The hoary chestnut roasting on today’s open fire is the thorny thicket of labelling. Part of me fantasises about serving the überinterventionist winemaker with the lengthiest of self-inflicted writs –that…
Of Dragonflies, Stagbeetles, Salamanders and Butterflies Andreas Tscheppe is part of the Styrian quintet of vignerons called Schmeck das Leben (taste of life). He has small vineyard parcels in a…
One of our “fauve-rite” summer reds Bruno Duchêne hails from the Loire Valley, where his family had a thriving business selling farm machinery. Before starting his career as a winemaker, he…
Of chacha at the gallop, Crazy Pomegranate=crazy-good food, old Rkat and new pet nat. They say in Sighnaghi that if you drink wine and chacha all night long you start…
Of healing cheese, #skintouch, bonny Saperavi, a qvevri academy and super Supra. "Truth is not found in other people's grapes. You can't call that your wine. Truth is in growing…
Two semi-supras, twenty-one score and five grape varieties, the other Iberian coffee, dodgy spice dealing and trying not to fall in qvevris After an overnight flight you’re bound to hit…
We experienced a tantalising flicker of high summer the other day, the kind of weather that moves the great British populace to invoke the inalienable peasant rite of “pulling a…
Illustrious Hermitage is spoken with a regal drawl, all languorous and timeless, Cote-Rotie, with its pleasing assonance and alliteration, trips authoritatively off the tongue, then there is Cornas. Not Corn-ah,…
“…A man who could make so vile a pun would not scruple to pick a pocket.” Gutenhashtag! Und #nichtsehrgutenhashtag! Only Donald Trump could make twitter synonymous with acute logorrhoea. Here…
Philippe Bornard lives in the village of Pupillin near Arbois. His vineyards were inherited from his father, who previously sold only to co-ops. It was Pierre Overnoy, no less, who…