Last chance to join Mosel protest
Tuesday 3 November
As regular readers of my blog will know, I’ve been to the Mosel to protest against this stupid road bridge and motorway that will plough through some of the world’s best Riesling vineyards. While the international press and bloggers like me have been getting their knickers in a twist about this, Germany’s media has given it little coverage: See my article on decanter.com
The latest from the region is that building work has moved ahead in several places but at last the issue has received some deserved attention from Germany’s equivalent of Panorama: Frontal 21.
The German gourmet magazine Der Feinschmecker has an online petition to help save the valley and vines from the politician’s bulldozers and concrete. The petition closes at the end of the month so sign up. It only takes 30 seconds and how often do you get the opportunity to save a wine region from desecration?
The Australian Alternatives
Monday 2 November
This week it’s the tenth Australian Alternatives Varieties Wine Show (AAVWS). Last year I was lucky enough to be an associate judge to taste my way through hundreds of Australian and Kiwi Tempranillos, Sangioveses and Vermentinos.
Max Allen is chief of judges and, as it’s a decade old, asked all previous judges to “indulge in some uninhibited crystal ball-gazing”. What will Australian wine be like in fifteen or so years from now, he asked?
His questions included what varieties will we be drinking, what will be the pressing issues of the day and will the export market have changed much?
My first thought was that I expect the Aussie industry to be a lot smaller than it currently is – through both consolidation and a lack of water.
What will Australia be producing in 2025? I certainly expect to see more alternative varieties accepted into the mainstream as we have seen with Pinot Grigio. The rise of varieties better-suited to a warmer and drier climate means the likes of Vermentino, Fiano, Grenache, Mourvedre and Touriga Nacional will be edging Pinot Noir and Merlot off the Australian shelves.
But for consumers to become more aware of these varietals as acceptable alternatives to Cabernet and Shiraz, it requires the big brands to get behind these alternatives and bring them into the mainstream consciousness as well as shows like the AAVWS.
Will the UK be a major export market for you? Perhaps not. Our Australian market offer is still promotion driven and I can’t see us moving away from that unless the government clamps down on those promotions. With an increased number of wine consumers in the USA, the Far East, and Scandinavia this is perhaps a better market for Australian wines. Ok, we do have more consumers who want to trade up to Grange or Hill of Grace unlike many other markets but ask any importer how Aussie fine wine sales are going and the answer is they can’t shift them despite the quality clearly being there.
Yes, the UK is a mature market and we are steadily growing to understand there is more to the country than South East Australia but will most consumers know the Hunter or Clare Valley exist by 2025? I doubt it.
Issues of the day? Doesn’t history repeat itself? Plague, famine, drought, war, the rich getting richer, the poor getting poorer. Why is the next 15 years going to be any different? I expect to see GM vines, flavoured wines, wines much lower in alcohol - how about robots instead of winemakers - at least we won’t have to put up with their egos then!
I wish I was over there judging again – it’s the most enjoyable judging week anyone could have: beers, bowls and jam sessions in between a lot of tasting. Follow the show on facebook or log on to The Australian Alternatives Wine Show website
The inevitable demise of Threshers
Friday 30 October
Who’d buy a wine shop? I wouldn’t. Supermarkets now account for eight out of 10 bottles sold and independents simply can’t compete on price.
To succeed you have to have a great range and decent customer service. Unfortunately Threshers-owner First Quench were lacking in both departments. I popped into my local Thresher this week before it finally collapsed and quite frankly, I couldn’t see an interesting wine in the place. It was all branded wines and in a specialist at higher prices than the multiples, it just didn’t cut the mustard.
So, now we have the inevitable news that more redundancies are on the cards for the wine industry. 81 have gone today and more are likely to follow. The industry has already been flooded with people laid off from their wine jobs. Things have gotten so bad that a small independent retailer in Sussex told me he’d had more than 600 applications for an assistant manager job in his shop, with ex-Constellation staff filling his inbox with their CVs.
The administrators KPMG are still unsure what’s happening next. They’ve said they’d like to sell the whole portfolio off in one fell swoop including Threshers, Wine Rack, Haddows, The Local but you’d have to be a madman to buy them. They no longer have any brand equity and I can only see them being sold off bit by bit.
Independents are succeeding – take The Sampler in Islington or Taurus Wines for example – they offer customers an interesting selection and make you feel like you are valued. It’s sad news about First Quench but you can’t help feeling it was their own fault.
Hopefully Oddbins will pull themselves out of the red in the next year to keep the high street wine retailers alive. They are doing the right things and it’s their press tasting next week. I’ll let you know if their wine range is up to much after I’ve swirled and spitted.
Have a good and wine-filled weekend.
