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The other day I was given a wine blind and asked to guess what it was. I wasn’t getting anything. It was neutral with a short finish and all I…

The other day, at a nameless restaurant in a nameless place, three colleagues and I drank a large number of nameless conventionally-made “classic” wines. When I say drank, I mean…

With torrential rain throughout the last couple of months, it is only fair that we report on a flood of new and recent arrivals. These are but a small proportion…

I have had a huge soft spot for Jurançon since I first encountered a dry version of the wine in a restaurant in Marylebone in the early 1990s. Our company…

Certain grape varieties, like football teams, engender strong supportive feelings in individuals. Perhaps, they enjoy an exalted reputation as a noble variety and accrue a mythology around themselves. We hear…

Appellations and pear-shaped thinking We work with the wines of Frantz Saumon (he’s a former lumberjack and he’s okay), a vigneron who makes most excellent wines from either old vines…

In his 1971 book “The Unforeseen Wilderness: An Essay on Kentucky’s Red River Gorge” influential environmental activist Wendell Berry, emphasizing the desirability of preserving natural areas and adapting a long-range…

The new Alsatian’s Natural Creed stateth that farming should be biodynamic and that winemaking boundaries can - and should be – pushed to the maximum minimal. It is not just…

The farm Podere Sassi lies in a beautiful location overlooking the surrounding valleys of the southern Sabina. It’s a small biologic agricultural holding that is characterised by a pure, strong…

What draws us to wine, in an intellectual as well as emotional way, is that we are naturally fascinated by people and the places they come from and the wines…

Do you remember when every other blog seemed to concern the irresistible rise of orange wines?  Orange was – for a time - the only colour. It dominated discourse. I…

I have been flailing around about what to write about recently until I read a thread on a well-known wine educator’s page. It was a classic lemon-sucking post, pooh-poohing the…

The 18-hectare family run winery and vineyards are situated on the south-eastern edge of the Montalcino appellation in the tiny village of Castelnuovo dell’ Abate. Flavio Fanti is a traditionalist…

  As I raise the glass of wine to my lips, I am listening to a verbal picture being painted by a friend of mine of a young female vigneronne…

  The Hearach is the first, historic single malt whisky from the Isle of Harris, as the distilling traditions lost during the Pabbay clearances of the 1840s have been revived. Every…

Bangers from Cangas Fran Asencio is the man behind Dominio del Urogallo, a domain of old vines, complex soils and steep slopes, in the cooler climate of an Atlantic-influenced region.…

This is a short addendum to the piece "Why Rowing Back is Not an Option", written earlier this year, which expresses how the growth of natural wine has revitalised the…

Walgate Wines (a.k.a. Ben Walgate) are committed to producing some of the finest wines in England. Ben is making good on this ambitious pledge. A slow and respectful winemaking process…

We were overwhelmed with positive feedback of the Real Wine Fair, which took place on 28-29th April 2024 at Tobacco Dock in London. Here is just a small sampling of…

Les Caves de Pyrene are delighted to announce an en primeur offer for the 2023 vintage of Lost in a Field “Frolic” pét-nat – not just a first for pét-nat,…

Our Sir Wregg is on the Interpreting Wine podcast talking about the Real Wine Fair 2024 (April 28-29th): its origins (and indeed Doug's and Les Caves de Pyrene's origins) as…

  I have been in more than one cab (but not at the same time), and when asked what I did for a living, explained truthfully that I was involved…

Tuscan can do Agricola I Forestieri was born in 2019 as two friends and colleagues decided to embark on their own winemaking journey together. Dario Marinari cut his teeth working…

Written by Barney Wilczak, Distiller & Owner of Capreolus Distillery in England's Cotswolds   As I write, a spiralling thread of liquid runs from the still before me. Inside the…

The wines of Savoie and Jura are often lumped together as issuing from a kind of agglomerated sub-Alpine region. In reality, they are very different in so many ways –…

Bernard Plageoles took the reins, to continue the work of his father Robert, an outspoken advocate for natural wines with a centuries old approach to winemaking. Robert Plageoles had researched…

The new appeal of orange wines The other week Susie and Peter Barrie were kind enough to interview me for their excellent podcast, Wine Blast, the pithy subjection under discussion…

As I am writing this we have just finished draining and pressing our last bunches from the 2023 Harvest.  Both our Red and Pink Pet Nats are in bottle and…

Having stuck a thousand blogs (mille tonnerres) in my back pocket – I am never going to let you forget that stat - it’s time to poke the first verbal…

