#212 Reuniting with an old enemy - Cockburns Special Reserve

We all have dirty secrets in out past, and here is one of mine.  The first bottle of port I had was Cockburns Special Reserve.  The year was 2001, I’d never tried port before and I didn’t like it.

I’d be lying if I could say I remembered what it tasted like, but I do remember that it was ‘Cockburns (anything with a funny name sticks in your mind) Special Something-or-other’ and that I really didn’t like it.  In the eight years following, I’ve been exposed to other ports, my palate has changed, and now, it is my favorite style of wine.  I don’t drink it often, but have more bottles of vintage port than any other wine in my cellar.

But I’ve never gone back to Cockburns Special Reserve since.  I’ve tried a few of their vintages, and thought they were decent enough, but not their entry level port, until last week.

I was invited by Maxxium UK to try Cockburns current releases, plus a few vintages, at the Deseo Restaurant at Gleneagles.  In the very impressive, yet informal, surroundings of their ‘food market restaurant’, we were treated to a food and wine matching with some of the ports.

First up was my nemesis!  The Cockburns Special Reserve, that had almost put me off port for good.  Prejudices put aside, I found that I actually enjoyed it!  It had a very berry dominated nose, with some caramel aspects coming through, with cloves and aniseed peppered throughout.  The palate was a bit light for my normal tastes, but had a bit of tannin up front which was nice and gave it some guts.  Tobacco flavours came next, with a lot of spice, with it all being rounded up with strawberry and cherry flavoured tobacco. As a basic port, it is not bad.  I still wouldn’t buy it at it’s full retail price, but when the supermarkets slash the price of this at Christmas, buy a case, it will be great for making gravy for venison and sneaking the odd glass for yourself whilst you are cooking!  (7/10)

We moved on to the 2004 Cockburns Late Bottle Vintage, and this was a bit of a surprise.  Cockburns always goes for a slightly drier style of port to the other big houses, and the LBV was exactly that.  A very soft nose, and with a dusty, cocoa and leather aroma arriving before the sweet fruit.  The palate was very savoury, with dusty spice, cinnamon bark and dark chocolate dominating the strawberry and bramble.  It is almost as though someone had got a fruit compote, and dusted it with lots of spiced cocoa powder.  As a wine on it’s own, it would be a little trickier to drink because of the savoury elements needing food, but because of that, it actually endeared itself to me more!  I scored it 8/10, and then had it with a little Amuse-bouche of chicken liver, shallots and parsley.  WOW!  The wine added a lovely sweet layer to the chicken livers, and the savoury elements of the wine balanced the pungent element of the liver.  It was outstanding.

Deviating from ruby ports into tawny saw us trying the ten and twenty year olds.  The Cockburns 10 year old Tawny was very lively and fresh.  Nutmeg, and marmalade on the nose, but not very complex.  The palate was a touch thin, with dried citrus peel and raisins.  Saltier elements come flying through, and whilst it was nice, it really wasn’t that special.  (7/10)  Pairing it with custard tarts was almost as good as the previous pairing, with a lovely creamy element being revealed in the wine, however, the sweet tart drew out the alcohol of the wine, and it became very unpleasant.  The  20 year old Tawny has a lovely clove and orange aroma, with light floral elements.  The palate is balanced, the alcohol is well integrated with a spicy dried fruit coming through.  There is a slightly burnt caramel and vanilla element on the palate too.  Seeing that this was to be paired with Crème Brulee made me think this would be another perfect pairing but it wasn’t to be.  The outstanding dessert hauled a dry, alcoholic element out the port resulting in a horrific pairing.  The theory was bang on, the execution was not. 

The first vintage port came along next, the 2007 Cockburns Quinta dos Canais.  This was very interesting.  A light, style of port, lots of fresh raspberries, strawberries with hints of herbs and a nod towards some chocolate elements.  The palate was sweet strawberries, quite herbal, with raspberry zing and then some cocoa and dried herbs.  This is a very drinkable, and enjoyable, port.  It has’t got a lot of depth though. (8/10 for drinking now)  It was paired with a red berry jelly with basil, and again, the execution didn’t match up to the theory.  Firstly, the basil leaf on the top of the jelly was a stroke of genius.  It went so well with the herbal aspect of the wine.  The red berry jelly would have worked too, but it was too light, with not enough fruit and not sweet enough.  Though it was delicious on it’s own, the port – even though it was light – simply dominated the pairing.  A shame, because this could have been magical.

