Bottleswap: Part Deux - Piquentum Malvazija 2019

A second online bottleswap, organised by an aspiring MW 

If you want to know what a bottleswap is all about, then check this out.

Assuming you are already familiar with the post-a-bottle-and-meet-up-online-to-guess arrangement, let me first mention my swappee.

Actually, I cannot say much about Alex Taylor except there are apparently too many of them in the wine trade to count and this one had last-minute parenting duties that meant he had to miss the event.

Winemaker at Tring Winery, his TL is full of light, delicate English wines, so I resisted the temptation to go with a hefty Big Red, narrowly avoided a clash with another pair of swappers who went for the quirky 2002 De Bortoli Dry Botrytis Semillon, and instead chose a sparkling rosé from English winery Hush Heath.

The wine I received from my swapper was a Piquentum Malvazija 2019, so clearly something a little unusual.

Initial thoughts were that the person had either done a lot of research on the sort of quirky stuff I like to explore, or happened to share my love of off-the-beaten track whites from corners of Europe.

On pouring, it proved to be an orange wine with (I later found out) three days' skin contact. 

Piquentum Malvazija 2019 sandy onionskin in colour; aromas of wildflowers and misty sea minerals; apricot, hay, orange peel and creamy roasted nuts, baked apple and sweet spices; saline, complex and supple with a fresh, savouriness and a very long, full mid-palate.

Very Good.

A versatile wine, it acts as something of a canvas for other foods.

This, I decided, had been chosen by someone with more than just a routine enthusiasm for eclectic wines; it had to be someone in the trade with a flawless palate and an iconoclast's love of the bleeding edge.

In short, it screamed "sommelier":

- obscure place and grape

- edgy style

- versatile, complex and food-friendly

- strong mid-palate

- sounds intimidating if you describe it but delicious when you try it

- almost too cool for school, but actually not

Inevitably, my swapper turned out to be donaldé, aka Donald Edwards, a man with a love of being back-lit, who channels serious Eddie Izzard vibes with a booming voice and sense of audience and shares my love of the possibilities of leftover cooking fats, as well as wines from Eastern Europe.

Donald, who is sommelier at La Trompette and makes wine in Tokaj, explained that he lists around 700 wines, but will only add a wine if it is in some noticeable way different from a wine he already has.

He talked through the background of the wine, neatly summarised by Wayward Wines who stock it:

This is a tale of a son of a Frenchwoman and an Istrian father, growing native Croatian grapes and making them in an old Mussolini-era concrete water tank. Born in French Basque Country (Jurançon) in the foothills of the Pyrenees, Dimitri Brecevic studied oenology in France and then worked at Domaine de Chevalier in addition to working harvests in Australia, New Zealand, Bordeaux, and Burgundy.

In 2004 he decided to invest himself in his father’s homeland of Istria near the town of Buzet - formerly known as Piquentum in the time of the Ancient Romans. Istria is the largest peninsula in the Adriatic, Croatia’s westernmost region, and borders both Italy and Slovenia.

With only about 1750 square miles, over 280 miles are coastline with 35% covered with oak and pine forests. Indigenous grapes like Malvazija Istarska and Teran coupled with the mineral rich white and red karst soil all seem to echo the salinity of this pristine coastline and the pungency of its truffle-ridden interior.

Grapes are hand-picked and then slowly pressed into tank without temperature control. Since the winery is a converted concrete water tank, the temperature is a constant 10-11ºC all year long. Whist this is perfect for ageing, it is often too cold to get a native fermentation started.

Using fans to draw in the warmer outside air to around 14ºC, all of Dimitri’s wines complete a wild ferment without the use of added yeast, bacteria, enzymes, or any additives. After a long and slow fermentation without stalling fermentation or cold soaks, the wines are bottled unfiltered with just enough sulphur.

