The Real Alternative Wine Glossary: E
Earthy to Extraction Earthy - refers to a wine displaying characteristics which are less obviously fruit-driven and more to do with flavours of the soil. Wines from the South West…
My summer selection
A bev(v)y of wines that are hot to trot… 2012 Musikanto, Rafa Bernabe, Alicante Musikanto! If music be the food of love play on- but this wine needs no food.…
The Real Alternative Wine Glossary: D
Dame to Dung Dame - “The last time that I trusted a dame was in Paris in 1940. She was going out to get a bottle of wine. Two hours…
“All Life is a Dispute Over Taste and Tasting”
“All Life is a Dispute Over Taste and Tasting” (Friedrich Nietzsche) When the words wine and industry appear together in a sentence, portentousness and navel-gazing are always in the vicinity. However, junk and science is one of my…
The Real Alternative Wine Glossary: C
Cahors (and Cassoulet) to Cult Wine Cahors (and cassoulet) - Those of you who don’t have duck fat coursing through your veins look away now for this a paean to three…
The Real Alternative Wine Glossary: B
Bandwagon to Burgundy Bandwagon - ‘If you see a bandwagon, it’s too late’ said Sir James Goldsmith. Unfortunately, too many bandwagons rumble on flattening everything in their path. The frenzied…
The Real Alternative Wine Glossary: A
Behind the winespeak If you really want to know your Alsace from your Elbling here is a sideways squint at the real meaning beneath the language of wine… ABC -…
Georgian Awards
Favourite Qvevri The clay jar on which I left my steaming wet pawprints at Makatubani, signed but not sealed with a loving set of dabs. Favourite unpronounceable grape Favourite Monastery…
Four Monasteries and no funerals: Georgian Adventures
As well as places for retreat, prayer and ascetic contemplation, monasteries have historically been associated with, amongst other disciplines and crafts, reading, writing, scientific research, farming and winemaking. Telavi Monastery…