Then we tried the last three vintages of Cockburns port.  The 2000 vintage had a lot of sweet bramble on the nose, some eucalyptus and fresh mint too.  A floral element comes through and is then followed by lots of alcohol and lots of spice.  Very dry leathery flavours, with not much fruit, and berry stalks galore.  A decent wine, certainly, but at a terrible point in its evolution.  A nice flavour of sweet tobacco on the clean finish though.  6/10 at the moment.

Moving onto the 2003 vintage, it was a lot lighter and fruitier than the 2000.  Aromas of cassis and then strawberry and cinnamon bark as well.  It is very inviting.  The palate has sweet berries at first, and then a lot of spice.  Dried leather comes along next with a beef jerky sweetness.  Lots of alcohol and then it softens with chocolate and juicy fruit.  Again, it decides to get vicious on the finish, with lots of spice, almost too much, on the finish.  A massive port, still in it’s youth and drinking well if you like a rollercoaster ride in your mouth.  7/10 at the moment, though I’d wait 20 years!

Finally, the latest release from Cockburns, the 2007 vintage. The more I try wines from this vintage, the more I realise that port producers are changing their wines.  They are becoming more drinkable in their youth, probably to appeal to the emerging markets around the world who don’t want to wait a generation to drink their wine.  There are a few exceptions of course, and Cockburns is one of them.  The nose was very closed, you had to really search for the cherry and stewed plums that fought to stay hidden.  Eucalyptus comes off and you notice a veggie element too.  The palate has dark chocolate, bonfire toffee, treacle and it is quite dark and tannic.  There is some sweet fruit, chocolate and a little toffee too in your mouth, but generally, this is quite tight.  A dry leather finish.  I think this is a sleeper, put it away for at least two decades, and you will have a delightful port at the end of it. 8/10 (possibly up to 9/10 with time)

I’m really glad to have been able to taste this old port house’s wines, and was pleasantly surprised at the entry level wines, particularly the Special Reserve and the LBV.  Like all my colleagues in the wine industry, we often overlook the basic wines, like Special Reserve, that kept the company alive for numerous decades and have, to a degree, subsidised the production of the company’s top wines.  That day at Gleneagles made me come away with a new respect for an old product. 

By Peter Wood with 1 comment

#211 Crap of the Week: Tie & Cufflink set

University lecturers, geeks, 14 year old boys and people without a sense of humour.  These groups of people generally wear comedy ties and  comedy socks and I really wish they wouldn't as this type of clothing is just sad.  The only remotely amusing cartoony item of clothing I have ever seen was a pair of boxer shorts with a picture of a hedgehog on them with the words 'Beware of the prick'!

And, just to show your Art History tutorial that you are a bit of a wine buff, Tiesplanet.com have this wine related tie and cufflink set for you.  For £14.99, you too can look like a pillock!

By Peter Wood with No comments

#210 B-Day, Beaujolais Nouveau

The human being is stupid.  How we can say that we have evolved from apes is beyond me when we continue to do absurd and disgusting things?  Take, for example, when we blow our nose.  We know that there is nothing good coming out of our nostrils and into the tissue, but we still have to take a peek when we are done.

If we open the fridge and find a bottle of milk that has started to go lumpy, not content with simply pouring it down the sink, we have to take the cap off the bottle and have a sniff first, when we know full well that the solids in the bottle indicate that it has gone off. 

And every year, we wine buffs will try Beaujolais Nouveau, knowing full well that it is going to be crap. 

The thing is, we know it isn’t going to be good, and that is is going to be all confected sweet fruit and bubblegum, which, for the record, the 2009 vintage continues the tradition admirably, but I figured out the problem with this wine, and it is not due to it’s quality.  It is to do with the calendar!

For those of you who might not know, Beaujolais Nouveau is the first wine of the year’s vintage from France.  The Gamay grapes were picked a couple of months ago and have spent just a few weeks fermenting, and the wine is released for sale on the third Thursday of November.  The grapes undergo carbonic maceration, where the juice ferments inside the whole grapes to produce a fruity, low tannin wine, but a side effect is that it is very confected and is not, by any means, a fine wine! 

The nose on the 2009 Georges Duboeuf Beaujolais Nouveau, is all about bubblegum and strawberry Chewits!  You expect, and get, confected fruit on the palate, but this 2009 has a hint of structure! It is pretty clean on the finish, with just a bit more of the strawberry candy which spoils things a bit.  It is not a terrible vintage of this wine, and though it isn’t worth the £10 price point, it is pleasant enough. Which brings me back to the problem with Beaujolais Nouveau.

