Confessions of a Wino

A mate, and former business client, used to take me to Rafa’s El Rincon in Manchester (I always paid).

When it came to whistle wetting tapas oil, Marqués de Riscal was our weapon of choice, partly because it was bloody good, partly because it was bloody and good, mostly because the bill payer knew it was bloody good value.

Taking good note of my cyber-mate, Rob‘s evaluation of the 2003 Rioja vintage, I popped into Sainsbury’s in Manchester and after a bit of mooching, selected a 2003 Marqués de Riscal Reserva at only £9.99, apparently £3 off (but I remember Rafa selling this stuff for less than 20 quid – not much of a mark-up!)

I wonder if the reduction is because most of Sainsbury’s customers had read Rob’s comments about 2003 and have already moved on to looking for the reputationally better 2004 and 2005 vintages.

I was not put off.  The wine, to me was top notch, tasting mostly of blackberry and apple crumble with cream and vanilla pods.  I always look out for Riscal in Spanish restaurants in Manchester, Spain and other places.

What’s in a name?  Or the way it is pronounced?  Or the way it is presented?  Hyacinth Bucket was famous for re-packaging her married name as “Bouquet”.  Snob residents of Burnage in Manchester (pronounced burnidge since 1478) are heard to mutter that they come from Burnaaaarj (as the French would pronounce it).

Long ago, the Cockburn family must have realised that their own name needed a bit of thought.  Who is going to buy a bottle of port from a company that sounds like a naked barbecue incident?  And so they became Coeburn by pronunciation.

193 years later, and change is on the agenda again, as Cockburn’s have decided to repackage port to make it more trendy, more appealing to the contemporary drinker, more relevant to the modern dinner table, and perhaps more attractive to the Buckets of the world.

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It is no secret that I am one of the remaining few who still enjoys a glass of Cloudy Bay, the “iconic”, yet some say over-priced, fire-starter of the Kiwi Sauvignon Blanc phenomenon, even though they “sold out” to LVMH and revered founder, David Hohnen, left in 2003.

Strange then that I have never tried any of the wines of Hohnen’s other famous former enterprise, Cape Mentelle, from Australia’s Margaret River.

Being a blend of Semillon and Sauvignon Blanc, as opposed to the pure SB of Cloudy Bay adds a softness to the wine.  Less of the gooseberry and rhubarb of Cloudy Bay and just a touch of honey and pear thrown into the mix.  Less acidic and therefore perhaps suited to a range of foods.

I really like it but like Cloudy Bay, it is not so cheap.  I got this from Majestic at £11.99.

The title may sound like a cryptic crossword clue, but it simply refers to the last time I tried Dog Point Sauvignon Blanc, the 2006 vintage, which was a superb example of this varietal’s clichéed ability to smell of cat pee.  I was pleased to receive a bottle of the 2007 recently as part of a mixed case so I wondered if I should hide the neighbour’s cat (on heat) before I opened it.

I know some of you beat up on Kiwi SBs and find them the height of 1990’s fashion – so last decade man – yawn, yawn, yawn.  If you are one of those, or you are not into feline urolagnia, switch off now.

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“Hey Al, cut to the chase!”  Uhm OK.

Catena has the usual smell I associate with Malbec – rich bitter chocolate and dark cherries.  Taste similar, possibly a touch of tomato ketchup too.  A super wave of contrasting and complementary flavours some spicy, some sweet - not sure how much value this complexity adds. At 13.5% very munchable, though, and I enjoyed it a lot.  Quite expensive but a great, if opulent, partner to beans on toast.

Imported by Bibendum (£11.95) and available at Majestic for £10.99, and Waitrose £10.44.

I have long been a fan of Susana Balbo’s Malbecs since I first discovered them on the rip-off wine list of the Gaucho Grill.  So I was intrigued to see this blend, named Brioso, on the virtual shelves of the Wine Society.  At £14.95 ($30) it is not cheap so it needs to be measured against serious competition.

As blends go, this one has a whopping 5 varietals contributing to the mix, but did this add as many facets to the flavour of the wine?

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Another from Virgin and you may recall me sampling a range of wines from a mixed case I took as an introductory offer.  The results of my samples have been mostly good and my conclusion on Virgin is that for everyday glugging wines, if you choose carefully you will find value rather than fine wines, drinkability rather than complexity, down to earth language rather than pretension.

This Chablis, though, tasted most unlike Chablis.

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There are occasional tiny slivers, splinters of darkness in my life, that give me a sharp reminder of what I am giving up for my work.  It’s not that I resent it, entirely my own choice after all.  When I started the company in 2001, I went in with my eyes open.  I realised it would mean sacrifices.

This afternoon I took my 10 year old god-daughter to see Man City.  The look of delight on her face when City beat Spurs 2-1 was matched only by my relief at the end of an awful run of games that had put us on a snake track slithering down the league table.

Kellie came over from Dublin for the weekend with her sisters, Rebecca and Chloe – all gorgeous girls, well behaved, entertaining, polite, model children.  Kellie is obviously my favourite and she is the footie fan, tomboy, fitness fanatic, make-up-rejecting bundle of energy.

And now they have all gone and I am alone in the flat.  It’s strange how lonely you can feel when sudden mayhem is suddenly replaced by a sudden quantum of solace.

So to cheer me up, apart from consoling myself that City are back on the ladder of success, I have dragged out my notes from a bottle of Shampoo I sampled last weekend.

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My jury has been deliberating on a verdict for the Costco wine buyers for some time now.  Do they market good wines and sell them at reasonable prices, or do they simply find cheap wines that look expensive?  For example, good names in bad years, second wines from average producers, albeit from good regions.  I mean, why would reputable domaines want to sell their best quality wine at a discount, on a regular basis, in large quantities?  This Puligny Montrachet was from Costco and was not that cheap being £12.75 plus VAT

The only other online price comparator I could find was at Fine Wine Online where it was £14.95 – so Costco is actually £0.03125 more expensive per bottle.

The wine was fine actually.  It had some nice zing from the quince flavour, balanced by the smoothness of butter shortbread.  A fairly long finish and quite enjoyable to quaff.

Not much of a discount though, guys!  Try again.

Chicken or egg?  The long standing debate about which came first will never be resolved by a cartoon depicting one or the other enjoying a post-coital cigarette.  Let’s face it, smoking is banned almost everywhere these days.  So I had to find another way to establish the truth.

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