This particular wine has a relatively short maceration of 3 days, and some time in various sized barrels adds to its golden hue

The wine has aromas of wildflowers and misty sea minerals and is rich and rounded on the palate, with great texture. Medicinal, Mediterranean sage lingers somewhere in the background. 

The twelve circles on the bottle label map the annual rainfall in the region over the year the wine was made, starting in October 2018 top left and finishing the month of harvest, September 2019 in the bottom right.

Blue of The Danube - Wines to Buy

A selection of wines from Wines of Hungary's Blue of The Danube Tasting

Many of the wines shown at the Blue of The Danube are not yet commercially available in the UK. Here are the ones that are.

Varietal: Hungary

Szent Donat Magma Kekfrankos 2018 (£17.99, Novel) fresh and elegant. Good.

Szent Donat Single Vineyard Kekfrankos 2017 (£25.50, Novel) very adept cherries-and-pepper, concentrated and muscular, supple and harmonious. Very Good.

Gilvessy Kekfrankos (£18.95, Davy's) earthiness and cherry fruit, supple and soft with fine tannins. Fresh and vibrant. Good.

Blended: Croatia

Danjanic, Clemente, 2013 (£25, Croatian Fine Wines - M, CS, Teran, Borgonja) dark and inky with black fruits, beetroot, sweet spices and florality; grippy with very fine tannins. Very Good.

Varietal: Romania

Nachbil Blaufrankisch 2017 (£21, Boutinot) aged 2m in amphora, fresh, supple and elegant; textured and grippy with very fine tannins. Somewhat curious - in a good way. Good.

Balla Geza Blaufrankisch Stonewine 2017 (£18.90, Novel) woodsy-earthy nose, fresh, lifted cherry fruit, very fine tannins. Good.

Varietal: Austria

R+G Triebaumer Blaufraenkisch Reserve 2016 (£34.26, Alpine Wines) oaky and concentrated with dark cherry fruit; assertive and grippy with a muscular core. Very Good.

Three Wines from 8wines

A fizz, white and red from 8wines

Now, if 6 turned up to be 9
I don't mind, I don't mind.

- If 6 Was 9, Jimi Hendrix (1967)

Like Hendrix's middle-child album, Axis: Bold As Love (on which If 6 Was 9 appears), I must confess to not knowing much about 8wines - their website explains that what started out as a small venture to cater to the specific wine tastes of our friends and family, turned into a business reaching customers in all corners of the EU and beyond.

With little more of a back-story other than that they are "headquartered in Cyprus with warehouses in Central Europe", they are somewhat anonymous, so it is hard to think of a compelling reason why you should try them over any other wine merchant.

If they have a compelling vision or driving sense of purpose, that passion is hardly to be found in their stated ambition to rectify the shortage of "functional sophisticated online wine shops in EU with unique and wide selection of premium wines from major and less known wine regions from around the globe".

I've seen more charisma from an actuary.

Then again, on the basis of these three well-made and well-priced wines, there's also no reason to avoid them; they are by turns pleasant, intriguing and compelling.

Saint Hilaire Blanquette de Limoux (£12.11) warm-climate, frothy, Languedoc fizz made from Chardonnay, Chenin Blanc and aromatic local hero Mauzac; apples, white peaches, flowers and citrussy freshness. Pleasant, elegant and clean with ripe, southern warmth.

Thoroughly enjoyable sipper that will match with summery picnic foods or a creamy risotto.

Kozlovic Malvasia 2017 (£11.80) Italian-influenced Istrian white with an intriguing, dried-sage musty-muskiness and ripe orchard and stone fruits with a sea-spray minerality and a touch of white pepper. Clean, fresh and savoury.

A versatile food wine to match with creamy pasta, such as gnocchi in a creamy blue-cheese sauce.

Manincor Reserve del Conte 2015 (£13.92) Bordeaux-plus-Lagrein blend from the dolomites, more Austrian than Italian; black cherries, bramble and blueberry fruit with savoury black olives and old leather; herbs, spice, freshness and fine tannins.