The low down on Vin Doux Naturels
Wednesday 28 October
Vin Doux Naturels aren’t the easiest wines to sell. Sweet, high in alcohol and sometimes oxidised, they don’t exactly fit the modern wine drinker. As a wine journalist, there aren’t that many opportunities to taste them either and it’s a bit of a gaping hole in my wine knowledge. So, I invited myself along to a back vintage tasting of vin doux naturels from Roussillon.
There was a big on-trade presence at the tasting with sommeliers from St John’s, Hakkasan and Benares - and that really is the market they have to be aiming at. Getting the top sommeliers to make unusual pairings must be their goal because you won’t get people to select VDNs without someone putting it in front of them.
However, I needed to reacquaint myself with VDNs before I went and so I thought I’d bring you up to speed in my blog today.
80% of all VDN production comes from the sunny and dry Catalan region of Roussillon with names like Banyuls, Maury and Rivesaltes all famed for producing these wines.
The wines are generally made from Grenache (red), Muscat Blanc a Petit Grain or Muscat of Alexandria (white), with other minor varieties playing a small part.
In the same way as Port is fortified, the fermentation of Vin Doux Naturels is arrested by adding a neutral grape spirit at a whopping 96% alcohol to kill the yeasts (it’s only 77% in Port). The spirit makes up around 5-10% of the finished wine, which attains a final alcohol level of 15-18.9%. Still with me?
For red wines, the winemaker has to decide whether to add the spirit while the wine is on its skins. If he makes the red wine using traditional maceration then presses the wine off the skins before adding the spirit, the wine’s colour will be lighter than if he adds the spirit while the skins and wine are still macerating. Alcohol is a solvent and at 96% it extracts a lot more colour and tannins. The longer they leave the skins in contact with the alcohol, the more colour and concentrated it becomes.
Some mature the wine in a non-oxidative environment such as a full stainless steel vat, for example those making a Muscat de Rivesaltes for early release. It will have delicate, grapey and floral aromas and a mid lemon colour. Others leave their wines in a glass ‘bonbonne’ or a container outside allowing the wine to age oxidatively, particularly with the reds. It is claimed that one year ageing outside in the Roussillon heat is equivalent to 10 years’ ageing in temperature controlled cellars. These wines get a garnet rim pretty quickly. You’ll get sweet dried fruit, plums, some nutty and oxidised character and, volatile acid on the nose (think nail polish remover),
These wines are unique. But they aren’t exactly quaffers. There is a lot of potential for them as food wines, particularly the older wines – we went back to a 1910 Rivesaltes, which was still incredibly fresh and compared to a Pedro Ximenez without the sweetness.
Food matching ideas
Muscat de Rivesaltes with tapas, sweet and sour, Thai cuisine
Maury or Banyuls with duck, hard goat’s cheese, chocolate or blue cheese.
Retailers accused of paying ‘lip service’ to the green issue
Sunday 25 October
I’ve just attended a debate, which asked whether the promotion of environment credentials is a marketing ploy. The room was half-full at best, which is a sad indication of the importance of the green issue in the UK wine industry. Or perhaps everyone had gone on half-term a day early? Compared to the full-house at the recent low alcohol forum, it was a poor showing – I didn’t spot one major retailer.
It appears many wine producers are going green for the right reasons but retailers were accused of using the green message to suit their own agendas – making a profit. Unfortunately the supermarkets weren’t there to defend themselves, but there were some damning comments.
Michael Cox, UK director for Wines of Chile, which is one of the main producing countries leading the sustainability drive along with South Africa and New Zealand, said, “Most multiple retailers will pay lip service to green initiatives.”
The main problem is consumers see wine as a natural product and that means the word sustainable or organic on a wine label has less meaning than organic on a bunch of carrots. It goes some way to explaining why sales of organic wine have not kept pace with the rest of the organic industry. Cox added, “Having a social conscience does not appear to sell more bottles. The consumer is not prepared to pay a premium for organic wine because they don’t understand the concept. ”
Retailers are clearly doing things to help the environment such as the plastic bag reuse scheme but a cynic would argue it is only because the authorities have ruled they must reduce their plastic bag use. Angela Mount implied retailers didn’t give a damn about saving the environment – it is all about saving money. If the changes didn’t save money, then they wouldn’t do them. She argued bulk shipping and lightweight bottles improved margins for retailers, adding “I don’t believe the green issue is driven by the consumer. It is often a convenient ploy to reduce costs.”
Peter Darbyshire, MD of UK importer and distributor PLB agreed, “The green solution is to move the point of packaging as close to the point of sale. It is moving to the UK but sadly driven by retailers’ price motivation rather than the green agenda.”