Gentle winds of change in Bordeaux M’lud. All the cynical cracks made about trad Bordeaux and the culture of conservatism may be partially retracted. Whisper it not, but there are…

Occasionally, we need to remind ourselves what we first loved about natural wines. The feeling of drinking something which was elemental and pure, made without additions or protection, wine that…

Wine taste snobbery Why can’t a hybrid wine from Vermont be as good as one from Burgundy? Maybe, as Dogberry says in Much Ado About Nothing: “Comparisons are odorous.” Or…

Natural doesn’t mean the wine has to be cloudy with a cute and tongue in cheek label. Az. Agr. Summer Wolff is the culmination of decades of dreams, ideas, study,…

It is a truth universally acknowledged that we’ve had a love affair with Georgia for the past few years, and over a decade ago became one of the first companies…

In epic sagas such as The Lord of the Rings, when the power of evil is eventually vanquished after a massive cathartic battle, you breathe a sigh of relief as,…

Coming Soon! Said to test the skills and testosterone levels of male wine waiters under the most extreme conditions, the challenge is divided into six stages. To the victor the…

Village G Force We are now in receipt of our second and final consignment of 2022 vintage Comando G (before you could say "Garnacha" the first shipment had all but…

This was perhaps not a vintage year for stellar wines, although that might be as much that I was suffering from jaded palate syndrome. The list below features a couple…

PX marks the spot Founded in 1729, Alvear is not only the oldest winery in Montilla, but in all Andalucia. The family-owned company has been around for almost three centuries,…

The Real Wine Fair will be returning for its 8th edition to London’s historic Tobacco Dock in 2024! The dates will be Sunday 28th (public and trade) and Monday 29th…

Wine tasting is traditionally broken down into three sensory disciplines: appearance, aroma or smell, and taste. However objective we may claim to be in our assessments, these are our perceptions…

Your money for your lupins The Boomtown Rats sang: “I don’t like Mondeuse”, but what did they know about Savoie’s great red grape? In Wine Grapes, by Jancis Robinson, Julia Harding,…

Continued from Part One... Of natural wine origins and movers-and-shakers Literature is riddled with examples of the unreliable narrator from Nelly in Wuthering Heights, Pi Patel in Life of Pi,…

The 1000th Blog (give or take) and doing it our way For what is a man, what has he got? If not himself then he has naught Not to say…

It takes a village to raise a child. It takes a friendly wine community to support a small wine company, especially through its first uncertain steps on a new path,…

It takes a village to raise a child. It takes a friendly wine community to support a small wine company, especially through its first uncertain steps on a new path,…

Muscadet Excelsior 2020 & Berceau des Fees 2022 This has not been a stellar year for wine epiphanies. The epiphany can be a whiplash crack of realisation and self-realisation, or…

Sato Wines was established by Yoshiaki Sato, and his wife, Kyoko Sato, as a small project in 2009. Kyoko and Yoshi met in 1998 at a Japanese bank, where they…

An introduction to a series of short articles   The phrase “demotic rag” entered my head the other morning. I wasn’t fully aware. Caffeine has yet to trigger consciousness. Don’t…

More random thoughts about wine This is, of course, a subject for a longer blog. A group of Cavistes were discussing the future of natural wine, and how our customers…

French savoir-faire in Marlborough When Jean-Marie and the late Rémi Bourgeois inherited the Henri Bourgeois estate, the brothers were inspired to explore the possibilities offered by international wine regions. Their…

By guest blogger Laura Milnes A few years ago, my brother-in-law became an orthodox Christian. Overnight, he was foisting prayer at every family meal and proselytizing why "his God is the…

  I have been in more than one cab (but not at the same time), and when asked what I did for a living, explained truthfully that I was involved…

  Statement: Whereas the vast majority of wines that are sold are technically correct as far as a faults-analysis panel might determine, they are also pretty boring to drink. With…

“ELEVATE!” One of the seminal moments in Dr Who history occurred in the imaginatively-titled 2005 episode Dalek when (spoiler alert!) the metallic pepper pot with the loo-plunger extension faced its greatest…

Amber in the pink of condition The beautiful thing about orange wines is that they have pushed the dial in different directions, both forward and back; They show us that…

We will bring vintage reports as and when producers find time to give us their perspectives. Suffice to say, that it is a mixed picture with some unique difficulties. In…

When one thinks of I Vigneri, one thinks of Etna and Salvo Foti. I Vigneri is a project dedicated to Sicilian, and more specifically, Etnean heritage, in terms of reviving…

Mag-nifico! I know what you’re thinking. Did he pour six glasses or only five, but in the excitement I kinda lost track myself. This being a 1.5 litre magnum of…