Good.

Match with red meat, especially game; roasts, artisan salamis or carpaccio will all work well.

#ChristmasJumperDay tasting - Big Reds

 

A blind tasting of (mostly) big reds with friends on #christmasjumperday

After the previous high-acidity fizz tasting, we decided on Big Reds as the theme to our last get-together of the year.

With a trainee MW in our ranks, our wines donned their Christmas jumpers and we guessed at origins, ages and grapes.

The wines were provided by G, J and CWB

D'Arcy Bredfield 2010 (G) scant information on the front label. And no back label at all. Correctly identified by trainee MW as "Champagne-alike, but cooler, possibly England". Elegant English fizz with fine mousse, yeastiness and redcurrant fruit.

RE Chardonnoir 2013 (J) orange coloured; fresh, elegant and substantial. We were utterly confused by this one. It turned out to be a Chilean blend of Chardonnay and Pinot Noir from the Casablanca Valley. A lovely, intriguing wine - with quite the most pompous back label.

Henschke Mount Edelstone Keyneton Shiraz 1991 (G) porty-eucalyptussy, big red. This had me immediately thinking of Australia. Overly alcoholic for my palate.

Another stream of thinking had it down as a Barolo - big, tannic, red with aromas of cherries, tar and roses.

Viña Real Gran Reserva 2009 (CWB) the age of this Rioja was correctly guessed as "around 5 years". Fresh, adept and and complex, this was very well liked.

S.C. Pannell Tempranillo / Touriga 2013 (J) truffley aromas, black-cherry fruit and fresh acidity but purple in the glass, this was like Pinot Noir's darker brother. Totally confusing.

Latching on to whatever details I could, I made a stab at it being New World (very clean, technically very well-made), so New Zealand (pure fruit and fresh acidity). It turned out to be a blend from McLaren Vale and Barossa.

Plasius Plavac Mali 2008 (G) with rosehip fruit, this was past its peak, but the underpinnings were still sound. We concluded that it was not a mainstream wine and so could be from pretty much anywhere.

It turned out to be a Plavac Mali (meaning "small blue", a reference to the grapes) from Croatia's Konavosko Vinogorje - roughly, Konovo Wine Hills - with a Decanter Commended.

Chateau d'Yquem Lur Saluces 1990 (G) with fresh acidity and botrytis, this was confidently placed in Sauternes. However, the fruit was oxidised and it was nowhere near as impressive as it should have been.

Taylor's First Estate Reserve Port (CWB) I had not bothered to conceal this half-bottle of fresh, fruited ruby port, so we sipped it with warm mince pies and brandy butter to finish off.

I liked the English fizz and the Tempranillo a lot, but my wine of the night was the complex, fresh, aged Rioja.

Other related articles
Fizz Tasting

"Wine Grapes" Seminar with Dr José Vouillamoz

A tasting of wines made from some of the world's rarest grapes with Dr José Vouillamoz, Ampelologist and co-author with Jancis Robinson MW and Julia Harding MW of the book "Wine Grapes", organised by the Circle of Wine Writers.

What does a wine made from one of the world's most obscure grape varieties taste like ?

Does the degree of obscurity of the grapes that go into the wine make it a better or less good wine ?

Are obscure grape varieties a symbol of diversity and heritage to be celebrated and preserved - or the oenological equivalent of dinosaurs or minor composers who merit no more than a footnote in history.

I am - still - undecided on these points; I want to see diversity and variety in wines, but I am not interested in obscurity for its own sake, wine tasting as a competitive, acquisitive, box-ticking exercise.

11 wines from 11 obscure and rare grape varieties.

The Whites

Versoaln 2009 - Castel Katzenungen, Sudtirol, Italy (Versaoln), 350yo vines, 350m2 acreage, can only be bought by the bottle at the winery: light sandy yellow, green apple and mineral nose; peachy and waxy, with ripe tropical fruit and some spiciness. Light with good acidity.