The aim of Nouveau is to sell a young wine to be drunk young.  The problem is, they are trying to do it in winter!  If it was a lovely sunny day and you chilled down the Nouveau a few degrees, you would drink this ad nausiam throughout the summer! Looking outside on this third Thursday of November, it is raining, and cold, and miserable and you need something bigger and chunkier!  Someone pass the port..

By Peter Wood with No comments

#209 Immediate Douro

There are wine regions in the world, particularly Europe, that make wonderful wines that need time to age.  Sadly, due to commercial needs, these wines often appear on the shelves years before they are ready for drinking, and are consumed way too young.  Inexpensive Bordeaux is a perfect example of this, with some 2007 vintages appearing on the shelves already, and despite this being a forward drinking vintage, the wines are nowhere near ready for consumption.

The Douro valley of Portugal is another region that has this problem.  Their wines are often overshadowed by their fortified wines, but the Douro has, and continues to produce, world class wines.  The only problem is that they take years to age or hours to open up, neither of which most people want to do.

I visited the Douro in 2005, and one of the places I enjoyed visiting the most was Quinta de Macedos.  It’s 7 hectares of vines, in the Torto river valley, were originally planted between 1920 and 1945 and has been fortunate to not have had all the old vines ripped up and replanted.  It is owned by Paul and Philippa Reynolds, and Paul’s brother’s company, Raymond Reynolds, imports this wine into the UK.  The wines from Macedos are a real family affair.

Macedos’ entry wine, the Pinga do Torto (approx £12), is made of fruit from young Touriga Nacional and some ancient vines.  It is, very obviously, a wine that isn’t supposed to be put away in a cellar for decades, but even the 2005 vintage, with four years of ageing, is still a bit too young.  You get cherry and a little menthol off the nose, with aniseed and some tar coming soon after.  A light, raspberry element comes off at the end of the sniff, but the nose is very subdued and closed.  The palate is dark, lots of liquorice, very firm tannin and a lot of bark and just a touch of coconut husk.  Bramble then fights it's way through with plum stone and cherry skin, but again, you just get the impression that this wine needs a few more years to open up and reach it’s full potential.  It is a lovely wine, and I’ve had more mature vintages which have been wonderful, and it is unfortunate that a lot of this wine is going to be drunk too young.  With time to breathe, this wine had the darker elements subside and it revealed a wonderful fruit dominant wine with stunning balance and a sprinkling of spice and liquorice around the edges.  There is still a bit of tannin hitting you, showing that this wine is still too young, but it is still a wonderful example of a Douro red.  The problem still remains that, in that most cases, people won’t give this wine the five hours it needs to breathe, and the Douro needs to provide the world with an open and pour wine that shows the style of the region but with instant gratification.

Elsewhere in the Douro is another family producing wine, by the name of Niepoort.  Dirk Niepoort’s wines are always of the highest quality (and sometimes of the highest price!), and, like Macedos he produces an entry level wine.  The difference is that Niepoort’s ‘Drink Me’ is intended to be drunk young, as the ‘Ronseal - does what it says on the tin’ name suggests!

The 2007 vintage is a blend of Touriga Franca, Touriga Nacional, Tinta Roriz, Tinta Amarela and Tinta Barroca, ‘Drink Me’ offers up a much more open aroma.  There is initially a touch of confected fruit on the nose, some cherryade and a little bit of dust.  Then with a few swirls in the glass, you start getting cherries in syrup, a bit of Highland Toffee, some chocolate too and then a stalky element.  The palate kicks off with a little bit of alcohol at the front, then this goes, revealing lots of darker fruit (blackcurrants and brambles) and a nice, subtle tannin.  I really get hazelnuts and liquorice mixed with a clove and cinnamon stick flavour on the finish.  This is so much more drinkable then the Pinga do Torto when they are both just opened, but it is not as good a wine.  There is a lack of depth to the fruit and whilst it is a very nice drink, you just feel that this is going to be past its best when the Pinga is hitting it’s peak.  Still, it gives you everything you want from a Douro wine, but without the need for ageing and that is exactly what the Douro needs to get people into these wines.

If you are buying a wine on your way home from work, get the ‘Drink Me’.  If you are having a dinner at the weekend and can let the wine open up for five hours, buy the Pinga do Torto, it is a far better wine.

By Peter Wood with No comments

#208 "I think this wine tastes wonderful, but I've never tried it"

Matt Skinner, Jamie Oliver’s head of wine, is coming under a little bit of flak for recommending wines in his book, The Juice 2010, which he hasn’t actually tried.  The book’s deadline was before certain wines from the new world had been released, and there are other critics saying that what Skinner has done is wrong.

