It’s not every day you get to taste every producer’s wine from a particular place but this was a brilliant initiative by the #verdunoptoducersassociation that allowed us to taste 17 examples of their special #pelaverga wines from the pelavega piccolo grape variety . This … Continue reading
Category Archives: Wine Trips
Verduno #1
After a long journey it’s fun to walk in the vineyards with expert @edmondobonelli – you never know who you will meet 😉 first photo Vittore Alessandria @fratellialessandria @edmondobonelli Diego Morra @cantinemorradiego President of the Verduno Producers Association and @ian_dagata in @fratellialessandria vineyards. Last photo of #verduno town on a little high crest … Continue reading
Malvasia Weekend
Salina is one of the Y-shaped group of Unesco-protected volcanic islands that rise out of the azure-coloured waters off the north-east coast of Sicily. It is one of the mystical sounding Aeolian Islands, the name conjuring up images of Odysseus … Continue reading
Anteprima Amarone
Valpolicella is a wine region we all think we know. Many of us may have cut our teeth on this light, fruity red when we first began to drink wine, but, like in many great wine regions, nothing stands still. I discovered there is always something more to learn on my first trip of 2016 when I attended the 13th edition of Anteprima Amarone. This is the big showcase event where the newly-released Valpolicella Amarone wines are first shown to the press at the end of January; it is held in the beautiful city of Verona in the Veneto. Continue reading
Wine Without Borders
After the Second World War, an interim Yugoslav-Italian border was drawn up by the Allied Forces and then re-drawn again by the Allies and Tito in 1947 when he established a unified Yugoslavia. Almost overnight, extended families found themselves separated by a border with wine producers having some of their vineyards in Italy while their homes were in Yugoslavia, now Slovenia. Continue reading
Timorasso
The chance to taste a whole selection of wines made from the rare, white Timorasso grape variety was too tempting an opportunity to miss so in June I jumped at the offer to make this trip to the less well … Continue reading
Malvasia Volcánica!
I had a very different idea of Malvasia before I visited Lanzarote. My first impressions were of a variety that was round, fat and simple – a little oily perhaps with low aromatics. Several examples that I tasted from warm areas in the South of France seemed to confirm that description and it wasn’t a grape variety I sought out much. Continue reading
Marche
The Marche (pronouced Mar-Kay) is a region full of surprises! It has such a lot to offer. Situated a third of the way down the Eastern (Adriatic) side of Italy, sandwiched between Emilia-Romagna to the north, the Abruzzo to … Continue reading
Planeta
Every time I visit Planeta there is something new happening. A dynamic attitude and the art of never standing still has taken them from a company that only planted its own vineyards in the mid 1980’s to quickly becoming one … Continue reading
Sicilian Master Classes in India
In January this year, I presented a five-day series of Sicilian wine master classes in four cities – Delhi, Kolkata, Bangalore and Mumbai. Responsible for organising this whirlwind tour were Michèle Shah and on the ground in India, Subhash Arora … Continue reading
Alsace gems
Domaine Weinbach Faller is a powerful name in Alsace. They are one of a handful of producers at the top of their game and they produce some of the very best examples of Alsace’s distinctive style of Gewürztraminer. When I … Continue reading
Feudo Montoni
Occasionally, when you visit a vineyard and a producer, in whatever troubled, busy or preoccupied state of mind you happen to be in, you are stopped in your tracks and transformed by something almost spiritual in the place and the people. So it was with Feudo Montoni and our meeting with its delightful owner, Fabio Sireci. Continue reading
Hand of God – The Finger Lakes International Wine Competition
The hand of God touched the land and that’s how the beautiful glacial Finger Lakes in upstate New York were formed. That’s how it was told to me, and if you look at the pattern of the five main Finger … Continue reading
Biodynamic viticulture – Alvaro Espinoza
It was good to meet up again with Alvaro Espinoza in Chile. Continue reading
De Martino
Family-owned De Martino have a long tradition of winemaking but are also at the forefront of innovation when it comes to discovering Chile’s new wine regions and expressing her diverse terroir… Continue reading
Travels In Argentina
We finally arrived at the pretty, white colonial building of El Esteco – a little oasis in a beautiful valley, surrounded by two dramatic mountain ranges. There was a lovely feeling of calm and the heady scent of orange blossom filled the air, wafted from the beautiful series of courtyards and gardens that make up the grounds of the hotel… Continue reading