Rudesheimer Berg - Schlossberg Orleans 2011, Georg Bruer, Rheingau, Germany (Orleans Gelb) one parent is Gouais Blanc, making it related to Chardonnay, Riesling and Furmint; was considered extinct in the 1920s, but now made by two wineries. Golden sandy yellow, floral and marzipan aromas, very high acidity initially, leading to salinity and minerality with some yellow stone fruit. Persistence and a touch of almond bitterness on the finish.

Lafnetscha 2011 - Chanton Kellerei, Visp, Switzerland (Lafnetscha) first mentioned in 1627, the name is apparently a local dialect for "don't drink too early", a reference to its high acidity. Parents are Humagne and Completer. 1.5ha grown, 4 producers. Fermented in stainless steel, medium straw colour, floral nose with almonds and green apples, high acidity and dense structure; white pear fruit and some sweet spice.

Grk 2011 - Branimir Cebalo, Korcula, Croatia (Grk) around 50ha, 2,400 bottles only, a difficult vine to cultivate. Deep golden sandy, aromatic, toasty nose; melon, honey and toastiness with some orange peel aromas. Fresh acidity.

Kolorko 2010 - Pasaeli Hoskoy, Turkey (Kolorko) almost nothing known about this grape's history, origins or acreage, but in decline since the 1960s; Pasaeli is the only known producer. Barrel fermented, then aged in glass demijohns. Golden sandy yellow, with volatile aromas of nail polish. Prominent sharpness, on the palate, quite challenging, with bitter lemon and pink grapefruit; zesty, bitter finish.

Vigna del Lume 2012 - Antonio Mazzella, Ischia, Italy (Biancolella) related to another local grape on this island, San Lunardo, only 6,000 bottles produced, a touch of late harvest. Medium golden straw, tropical fruit and sweet spice, pineapple and honeysuckle with some dried apricot. Well-balanced with a persistent finish.

The Reds

Negre de San Colonia 2010 - Vins Toni Gelabert, Mallorca, Spain (Callet) 134ha grown, Callet means "black" in the local dialect, spends 13m in French and American oak - a favourite of Wine Grapes co-author Julia Harding MW, apparently. Dark purple, sweet oaky spice, vanilla and coconut, red fruits and tobacco on the palate; fresh acidity, supple tannins and a long finish.

Karasi 2011 - Zorah Wines, Rind, Armenia (Areni) almost nothing is known about this grape, but it is the most-cultivated in the area.

Winemaker Zorik introduced the wine and explained that Rind has evidence of winemaking back to 4,000 BC. He mentioned the loss of winemaking culture as the Soviets insisted on Armenia producing brandy.

20,000 bottles are produced, ungrafted vines, fermentation in stainless steel with ageing in French and American oak. Dark purple with truffles, mushrooms and cigar; some yeasty pungency and dark fruit. Mid-palate of blackberries and vanilla custard, grippy firmness with orange zest bitterness on the finish.

Jancis Robinson calls this a "gypsy wine" and gives it 17 points.

Gelsaia DOCG Piave Manalotte 2009 - Az. Agr Cecchetto, Veneto, Italy (Raboso Piave) Raboso means "acidic", or perhaps "tannic". 1,100ha and 7,000 bottles produced. Around 20% of the grapes are dried for 35 days, ripasso-style; ageing in a mix of new and used barrels. Almost opaque, complex nose of rich, dark dried mixed fruit and tobacco. Sweet ripe fruit, it feels big and grippy, full-bodied with ripe, red-tea tannins. Grippy finish with some liquorice aromas.

The Orange Wines

A term coined in 2004 for wines fermented in amphoras / kvevri / karasi etc.

