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Christmas Wine II

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Another bit of infanticide,what you gonna do? Wish I'd bought more at under 13 ducats. Delicious. 100%syrah.

Beautiful.Not sure if it's a Leadbelly song or traditional.It is Leadbelly.
 
Another day, another Waitrose. I had to go there to collect the Clos de Mosny. I bought three Catena Chardonnay and three Chocolate Block (so frown at me.) Further wine spending was justified as follows - obviously it makes perfect sense to add £78-worth of wine to my £16-worth of groceries - that way I can use another of my £18-off-a-£90-spend vouchers.

Hmmm. 999, in more ways than one.
 
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Sorg night. I knew the only bottle left in the Aldi cooler was a Sorg Gewürz, so when cook’s chicken salad was offered up I grabbed it, opened it and poured the first glass without even putting my specs on. The second I tasted it I knew it wasn’t the generic Gewürz I had assumed it was and peered at the label. Aha! This is fantastic, oddly simultaneously less in-your-face lychee-style Gewürz than the basic Sorg model (although that’s still obviously the grape) but also richer, more concentrated. Really lovely stuff.

Tonight this is being paired with a variety of Randy Weston via Spotify, staring at the moon in a totally clear sky and a happy heart due to a tiny bit of daylight still being present at 10pm.
 
Marchbanks said:
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Sorg night. I knew the only bottle left in the Aldi cooler was a Sorg Gewürz, so when cook’s chicken salad was offered up I grabbed it, opened it and poured the first glass without even putting my specs on. The second I tasted it I knew it wasn’t the generic Gewürz I had assumed it was and peered at the label. Aha! This is fantastic, oddly simultaneously less in-your-face lychee-style Gewürz than the basic Sorg model (although that’s still obviously the grape) but also richer, more concentrated. Really lovely stuff.

Tonight this is being paired with a variety of Randy Weston via Spotify, staring at the moon in a totally clear sky and a happy heart due to a tiny bit of daylight still being present at 10pm.
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Leave your specs off more often.
 
Finally got into our first mixed case from Vinatis. First this Gewürztraminer for apero and with the beginnings of a six course Greek meal (made and delivered by a local enthusiast).

 
Nice and old - brick red, smells of blackcurrant and at 14.5% there’ll be some left for cheese.
 
Very interesting TV programme tonight on the poverty of people who work the vines of Bordeaux - apparently the region of the Grands Crus is one of the poorest in France - the chateaux just exploit skilled manual labour by the sound of it. They call it Le couloir de la pauvreté. To compound matters, the chateaux benefit from significant tax advantages, which means that the regional administrations, the municipalités, are poor.


Marchbanks said:
I went to my nearest big (in wine terms) Waitrose in search of Catena Alta Malbec. No luck. A helpful assistant did a lot of tapping on his handheld thingy and said there were no bottles to be seen anywhere within 40 miles. Unusually, the shelf was full of Chocolate Block which, with my pocketful of spend-£90-get-£18-off vouchers, would have come in at £13.50. But (having been frowned at here for quite liking it) I let myself be tempted instead by Guigal Brune et Blonde. After ten minutes with a calculator working out the most propitious combination I bought two (came down from £40 to £25) and topped up with four bog-standard Catena Malbec (from £13.50 to £8.20).

Then six Clos de Mosny from Waitrose Cellar when I got home, obvs. (Ordered I mean, not consumed.)
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We had a bottle of Chocolate Block today, 2019. I can see that at Waitrose price minus 25% it’s not a bad price, but still, I don’t think it’s a wine for me. Perfectly drinkable, it won’t end up in the daube, but somehow I feel it’s a bit without personality, bland.
 
mandryka said:
Very interesting TV programme tonight on the poverty of people who work the vines of Bordeaux - apparently the region of the Grands Crus is one of the poorest in France - the chateaux just exploit skilled manual labour by the sound of it. They call it Le couloir de la pauvreté. To compound matters, the chateaux benefit from significant tax advantages, which means that the regional administrations, the municipalités, are poor.




