Wine Fictions

 Tasted in a particularly nice atmosphere  in the middle of an evening dominated by Italian wines, this Portuguese Petit Verdot from the Alentejo region has stood out to me due to its deep body and tremendous complexity revealing some green herbal notes allied to pleasant tertiary flavours such as coffee and tobacco leafs.  Even though it is a thirteen year old wine, it has still shown some vibrant acidity revealing that it is still fit for some more years in the bottle.  Still, there was a question which has assaulted me yesterday: how much of the taste of the wines was influenced by the fact that they were being drunk in the cellar of an iconic historical building surrounded by bottles charmingly stored in cages? The attention and knowledge of the person responsible for our group also played an important role in the general atmosphere of the evening.  I am often confronted with customers who can swear that the exactly same wine tasted absolutely different in a...

 Being Portuguese I always feel tremendously attracted to cuvées as I find that they reveal a very specific kind of art in wine making which translates to an incredible extent the profile and intents of the winemaker.  I know you may be thinking: what does it have to do loving cuvées and being Portuguese? Even though Portuguese producers have been changing its patterns by producing more and more single grape wines in order to respond to the demands of the international market as well as a small part of the Portuguese, Portugal still is the country of cuvées due to its wide range of grapes.  On the other hand, Germany is a country mainly dominated by single grape wines which we can, somehow, correlate to a specific mindset and way of approaching the market. I have lost count to the amount of people who have asked me for a Pinot Gris (or the germanized Grauburgunder) without any other kind of information.  When I ask whether they want a more complex or fruitier one, I ...

Sometimes I hardly find words to describe the multiplicity of worlds that we can find through a simple bottle of wine.  In this case, I have to first refer to the impressive social project developed by the Valdibella Cooperative  and its strong commitment to nature, to the quality of their local products and specially to their local grapes. This Acamante is no exception. Made from Perricone, it reveals intense red fruits with a light leather scent and spices. Its vigorous tannins make it a perfect wine for tomato sauce dishes or red meats like lamb. In fact, every new sip I had form this wine awoke in me new gastronomical ideas.  I have to confess that I ended up having part of it with a homemade codfish ceviche as I found its acidity matching the  lime juice marinade and the stronger texture of cod.  And as I start biding goodbye to the long Hamburg winter, I leave you this Claude McKay's To Winter for all the ones who will miss it:        ...