Riesling

I have been looking forward to week R (2013). As you may have read, my site is called Late Harvest for a couple of reasons, one of which is my liking for dessert wines and especially the unfortified variety that attain their sweetness from very ripe grapes rather than a fermentation that has been stopped by the addition of high strength alcoholic spirit.

Riesling is a grape that can produced wines like this and, in the right hands, the results can be remarkable. Germany is known as the most famous source of these wines and I had expected to choose something from there, however, I came across this South African wine almost by accident in M&S.

Once again I have been surprised to find a wine of the week in Marks & Spencer, this time close to home rather than in London, who seem able to supply a diverse range at keen prices.


Week R (2013) is Riesling, Noble Late Harvest, 2011 from Paul Cluver, Elgin, SA.
M&S £14.99 for 37.5 cl.

It is lovely. It must be. Mum-in-law asked for more the day after we tasted it. It is a golden yellow colour and shines beautifully in the glass. It smells, and tastes, of apricots, honey and subtle spices.

In the mouth it feels full and luscious and the intensity of the flavours is impressive. The mouth-filling character comes mostly from the level of residual (unfermented) sugar which at 214 g/ltr is pretty high. A dry wine will typically have fewer than 4g/ltr and it is not surprising that with so much sugar left that could have been converted to alcohol, it is only 10.5% abv. This much sweetness could produce a sickly, cloying drink, however, the acidity levels are also good (10 g/ltr) and this balances the sugar very nicely.

The grapes are grown on a relatively small site and represent only 5% of the estate's output. The annual production is 625 cases (i.e. 7,500 half-bottles) and so I feel fortunate to have picked this up without ever having heard of it before. That's what I had hoped my 52 wines in 52 weeks exercise would achieve; discoveries.

I found after tasting it that this is an award winner and has been listed by Tim Atkin MW as one of his top 12 sweet wines and he knows lots more than me. He does this for a living.


I had been gearing up to explain a couple of German terms: Beerenauslese and Trockenbeerenauslese, but having happily stumbled upon this South African gem I will let you do your own research.

Happy New Year to you all.

Quinta do Spirito Santo

I should have planned for Christmas better than I did, having been out of the UK for the four weeks leading up to the last two shopping days, however, a cut price tree was secured on the 23rd and remaining gifts on 24th; the traditional male shopping opportunity. So far, so good.

I knew finding a red variety beginning with Q was going to be impossible (please do let me know if I am wrong. My birthday is in February and I would rather like a copy of Wine Grapes  to help with my exploration....), so I had hit on the plan of buying a nice Port to was down the inevitable Stilton and thought it should be easy enough to find one with the word 'Quinta' (Portuguese for 'estate') prominently on the label.

I failed, needing the rest of Christmas Eve to wrap presents, roll chipolatas in bacon, etc, etc, so I resorted to wandering through my cellar to see if I could find anything appropriate. This didn't take long as my cellar consists of a handful of storage boxes in a cupboard found in an area of our house known as the Panama Canal (don't ask).

Earlier in the year we had held an informal party for a number of friends and many had been kind enough to observe the unspoken protocol, originally derived in impoverished youthful years, of bringing a bottle. Being, in the most part, fine, upstanding and church-going members of society, one of them (unidentified) had brought along a bottle that was not opened at the time and has now become:

Wine Q (2013) Quinta do Espirito Santo 2011. It is a Vinho Regional de Lisboa. £7.99 at Laithwaites.

I don't know if the donor selected it on the basis of its qualities as a wine. or on the basis that Espirito Santo means, of course, Holy Spirit. Either way, it works for me.

Made in Portugal from two grapes permitted in the production of Port, Tinto Roriz and Castelao, it is 15% abv without the benefit of fortification. Unlike Port it is dry, inky black in colour and tastes mostly of blackberry and damson fruit, with flavours of coffee and chocolate being suggested in the lengthy finish.

Its tannins are smooth and the concentration of the fruit flavours impressive. It seems like exceptional value, as much of good Portuguese wine can be, and I might even pay for my own next time.