When one thinks of red wines from the Loire, one probably imagines fruit-freighted wines, soft and juicy numbers. The real story, however, is a wee bit more complicated than that.…

There are three levels (so to speak) of wines from Cara Sur, a collaborative project between Sebastián Zuccardi and Marcela Manini teaming up with Nuria Año Gargiulo and Pancho Burgallo,…

News of imminent arrivals The vitality of a wine portfolio depends on its constant renewal. This does not mean that it needs to increase in size, but rather than it…

Natural Star Wines – Gers Gers Bins   In 2012, his family estate in Courresan in Gers, southwest France was under conventional farming methods. Then Sébastien Fezas stopped the use…

Rusticity refined from Argentina Cara Sur was formed in 2011 as a partnership between two couples inspired to revive ancestral vines and produce wines from traditional Argentine varietals. Sebastián Zuccardi and…

Discursions and digressions I know an epiphany when I experience one. They are not like buses. They don’t run to a schedule (maybe they are like London buses, then!). If…

Monday: I have just tried a white wine with so much alcohol that it practically cauterised my tongue and dissolved my taste buds. From a grape variety one might associate…

To Pet Nat or To Pet Not Pet Nat is now indubitably a genre. Ten to fifteen years ago, you could reel off all the practitioners of this winemaking style…

Lisbonny-bonny wines Vale da Capucha was started on the family property by Pedro Marques and Afonso Fernandes Marques within the Torres Vedras DOC, 45 minutes northwest of Lisbon, a mere…

Wine and humility. Is this some sort of new delicious pairing combo like Sauternes and Roquefort or Savennières and salmon? Which red would accompany the humblest of pies? Or is…

What’s in a tasting name or theme? Even to talk about the tasting seasons seems to scoff at the evidence of climate change. Spring can spring during the so-called winter…

As the 2022s have just landed, it is a good moment to reacquaint ourselves with these classic Northern Rhône wines. A word about Hervé’s wines. I would describe them as…

The brief history, the culture, the arguments and the current state of play in the U.K.   I was directed by a friend recently to an article describing the nature…

Trendzilla ~ An Instagram post featuring nigella seeds, acai berries and a perfectly framed bottle of Gut Oggau Theodora. --The Real Alternative Wine Glossary ~ Vol 2 "A trend is…

The trade has been rightly chattering about the upcoming duty rises. For those of you who may have been hibernating since December 22nd 2022, the government in its wisdom have…

Grand Blanc-ety Blanc We prefer real pagne over sham pagne any way. There’s not so much of it about, unlike bad old jokes. The Maison Vauversin, currently managed by Laurent…

Liberté, fraternité and vinosité   Now that Real Wine in the Vines is nestling happily in the dustbin of history, I can concern myself entirely with trivia or propound my…

Savennières. The name for me has always oozed mystery and majesty. And class in a glass. Its very sound suggests something serpentine like the Loire river winding off into the…

...And influenced me to do what? To run shrieking “eureka” through the streets? To put aside my nefarious plans to take over the world? To retreat to the hermetic life,…

In 2014 Jasper Button and his sister Sophie returned home to help save their family vineyard called Fernglen. Commune refers to their project’s continued happy reliance on community and shared…

In the future, everyone will be famous for fifteen minutes. Once upon a time when we were but a teeny amateur company knee-high to a Diam cork with barely two…

A matter of taste 'To show the relativity of what’s good taste and what’s not is something I like to play with.' ~ Jean-Paul Gaulthier 'I have drunken deep of…

Les Caves embraces the unorthodox. Or perhaps it would be fairer to say that the unorthodox embraces Les Caves.  We are now well into flaming June and the year seems…

And why this is a good thing When we are first taught about the facts of life about wine, everything is binary and conveniently boxed. We are told that all…

Marasby White Pinot Pioneers Tasting   I am a tough crowd as a wine taster, as I believe in always benchmarking what I taste against the best in that category.…

There is a saying in the wine world, that we sometimes need to look back to look forwards. This is certainly true of Georgian wine culture, which is not merely…

A Trend-Bucking Event   And so it came to pass. On Tuesday 16th May, the first ever UK artisan wine/drinks fair featuring producers working sustainably, organically and/biodynamically and making products…

Thought sediment about wine (and other loosely related subjects) Seeking inspiration When you run out of things to say about wine, then write about writing about wine. Or better, write…

It's hard to believe we're nearly half way through 2023... with spring kind of sprung, we thought it a good time to reflect on some vinous highlights so far. The…