Grand Vin Wine Merchants UK | Blog

Sauternes battles the fate of all truly fine sweet wines. Our age, unlike those that went before, does not prize sweetness in wine. We have full, cheap access to sugar. And then there is the association of sweet wines with unsophisticated palates. Yet ‘Sweet’ is an entirely inadequate term for the scintillating, lush tension of the best examples. Sugar, acidity, extract and the mysterious sour, perfumed freshness of botrytis create wines of captivating textures, aromas and longevity. Sweetness ceases to be the point. Yet these wines remain tethered to the dessert trolley. I adore sweet wines and drink them with anything. They are just so improbable. I love these expressions of human ingenuity intersecting with nature. This applies not just to botrytised wines, of which Sauternes is the most famous but far from only example. The Recioto wines of Italy and Ice Wines of Germany are similarly weird but brilliant. Rotten grapes. Shrivelled grapes. Frozen grapes. You couldn’t make t...

The first Monday of En Primeur week is always punishing. We visited 18 chateaux in the Medoc yesterday, including 4 of the first growths. We set off at 7am and returned, with teeth as black as vampires', for debrief and dinner at Chateau Carignan. Perked up by Bolly, we each pick our top 3 "values" and "keepers" before sharing and debating each others choices. It's a great way of working together to get a feel for the vintage. It's still early in the campaign, but from what we've tasted in the Medoc at least, 2011 is lively, refreshing and lithe. Good producers are stressing the importance of gentle extraction, and appetising textures and finely resistant tannins are a feature of many of our favourite wines. Lacoste Borie, in Pauillac, stole all our hearts with its vibrant fruit and elegant, supple energy. I don't understand how anyone could think there's nothing of interest here, but if the predicted critical antipathy to 2011 does mater...

A tweet a few weeks back from Robert Parker about the upcoming Bordeaux 2011 En Primeur tastings evoked anxiety in some, but optimism in others. His comment, to the effect that 2011 appeared to be a vintage of little interest, might depress those who rely only on Parker's points and endorsements to sell or buy wine. But there is a brighter side. Immoderate praise from the world's most influential wine critic will certainly make producers more likely to reduce prices, possibly significantly, from the heights of the two preceding years. As for me, maybe it's a love for the underdog, or good old-fashioned masochism, but I find it impossible not to be interested and curious about every vintage. The cooler, difficult and marginal vintages probably most of all. They are much more challenging and therefore rewarding to evaluate in all senses, gustatory and intellectual. My preference veers more towards austerity than extroversion in wine, which I accept is not the case for eve...