Confessions of a Wino

Ah! Well a day! What evil looks
Had I from old and young!
Instead of the cross, the Albatross
About my neck was hung.

If you are a regular reader you will recall my previous disappointments with wines from Costco.  The Costco philosophy is to stack it really high and sell it really cheap, but, and here’s the thing, they stick to one brand per similar item (to maximise buying power) and generally make it an upmarket quality product.  When you translate that to wine you typically get good name wines in bad years.

 

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Raymond Burr was considered by some to be a TV genius.  Robert T. Ironside was super-attorney, Perry Mason’s succesor (in his acting career).  Personally I much preferred cigar slugging Columbo.

Talking of American trash, I’ve had to add a new category for this post which shows how much wine I drink from the world’s only remaining super-power.  I have had bad experiences of US wine in the past, perhaps based on the cheap end of the Gallo range, so I didn’t have high hopes from this one:

Ironstone Vineyards 2004 Chardonnay/Viognier  from California retails at about £7 a bottle. Surely £6 of that must be shipping costs and £1 duty (or is that vice versa) so exactly how much is spent on the wine?

I was astounded by the quality.  Uncle Sam, I apologise, even if you are bald (and especially if you are listening in via spyware or remote listening device).  A gorgeous smell of gooseberries led to flavours of pear slices in yoghurt.  Fresh fruit salad and natural yoghurt is such a great breakfast starter (as long as it’s followed by bacon and poached eggs).  Much superior to taking a cyanide pill.