FWD newsletter - No. 42 (26/04/2002)

In this issue:

Welcome to the 42nd edition of the FWD newsletter, the free fortnightly fine wine email newsletter from www.finewinediary.com .

In this newsletter Toby goes to the Edinburgh Slow Food Convivium and has another Wine Group dinner, Richard goes to a wedding (congratulations Mark and Katherine) and in Bin-ends we have a reader's advice on Tokaji.

As always we welcome readers' views and feedback (either reply to this email, or see our contact details at the end of the newsletter).


Highlights (the best bottles from the last fortnight)
[Star ratings are out of five with potential indicated by the outline stars (bracketed if reading in text only format). Hence the de Fargues mentioned below is three stars for drinking now, but should become a four-star wine with time.]

Slow food and Italian wines (Toby)

The Slow Food movement (www.slowfood.com ) is an interesting organisation that I have only recently become aware of, devoted to promoting proper eating and drinking, and (an excellent idea) educating children in these things. It is good to see it spreading fast from its strongholds in France and Italy. It is the publisher, by the way, of the useful Gambero Rosso Italian Wine Guide.  

John Tiller has started a Convivium (as local branches are called) in Edinburgh and the inaugural event was a splendid dinner at the Sheraton. We began with a glass of fizz, pleasant but reminiscent of used straw (I didn't catch what it was). Auchtertool Pork Sausage wrapped in Scottish Brioche with Rhubarb Relish (a.k.a. Sausage Roll and Chutney) was accompanied by a fairly good Dolcetto 2000 from Sanmarco. Another producer I do not know, Lorenzon - I Feudi di Romans (if I read the bottle correctly) supplied a fresh Pinot Grigio Isonzo 2001 and the main course of beef came with the 1996 Taurasi from Feudi di San Gregorio .  I have had a few wines from this estate recently and I still can not quite decide whether there is a really interesting terroir here or do we just have some very good winemaking. I would like to taste a few older bottles on the basis that it takes time for the terroir to show through in a wine. Whatever, it is worth trying a few of the offerings featuring less common grape varieties like Aglianico and Fiano from this excellent Campania estate. We stayed on a high with the final wine too, a lovely 1993 Vinsanto from Cennatoio .

I have tasted a few other Italians recently, including Soave Classico Superiore 2000 from Inama and the Calvarino 2000 from that other master of Soave, Pieropan. Interesting - I won't deny that Pieropan's wine was at least as fine, but I do find it easier to get more out of the Inama with its attractive honeysuckle nose and minerality.

The full notes and scores for these wines can be found at http://www.finewinediary.com/diary/index.shtml#w02apr63


A wedding feast at the Old Bridge, Huntingdon (Richard)

It’s not often that the food and wine at a wedding are much to write home about, or even to write about in this newsletter. And it’s not often that this newsletter concentrates on food and wine together. But the recent wedding of sometime contributor to FWD Mark Stalham produced, with the aid of the chef and cellars at the Old Bridge, Huntingdon, a menu well worth taking note of.

The Old Bridge is a lovely hotel to wile away an early Spring evening with friends, as the bride and groom do the rounds. A constant supply of Roederer Brut Premier, surely one of the top NV Champagnes, naturally adds to the whole atmosphere. After the odd bottles of this wine (possibly due to millennium meltdown) mentioned in the Diary last year, it was reassuring to try this from at least seven bottles and find, that apart from one corked bottle, there was consistent quality. By the way, this is the first time I can remember coming across a corked fizz - are such wines less prone to corkiness?

The meal itself consisted of a choice of four dishes for each course, and a choice of three white wines and three reds. It was possible to, and of course I did, try all the wines, but alas not all the food. In the end, call me mad, I went for two beef dishes: a carpaccio to start and a roasted fillet of beef afterwards. Both were executed well, and clearly involved good quality ingredients. Indeed all the food was much enjoyed: an impressive performance given that the Old Bridge was cooking for a party of 40 and looked like they had a full Saturday house as well.