Gringet Amphore 2010 - Domaine Belluard, Haute-Savoie, France (Gringet) nothing known about this grape, except that it is not Savagnin, as some have said. 15ha, fermented in amphoras with 2 months' skin contact using indigenous yeasts, 1,200 bottles. A slightly cloudy pale orange colour, sweetly pungent and spicy nose. Floral orange blossom and jasmine, lanolin texture, tannins and minerality, with some aniseed and persistence on the finish.

Kisi 2011 - Pheasant's Tears, Georgia (Kisi) 50ha, nothing known about the grape, 3,500 bottles made by American John Wurdeman. Fermented in kvevri, 100% natural wine, 6 months' skin contact. Bright golden orange, the colour of brandy; floral aromas with camomile, straw and herbs. Musky, smokey palate, chewy tannins and dried apricots. "Not for the fainthearted" was José's description of this wine.

Conclusions

The Orange wines were the most unusual and interesting here, but that comes more from production method than grape variety.

The Whites were generally pleasant and well-made, but as wines, I felt they generally lacked any compelling individuality.

The Reds then seemed to have the most innately characterful personalities and made virtues of their idiosyncracies, whilst also being recognisably contemporary wines.

Fans of obscure grape varieties may wish to check out this blog devoted to the oenologically unusual, Fringe Wine.

Jim Budd's photos of the event are here.

Other related articles
On Wine Grapes
De Martino at Circle of Wine Writers
Virginia Wine at Circle of Wine Writers
English Wine at Circle of Wine Writers
Greek Wines at Circle of Wine Writers: part 1 and part 2

Links
Circle of Wine Writers - website, twitter
José Vouillamoz - twitter

Croatia: A Bit of Geo-Political History

Last week, I went to a Croatian Wine Dinner with Pacta Connect at Hotel du Vin. I had planned to write a brief introduction to the country to set the scene, but it turned into the full-length piece below.

So if you just want to read about the dinner - the Croatian wines and matching dishes - click here.

If on the other hand, a shallow dive through the socio-political, ethnic and economic history of this former-Yugoslav EU aspirant grabs your attention - or if, having read about the dinner, you want to dig a little into the background of Croatia, read on.

It often seems to me that Slavic nations are shaped and defined as much by their neighbours as by themselves - Russia is more than half Asian and culturally looks back to centuries of domination under the Mongol empire for its heritage, Ukraine is a borderland passed over and through and occupied by bigger and more powerful neighbours.

Croatia, by contrast, was a teen-bride forced into an unhappy marriage of states jointly renamed Yugoslavia that never really had any shared identity - as became all too obvious in the 1990s.

If the Slovenians to the north are Little Austrians and the Serbians eastward-looking in their Orthodoxy, Croatians are urbane and proudly Catholic with a mixture of central European and Mediterranean influences.

In Balkan Ghosts, Robert Kaplan explains that Croatia has long been a battleground for East vs West struggles: Capitalism against Communism, Catholicism against Orthodoxy, Rome against Constantinople, Habsburg Austria-Hungary against Ottoman Turkey.

He sees the country as lying on a fault line of the great divisions of history, a crucible for centuries of ethnic, religious and cultural tensions which decades of Communism held barely below the surface: "there were reckonings aplenty here".

In the late 90s, I worked in Croatia for a few months on summer, driving down from my home in Vienna every week through southern Austria and Slovenia.

It was not an easy or particularly pleasant time - the countryside of northern Croatia seemed deserted whilst temperatures in central Zagreb were in the high 30s with rubbish uncollected on the streets and packs of stray dogs; most of the local restaurants were scruffy and basic, in the old school communist style.

There were buildings in the grand, Central European style, but they seemed rather sad and neglected - a sign not so much of faded glamour but of faded aspiration.

The wave of optimism at the collapse of communism throughout eastern Europe had first dissipated and then turned into a tide of despair as the aftershocks of the Asian currency crisis swept through the region with as much force as the political changes of half a decade earlier.

Against a background of ethnic tensions, politically and economically the country was on its knees and making good wine seemed the lowest of its priorities.