We had a bottle of Chocolate Block today, 2019. I can see that at Waitrose price minus 25% it’s not a bad price, but still, I don’t think it’s a wine for me. Perfectly drinkable, it won’t end up in the daube, but somehow I feel it’s a bit without personality, bland.
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This is a wine thread, outside reality doesn't come into it ,or I could throw up a few questions about SA wines.
 
^ wine areas are usually obviously richer than non-wine areas anywhere in the world. The city of Bordeaux certainly looks prosperous.
The manual labour who do the back-breaking work picking the grapes usually move around to wherever needs them. They are probably not French. I doubt itinerant seasonal fruit pickers are well paid anywhere. Would you pay £1 a bottle more if it went straight to the labourers ?
From what I have read individual SA vineyards have tried to encourage some non-white participation at meaningful levels. Apparently there are stupid SA laws that prevent vineyards being divided. The SA govt also banned the sale of alcohol for long periods, including SA wine, during Covid; which certainly has not helped finances.
 
Apparently in le couloir de la pauvreté there are families of labourers who have looked after the vines of the chateaux for generations, français de souche. Though in the vendange they need to import labour from elsewhere - Spain, Romania etc. They operate a system of micro management and targets which are increasingly demanding apparently, one Spanish worker compared it to slave labour. They interviewed one woman, a single parent, French, living in Médoc, three kids, who said she was earning 700€ a month working on the vines. What I found particularly surprising is the tax status of these businesses: these grands crus are taxed as if they are peasant farmers.

I am sure the City of Bordeaux is prosperous! The area in question is from Médoc in the north through Entre de Mers, St Émilien an Sauternes.
 
Marchbanks said:
Another day, another Waitrose. I had to go there to collect the Clos de Mosny. I bought three Catena Chardonnay and three Chocolate Block (so frown at me.) Further wine spending was justified as follows - obviously it makes perfect sense to add £78-worth of wine to my £16-worth of groceries - that way I can use another of my £18-off-a-£90-spend vouchers.

Hmmm. 999, in more ways than one.
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I adore chocolate block. I have some very early vintages which were made in low number of barrels eg 53! Interesting to see the new vintages the number of barrels increase. Well into thousands now. I’m reluctant to open some of my early vintages.
I met Marc Kent twice. Really nice man and so enthusiastic about his wines. I buy a case every year from Waitrose with 25% discount. Although price has crept up over the years. I think I was originally paying about £12 per bottle for such low number wines. At that price they were probably best value wine on planet. I used to buy lots of Penfolds bin 28 and 389 at £5 and £15 respectively. The are now in excess of £30 and £60. Never again. Although I do have a few cases stashed.
 
Spike said:
I adore chocolate block. I have some very early vintages which were made in low number of barrels eg 53! Interesting to see the new vintages the number of barrels increase. Well into thousands now. I’m reluctant to open some of my early vintages.
I met Marc Kent twice. Really nice man and so enthusiastic about his wines. I buy a case every year from Waitrose with 25% discount. Although price has crept up over the years. I think I was originally paying about £12 per bottle for such low number wines. At that price they were probably best value wine on planet.
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I can see the argument made by some that it’s a wine made to a pleasing formula, but it’s far from being the only one that is. I paid £12.84 last week at Waitrose after various discounts, which is pretty fine VFM in my book. I admit I wouldn’t bother at £22.

Spike said:
I used to buy lots of Penfolds bin 28 and 389 at £5 and £15 respectively. The are now in excess of £30 and £60. Never again. Although I do have a few cases stashed.
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I picked up some Bin 389 in a French supermarket for £18 a couple of years ago. But that’s a story I’ve bored people with too many times already.
 
I can see that. It’s starting to get expensive even with 25% discount. Still a good wine. I treat myself to a couple of cases of Amarone from Waitrose. Blockbuster of a wine. Bought 12 masi conteserra amarone and 12 Tommasi amarone.

I’ve a few cases of penfolds St Henri and RWT that I must try.
 
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