Should you be interested, the reason that this high alcohol red wine from Portugal is not 'Port' is because it has been fermented 'to dry', which means that all the sugar contained in the grape must (juice) has been converted to alcohol. With Port, fermentation is artificially stopped before this happens by adding distilled grape spirit to the vats of fermenting must.

This has two effects. Firstly, the resulting wine remains sweet as there is a higher sugar content and, secondly, the wine has its alcoholic content boosted even further than would have been achieved by a complete fermentation, usually up to 20% abv.

This practice of fortification was started by the British to enable Port Wines to reach England in a palatable and stable state as the transportation of the base wines had been a problem previously. The style became popular and we now live to enjoy the benefits of both Port and now wines such as this week's choice.

Pinot Grigio

A good friend of mine recently commented that Australia is full of very friendly people, but none of them are Australian. Together with The One, who had joined me at the end of week N (2013) I paid a visit to Queen Victoria Market, Melbourne, where I nearly came to the same conclusion.

The Spanish lady who explained how to distinguish the genuine Australian Ugg boot from the inferior Chinese copy was indeed friendly, as was the Englishman from whom The One bought some small opals and the Chinese man selling didgeridoos,which neither of us bought.

In the middle of this cosmopolitan array of mercantile bonhomie I came across a stall selling wine decanted from barrels into reusable bottles. This was run by a true Australian (non-indigenous) who was equally friendly and she explained that not only did her approach to distribution help her keep her prices down, but by reusing bottles her business was more eco-friendly than most of the wine trade.

This week, P (2013), the wine is Re Wine Pinot Grigio. $15 ($11, if you BYOB).

The eco-friendly claim is good, but it did make me wonder why I had learned about the sterile bottling conditions necessary to ensure wine reaches the consumer in a  good state. The instructions foe re-use on the back of this bottle says 'rinse twice with hot water', which seems to be a rather lower standard.

I imagine it's all to do with how long the wine is likely to spend in the bottle. Any wine sold in this way is probably not going to be intended for lengthy ageing and that was certainly the case with this particular example.

Bought on the Sunday, it was 'tasted' on the Monday after a long drive which was well rewarded by the sighting of live Platypus in the wild. These little duck-faced fury chaps are as remarkable as I had hoped and I am glad we found them. They were not as accessible as the equally wild Koala who allowed The One to make up close and personal contact as he sat in a roadside bush nibbling on a gum leaf, but at least equally pleasing. I digress. The wine was good. Clear, bright and lemon yellow, with quite concentrated stone fruit aromas it was pleasant to drink and had quite a long finish, especially considering the price. Maybe the bottle reuse does have its advantages.

You may have noticed the style of picture is different this week. That's because all the others have been culled from a producer's or distributor's website. This one I took myself as the Re Wine website is not yet up to the job. You may also notice that there is no plaster on the wall behind the bottle. That is because we spent the night in the Bega Downs Motel and they didn't really go in for unnecessary frills. Like food.

Back to Blighty for next week. A red Q. Any ideas?

Otago

Or Central Otago, to be precise, but I was drawn by the O.

I like Pinot Noir and Central Otago, the world's most southerly vine-growing region, has a great reputation so I was happy to use this week's vote on the appealing combination of grape and place rather than grape alone.

Still being in the land down under, where women glow and men don't, I once more gave up on the idea of an extended bottle-o tour in search of anything made with Oseleta and went instead to the cellar department of David Jones; Sydney's equivalent to Selfridges or similar.

I was dithering by the wine wall so long that on two occasions I was asked if I needed help. It was rather reminiscent of my usual performance in restaurants when faced with a menu containing more than one good option as at such times I need a certain amount of time-pressure to force a choice from me. The problem this time was to decide how extravagant I could justify being. There were three, or perhaps four, Central Otago Pinot Noirs on offer, but the oldest was only a 2010. It was in a nice thick bottle with a deep punt (the indentation it its bottom) so it was reasonable to assume the producer was not the cost-cutting variety. However, it was $45 rather than $28.99 and a 50% increase over the low end didn't seem appropriate for an untried punt. No pun(t) intended.

