A Tasting with Jascots Wine Merchants

Last week saw an abundance of tastings happening around London town, and of course I attempted to attend as many as I could humanly possibly attend in one day, I love my wine but I can still only drink so much before it everything blurs into one. My final port of call for the day was the Jascots Wine Merchants tasting in Cavendish Square, I arrived mid afternoon very wet and probably not really in the mood, (I’d been up all night with two very poorly kittens) but I’d been invited and it would have been very rude not to turn up. On arrival I was introduced too Ben who was a member of the Jascots team and would be my guide around the tasting, I have to admit I was great to have someone to go around with and talk about the wines too, and not just make notes on my own.

Despite my initial lack enthusiasm, as we went round I was pleased to find that there was still a lot of wines that really caught my eye, well actually my taste buds, but there was one vineyard that really stood out, TerraVin from New Zealand, who I nearly missed had it not been for Ben insisting that I taste them. They also had Mike Weersing on hand who is their winemaker, after spending a good half an hour talking to Mike and tasting his wines we had to push on, I was so impressed with his wines they deserve a post on there own, which will be coming soon.

Getting back to the rest of the wines on show, there were so many that I could talk about, but here are the five that stood out to me;

2010 Three Choirs ‘Winchcombe Downs’, Gloucestershire – Yes, I  know an English wines starts us off, but this is really a fantastic wine, with loads of green fruit and a touch of white pepper flavours and aromas, a rich and rounded mouth feel and well balanced level of acidity, really enjoyable.

2008 Bolfan Primus Riesling, Croatia – Again a country not really known for producing great wines, but they’ve managed one with this. With plenty of green fruit, citrus and loads of acidity, it really was showing all the classic Riesling traits, as opened up a little you started to get the faint aromas of petrol in the background, which you only tend to get from aged Rieslings, it really was quite stunning.

2010 Maison de la Paix Old Vine Carignan, Vin de Pays d’Oc, France – An entry level wine with lashings of dark fruit, fine tannins and a good amount of acidity all combining to make a well balanced and great drinking wine, one I shall definitely be keeping my out for.

2006 Cellar Cal Pla, Priorat, Spain – A wine that I’ve really only just found and started to enjoy, this is a blend of Garnacha, Carinena and Cab Sauv, producing a wine with a deep ruby/garnet colour and pronounced flavours and aromas of plums, damsons and spice. With these were the perfect amount of tannins and acidity which, when all combined together produced a stunning wine, shame about the bottle label though!

2003 Rocca Rosso, Angelo Rocca & Figli, Puglia, Italy – This had I have to say one of the biggest and  heaviest bottle I’ve seen for a long tine, probably also not the most environmentally friendly, but the wine was delicious. With baked dark fruits, oak and loads of sweet spice, a tiny amount of fine tannins and enough acidity to go with the fruit and spice, all combining to produce a really interesting wine. 

I must say, there were a lot of very good and enjoyable wines on show, a lot more than I’ve written about, these were just a few that really stuck in mind, but don’t forget to keep an eye for my post on the wines from TerraVin, which should be up very soon.

London International Wine Fair 2010

This week saw the wine world descend on London for the biggest trade show of the year, the London International Wine Fair. As usual producers from all over the world came to show off the latest releases from their cellars, along with packaging manufacturers and distribution companies. The biggest difference this year was the size of the show, which was remarkably smaller than in previous years, an obvious effect of the global recession. The biggest omission from this years show had to be Constellation, who own brands such as Ravenswood, Mondavi, Inniskillen and Nobilo. Notably, many of the smaller producers shared stand space, instead of spending money to have their own.

We started the day by sampling five fantastic wines, from what must have been the smallest producer there, Terre Di San Rocco. It only produces 40,000 bottles a year, but wow it was good – so watch out for a post on those. Next, we stopped to listen to Adolfo Hurtado the chief wine maker from Cono Sur in Chile, talk about its organic wines. The guys from Brown Brothers, who produce some fantastic, if not a little off beat wines, were also there, showing off its full range. This included its lusciously sweet Patricia Noble Riesling. It had amazing flavours of stone fruit, honey, marmalade and citrus; all balanced with a mouth watering acidity. This is definitely one I’ll be adding to my wine rack!

The highlight of the day, for me, was meeting Ronald Hocher from Chateau Musar in the Lebanon. We spent some time discussing how foolish we thought a leading supermarket had been for delisting his, and many other wines. We also went through a selection of vintages of its Chateaux Musar White and Red, with Ronald revealing that they have vintages going back over 50 years for both wines, which is just amazing.

All in all, it was a fantastic day. It’s great fun getting to see what wines were coming through in the next few months, and meeting some great wine makers! I’ve already booked it in my diary for next year!