Yearly Archives: 2025

Puglian all one’s talents I Parieti was founded in 2019 by Matteo Santoiemma on his family farm in the Murge between Bari, Taranto and Matera. Matteo personally takes care of…

What is bang-for-buck wine? The Bang  …happens when a wine that favourably impacts your senses. It does not have to be obvious or powerful, the proverbial 2 x4 to the…

What is bang-for-buck wine? The Bang  …happens when a wine that favourably impacts your senses. It does not have to be obvious or powerful, the proverbial 2 x4 to the…

  We’re getting used to wines being other than what they should be. Cue a woad-spattered Mel Gibson screaming “freedom!” at the top of his lungs. Vin de France has…

'Tween seasons (summer & autumn) bottles End of summer sounds so final. Like the end of childhood. I always associate September with going back after hols like “the whining school-boy,…

Why are you not tasting what I am tasting? (I ask silently) Why are you making undue allowances for a wine that is plainly not interesting? To me! Every rhetorical…

Sclavos Tsausi, Cephalonia, Greece The Sclavos family traces its roots back for centuries in Cephalonia. A branch of the family emigrated in 1700 to the Black Sea port of Odessa…

A magnificent six ride again   Italy was known as Enotria Tellus, the land of vines. Metternich said that Italy was “a geographical expression.” From the Alpine valleys of Valle…

What sort of wines make me think, 'yes, I am now on holiday'? I am nothing if not predictable. My holidays are always spent in the same cottage in the…

  The Beck winery is a family estate in Gols, in northern Burgenland near lake Neusiedl. Traditionally, there were small mixed farms in the area, but they always grew vines…