteristic dark cherry
flavour, but then got completely confused by its provenance – was it Burgundy,
Oregon, Australia – all wrong, since in fact it is from Marlborough, New
Zealand. This was a red wine you could
very enjoyably drink on its own, and since I’m flagging now, I’m going to go
straight to the tasting notes “This is not like your ordinary Pinot Noir, this
Pinot has guts! Aged for 11 months in French oak barrels, this wine has lovely
aromas of cranberries and red cherries with hints of tar. Although medium
bodied, it offers a tasty, long, earthy finish.
This would go very nicely with grilled Tuna or a tasty Turbot.”
Paired with the Pinot Noir was a Pinotage. This took a bit longer to identify – but once
you got there the smokiness / woodiness of a classic Pinotage was obvious. This was surprisingly easy drinking wine (it
went well with Turkey
and the stuffing and sausages on Christmas Day for example), but with lots of
flavours. Going again to the tasting
notes: “Medium-bodied Pinotage with a youthful side to it. An amazing kick of blackberry and damson fruit
with a hint of cedar wood and a faint whiff of chocolate and coffee aromas. This really is delicious drinking. This is great served just slightly chilled on
its own. Also perfect with the season's
turkey fest, or even a leg of lamb, rosemary and garlic”. (See – I said it went well with Turkey and I
wrote that before reading the notes!)
We then went off piste slightly, with a 2005 Clos du ValCabernet Sauvignon from Napa
Valley
The Clos du Val was paired with a classic Bordeaux wine, which is of course a Cabernet
Sauvignon blend. At half the price of
the Clos du Val this showed lots of complexity and a ripe mix of proper red
wine flavours. As the tasting notes put
it “A great example of why Bordeaux
is sooooo sought after…. Look out for a violet scent (don't be put off!). This
wine has a really powerful nose with plenty of blackberry connotations. But
it's a softy really. Think deep, supple, long, juicy and very elegant. This 2004 vintage was awarded 5 stars in
Decanter Magazine.” This was a good wine
and well worth stocking up on – one to impress the neighbours / parents etc –
and strangely enough there was none left at the end of the night.
The final wine was another excellent choice. Michael liked this wine, despite claiming not
to like Grenache (although after the Costiere de Nimes episode, I’m wondering
if Michael really does know what he really likes!!!! J). This was a prefect wine for a winters evening
– lots of berries and depth. It was
relatively easy drinking (no sniggering about any wine being easy drinking at
that stage of the evening), but turning once more to the tasting notes: “This
wine is happily fruit dominated and sun drenched and fills the corners of the
mouth with deep fruitiness. Whiffs of plump summer sweet berries make this
bright and up-beat Grenache a real winner.
One of Hannibal 's
favourites - give it a go, this is worth every penny and you won't be
disappointed.”
Roll on 2013 and thanks once again to Pam and Jude for
orchestrating the evening!