Skinner’s defence is that there are some wines that are consistent from year to year, but he has shot himself in the foot as in his GQ column he wrote 'It's important to remember that every year is different and that no two years – even in the same spot – will ever be the same. That's the beauty of Mother Nature.'

His publisher, Mitchell Beazley, said that the first edition of the book had negative feedback due to the fact that the book, in 2006, was effectively out of date as a lot of the wines in the book had long gone from the shelves. 

In defence of Skinner, every wine merchant has done what he has done.  No retailer tastes every single vintage of every wine they stock, and they do rely on earlier vintages when recommending wines to customers.  I tend to admit when I’ve not tried a current vintage, but that it is likely to be pretty close to the one I did try, but I’m not whiter than white and I know I’ve ignored vintage differences.  It isn’t as if I’m trying to pass off a Australian Shiraz as an alternative for Beaujolais, but I am using an educated guess to assist the customer.  This is what Skinner is doing in his book, and lets face it, and I don’t mean this in any negative way at all, but the people who are buying this book are not really going to be able to tell if there are any differences between Jacob’s Creek Riesling 2009 and 2008.

The fact that Skinner has tried to cover up the fact he’s not tried the wines is the problem.  If you are putting something into print, you know you are going to have to submit your text months before it is going to be on the shelves, so in knowing this, it would have been wise to ‘fess up and say “as everyone knows, these wines taste exactly the same, year in, year out and so, barring an act of God, you can assume that the 2009 wine will taste the same as the 2008.”

One thing though Matt, in the unlikely event you are reading this, if you are going to admit to not tasting the wines in your book, and use the “it tastes the same every year argument”, don’t write a column that goes against this view!

By Peter Wood with No comments

#207 Wine Web Watch... Wine tasting, Muppet Style

Sesame Street celebrates it's 40th birthday today, and as you would expect trying to find anything about wine from a show that teaches four year olds the alphabet is pretty hard.  So, we turn to the Kermit the Frog, the only character to transcend The Muppet Show/Sesame Street divide, having a little trouble with a wine waiter in the film 'The Muppet Movie'.



Happy Birthday Sesame Street.

By Peter Wood with 2 comments

#206 The impending doom of the third thursday of November

We are approaching the third Thursday of November and the word that will be on every wine buff’s wine stained lips will be Beaujolais.  On this third Thursday, all the Beaujolais houses will be releasing their cherryade like Nouveau "wine" (note the deliberate inverted commas) emblazoned with the 2009 year on the label.  All retailers will all be trying to flog it as quickly as possible to as many pensioners as they can, as those over 60 are the only people in the universe that Beaujolais Nouveau means a damn thing to.

But the unfortunate thing about Beaujolais Nouveau is that it is, and not to put too fine a point on it, crap.  There is a chance this year, because the 2009 vintage is so good in the region, that this year’s Beaujolais Nouveau could be less crap than normal, but it is still going to be scoring high on the crap-o-meter.

Once the excitement of this wine has died down, people will stop drinking Beaujolais again and all will be back to normal with them slugging back Australian shiraz.  Which is a shame, because Beaujolais offers more then their annual soft drink release.  And back in September I visited such a place, Chateau de Pierreux in Brouilly.

Owned by Jean Claude Boisset, this beautiful Chateau was build during the Renaissance, and produces some of the best wine to come out of Beaujolais.  Sited on the pink granite soils, the vineyards are generally organically tended.  But what amazes you when you visit, is that everything is meticulous.  From the yellow painted walls of the chateau with duck egg blue shutters, to the immaculately kept lawns, the stunning views… and then you go into the cellars and it is business as usual!  Dark, stone cellars, moistness in the air, big old oak vats and that omnipresent smell of fermenting grape juice and dust!

The wines are as far away from Beaujolais Nouveau as you can get.  Chateau de Pierreux’s two wines have depth, structure and darker elements, yet still provide the drinker with a lighter style of wine.  Take their 2008 wine.  You get light cherry and hints of mint coming through on the nose, with light, zingy raspberries and just a touch of darker, meatier elements.  The palate has a very subtle tannin, more raspberries and a very gentle cocoa element all the way through.  A very nice wine at around £12,  8/10.  The only problem however, is that it has a major competitor in it’s bigger brother, the Reserve du Chateau.

The 2006 Reserve du Chateau is only a few pounds more and is a much better, and more serious wine.  Sweet raspberries, a lot of rosemary and some mint on the nose, and then darker berries.  Cassis comes out first, and then you get a little balsamic element too.  The palate is dark, liquorice, leather and dark, stalky fruit.  A meaty textur  You feel the wine getting weightier and then, it just freshens up, having lighter fruit coming to the fore. 9/10

Neither of these wines are the overpriced fruit juice that most people expect from Beaujolais.  They are serious wines, what are superbly made.  What a shame that few people will experience them and they will just view Beaujolais as the garishly labelled drivel that will be being released in a fortnight.