This week's wine O (2013) is Rabbit Ranch Pinot Noir, Central Otago 2012.

It is a medium ruby with some purple hints, has red fruit and some other Pinot flavours that I love. It has enough acid to make it mouth-watering but not so much as to have you looking around for some chips to sprinkle it on.  It is 13.5% abv.

At this point in its life it could not be confused with its Burgundian cousins of a certain age, not having anything remotely vegetal about it, but it is a very drinkable and I shall prove that as the evening wears on.

It is packaged in typical tongue-in-check southern hemisphere style and described as 'a bright-eyed red with hints of briar and a whiff of gunsmoke', following a shaggy dog story about sheep and rabbits competing for the land on which the grapes are now grown by Mr McGregor.

It also claims that the wine has been fined (clarified) with Easter Eggs. This is a reference to the popular habit in Bordeaux, and other places, of cracking a couple of hens eggs into the top of a barrique of maturing Claret so that the bits and pieces that make wine cloudy, but are too small to be caught in a filter, can cling to the protein in the egg and fall to the bottom of the barrel.

I looked up Rabbit Ranch on the internet, as is my habit, to see if there is any interesting technical information that I could share. It seems that this wine producer is not the only operation to use the name. In the UK there is a Rabbit Ranch that provides boarding facilities for its customers' pet rodents, whilst in Illinois there is one which is a supplier of Christian children's music. Amy's Rabbit Ranch in the US breeds dwarf Hotots, in both black and chocolate banded varieties (I think they are rabbits), and in Texas there is a similar sounding Bunny Ranch, but I understand that is something completely different.

Ninth Island Chardonnay

I knew that a white N was going to prove difficult. I had a choice of whether to spend my weekend on a wild goose chase around series of bottle shops, or to take the ferry and go to the Australian Golf Open.

I've never been to a major golf tournament before and so didn't really know what to expect. The condition of the course was outstanding and I have seen putting greens in a worse state than the fairways these chaps were playing on.

I stood right behind Jason Day (an Australian star) on the 12^th tee. I knew the professionals could really hit a ball, but I had no idea what that looks like in the flesh. It is hugely impressive and a little bit intimidating.

The day built nicely and one of the very few Europeans to have made the cut won the championship on the last green. This I found out from the news as after about four hours I decided to avoid the public transport nightmare that would have occurred had the event been in London and have a beer on a beach one more ferry ride away.

Anyway, all of that is by way of an explanation why this week's wine N (2013) is Ninth Island Chardonnay, 2012, from Pipers Brook Vineyards in Tasmania. $26.99 (~£16.20) and not made from Nosiola, as I had hoped.

Ninth Island is a brand and I found a Sauvignon Blanc alongside the Chardonnay. I avoided the SB because I was about to eat some cheesy pasta and wanted something softer and more rounded to drink with it.

The first observation is the wine is almost completely colourless, with the exception of a slight lime green tinge, which should have been a clue. The flavour was quite intense, if hard to identify. I seem to find my myself thinking 'crisp green apples' fairly frequently and this could be because that's what a lot of young and highly acidic wines really taste of, or it could be that I don't eat enough other fruits. Or any fruits, including crisp green apples, come to that.

It didn't go well with the pasta. Too sharp (refreshing?) and none of the smooth feel that I had hoped for even if the label did tell me it was unoaked. It was mineral, but not in the way the Chardonnays of Chablis are, and I was left thinking that I could have had a much more enjoyable experience with a bulk blend like Yellow Tail. May the producer please forgive me, but £16 in the UK can get you a pretty decent wine.

I wanted to like it because it came from Tasmania which, I have read, produces some great cool climate Pinot Noir, but I wasn't allowed Pinot Noir by the rules of my game and so I will have to wait until the red N comes around. Alternatively I could just try one anyway. It is my game after all and I make the rules.

Life will not get easier next week as I search for a red O.