The wines with the meal began with a Riesling from Brundlmayer (the Alte Reben 1998). This is lovely wine and perfect with some spicy duck wanton that appeared as an appetiser. The wine has a good balance of acidity and a touch of sweetness whilst not being too big bodied. The 2001 Isabel Estate Sauvignon Blanc that followed isn’t a style of wine I greatly enjoy - the wine also had too much ‘pear drops’ on the nose. In contrast the Shaw and Smith Reserve Chardonnay 1998 I liked more than I thought I would. This is maturing more quickly than its French counterpart might, but if caught now is a good drop.

Allegrini’s La Grola 1998 from magnum was the lead red and a fine light-bodied way to start after the whites. This is elegantly put together and enjoyable now - perfect with the carpaccio of Aberdeenshire beef and shavings of salty parmesan. Fontodi’s Chianti Classico 1999 followed and showed typical, full Sangiovese fruit as one would expect from such a good producer and, again, was a good wine with the food (on to the fillet of beef with wild mushrooms by now). It’s often said that Italian wines are food wines and these two reds amplified that point.

However, there are times (more often than not if you ask me) when the marriage of wine and food is an over practised art or science (whichever is your view on its precise nature). If the wine and food are fine, then, unless the combination is particularly crass, the partnership works. A case in point came with the last wine: Geyserville 1999. This is lovely stuff that, oddly, drinks well young but is also ageworthy. It went well with the food in the sense that it was good as was the food and one could deliberate over each separately.

If the Old Bridge is still standing (I came close to burning the place down when my name card on the table fell onto a candle), then I would recommend a visit. The food is good, and whether or not you are keen on food and wine matching the wine list is excellent.

The full notes and scores for these wines can be found at http://www.finewinediary.com/diary/index.shtml#w02apr70


A Wine Group dinner (Toby)

Another month and another wine group dinner. We began with three rieslings: I picked Grosset's Polish Hill 2001 as an Australian with its pronounced lime character. Probably one of the best from Oz, although I do not think Riesling from that country matches Germany, Austria or Alsace, at least yet. The second was Austrian - Zobinger Heiligenstein 1998 from Hirsch . It did not seem so typical of the country to me, being fatter than most and tending a bit to flab even, rather in the way that Gewurz. sometimes does. Good wine, but on this showing some way short of the remarkable Alte Reben wines that Brundlmayer makes from this vineyard (see Richard's note in this issue). Frederic Emile 1997 split the table at first: I thought that though tightly wound and restrained it had a lot of class and it will be excellent. Others thought it rather insubstantial, but I think that is a consequence of this wine always needing time to show its best and the difficulty of tasting it after the fat Austrian.

The reds were mainly a selection of Riojas from Marques de Caceras , respectable on the whole in a modern style, but I don't think they are really trying to push to the limits and are happy with its middle-of-the-road commercial success. Not, I think, an Estate of interest to the fine wine enthusiast.

We finished on a high though with two excellent oddities from the Wine Society. Molino Real Mountainwine 1999 from Malaga was a really delicious high-class Moscatel and Pedro Ximenes Vino Dulce de Postre Gran Reserva 1972 a really attractive old PX - this style of dessert sherry is something I only want occasionally, but an example like this justifies the style.

The full notes and scores for these wines can be found at http://www.finewinediary.com/diary/index.shtml#w02apr52


Bin-ends
Reader Andras Hanich has written to the newsletter pointing out the resurgence in the great, sweet Tokaji wines from Hungary. I have not tasted very much recently although I would like to have a good look at what is happening as a result of all the investment. This is after all one of the treasures of the fine wine world and I have very much enjoyed the best examples that have come my way over the years. He recommends some recent vintages and I pass them on in case other readers start to do this research: 1972,1975,1983,1988,1993 and 1999.

Life's too short .... for vegetarian wine

Running my eye over some down-market supermarket wine shelves recently I noticed (next to a dreadful looking bottle labelled Bordeaux blanc Medium Sweet)  "Vegetarian Chenin Chardonnay". I suppose isinglass may be used in some wine, but I suspect it is more a question of gullible consumers here. The same place also had bottles of "Not too dry Chardonnay". Talk about wine for people who don't like wine. (TNB)

We welcome reader's contributions to "Life's too short" (contact details below).


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FWD newsletter is written and edited by Richard and Toby Bailey.