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By Peter Wood with No comments

#205 The Obvious question is 'why did we do this?'

When I first saw Crystal Head Vodka, I thought it was a hoax, but desperately wanted it not to be!  With Dan Aykroyd talking about the “implicit potential indestructibility of the soul” concerning us in the online video, and then a spirit’s buff coming onto the screen and talking about filtering through diamonds, meant that this had to be a wonderfully constructed con.  After all, if diamonds are tough enough to cut glass I’m pretty certain that if you pour vodka on them, the liquid is just going to trickle through the gaps between the stones and they are not going to have an influence on the vodka!

So to review it.   The first thing you have to review is the packaging.  I know it shouldn’t matter when you are reviewing a spirit, but with this insane product, you have to review it. It is spectacular!  Not everyone’s cup of tea, I will grant you, but the bottle is unique and, for a brand, unrivalled in it’s immediate impact.

I don’t imagine for one second that this bottle, made by Bruni Glass, comes cheap.  And as a result, you have to ask what the vodka is actually like.  It costs over forty dollars, so you really need to have a decent product.

The aroma is of hints of pepper, a creamy element too and quite a fresh, sea air without the salt aroma.  The palate is quite oily, and very alcoholic, but it is vodka so it is supposed to be!  There is more of the pepper on the palate, it is quite spicy but still quite clean.  It isn’t bad, but it is, after all, vodka!

You really aren’t going to be buying this for the product, you are buying it for the very cool skull bottle as a conversation piece.  You will talk about the bottle, then you will talk about the crazy video with Dan Aykroyd in it, all the while drinking the product,   And for that, it is worth the money you are paying for it.

Just for the record, if Crystal Head Vodka want to fly me to Canada to change my mind about the diamond filtering, I’d be most happy to go!!!

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By Peter Wood with No comments

#204 Fast Food Wine List... McDonald's

Founded in 1940 by Richard and Maurice McDonald, McDonalds has become the largest burger chain in the world, serving more than 58 million customers daily in 119 countries and have over 1.5 million employees.  This is a big restaurant company, yet they don't have a winelist.  Until today.

The simplest of all the burgers and for this you want something simple, mellow and with not a huge amount of character. A £5 Chilean Merlot would do the job quite nicely.
Anakena Merlot £5.00-£6.49 (Independent Merchants)
Carta Vieja Merlot £4.99 (Oddbins)
and for a special occasion...
Concha y Toro Winemakers Lot 10 Merlot £8.99 (Oddbins)

Again, stick with the Chilean Merlot. Adding cheese to a burger isn't going to change things that much!
Anakena Merlot £5.00-£6.49 (Independent Merchants)
Carta Vieja Merlot £4.99 (Oddbins)
and for a special occasion...
Concha y Toro Winemakers Lot 10 Merlot £8.99 (Oddbins)

The signature dish from McDonalds justifies it being worthy of something special, and therefore a little more expensive. Rhone wines should go pretty well with this burger, but a claret may too.
Paul Mas Cabernet Sauvignon £6.99-£7.99 (Majestic & Luvians)
Paul Jaboulet Aine Parallele 45 Rouge £8.99 (Widely available)
and for a special occasion...
Chateau Tour St Bonnet 2005 £10.99 (Independent Merchants)

For those of you who want something healthier, the Filet-o-Fish offers you the chance to venture into trying a white wine.  Chardonnay should go pretty well with this.
Snake Creek Chardonnay Semillon £4.99 (Oddbins)
Hellfire Bay Chardonnay £6.99 (Independent Merchants)
and for a special occasion...
Chablis Alain Geoffroy £12.99 (Oddbins)

 Only served until 11am, it means that any wine pairing has to be light, and low alcohol, yet with acidity and some element to match the herby element of the sausage.
Innocent Bystander Pink Moscato £5-£6 (Independent Merchants)
Martini Asti £7-9 (Widely Available)
and for a special occasion...
Michele Chiarlo Moscato d'Asti £6-8 (Independent Merchants)

By Peter Wood with 1 comment

#203 Wine Web Watch... Hong Kong Winery

Oooh, the environmental lobby would have a field day with the carbon emissions of lugging all the grapes to Hong Kong, just to say you have made the wine there! Why not just ship wine from America or Australia and put another label on it?

8th Estate Winery

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By Peter Wood with No comments