Around the same time, I also took a holiday in Istria in the "armpit" of Croatia just around the coast from Italy and still very heavily Italian-influenced. If there's a certain "Italian shabbiness", Istria took it a step further with Italian-feel "communist shabbiness".

Further south, the Dalmatian coast is rocky, bare and almost lunar in places but hosts a number of ancient Roman cities including the port of Split where tennis champion Goran Ivanisevic landed after winning Wimbledon in 2001.

Moving forwards, a country that seemed like a doomed basket-case is now sitting in the waiting room of EU accession, rather like the more northern states of Czech, Poland, Hungary and Slovakia were a good decade ago.

Like any country re-inventing itself, there is a new wave of people who are prepared to take risks as they have only reputations to gain and not to lose.

The communist approach to wine-making - indeed to all agriculture - was to treat it like an industrial process, focusing on volume and standardisation, not individuality.

Freed from such socio-political constraints and forced collectivisation, Croatian wine-makers are now able to get back to ideas of wine-making as an artisan activity, an expression of local terroir.

This also means they are free to choose their approach, methods and styles; often the average age of the vines is greater than that of the wine-maker.

The way I think of this new breed of Istrian wine-makers is as having a Mediterranean, Italianate love of food and wine combined with the energy levels and ambition of a new eastern European democracy.

As to the future, Trevor sees some seismic shifts for Croatia's wine industry - joining the EU will open up export markets, but will also bring a flood of cheap imports that will challenge producers of basic wines.

In the longer term, however, the best wines will gain the recognition they deserve and prices will increase accordingly.

Other related articles
Croatian Wine Dinner
Geo-politics
A Croatian wine from M&S

Recommended reading

Balkan Ghosts by R. Kaplan (Paperback - Mar 1994) - see here

Only Pacta Connect - Croatian Wine Dinner at Hotel du Vin‏

Trevor and Judith Long of Pacta Connect Wines are a lively and entertaining couple; I met them at Cambridge Hotel du Vin at a Croatian Wine Dinner where they were showing some of their wines matched to food by Chef Jonathan Dean.

After originally working in the music business, they made the decision to change careers and become wine importers. With a commercial background, they bring a pragmatic, businesslike approach to the task of making and selling wine whilst likening the task of getting the best out of a winemaker to that of keeping a performing artist happy and focused - both being creative, gifted, egotistical and rather precious types.

Trevor is an engaging rough diamond of a Brummie who would not seem out of place as a bassist-cum-roadie-cum-manager of a pub rock band (he actually tour managed Duran Duran, The Fall, The Stranglers, Haircut 100 and Then Jerico); when he says "kipper tie", he is referring not to a garment but a hot drink.

By contrast, Judith - who was previously PA to a record label Chairman - is rather proper in a well-spoken, slightly plummy sort of way, albeit one suspects she has a darker, more wayward, somewhat punkier sort of side.

They remind me a little of Tim Pearson, a Midlander who made his money in contract cleaning before setting up 7Springs winery.

So I had three questions in my head - why Croatia, whence the palate and how do they spot winemaking talent ?

Over dinner, they explained that Judith had connections in next-door Slovenia but that, popping across the border to Croatia, they had found the wines to be much better there.

The palate is apparently Trevor's - clearly a result of the rock and roll high life.

As to spotting talent, as Trevor puts it, he has had to kiss a lot of oenological frogs before finding the 70-odd wines that now make up their range and which he considers his "children".

"You've clearly been busy" I remarked dryly to which both he and Judith erupted into peals of laughter.

Canapes

We started in the library of the Hotel where Judith and Trevor - who often talk over each other in their enthusiasm to tell stories - introduced the first wine of the evening - Misal Millennium, a Champagne-method fizz produced by 25 year old winemaker Ana at her grandfather's vineyards.

A blend of 80% Istrian Malvazija, 10% Pinot Noir and 10% Chardonnay, it is fermented in stainless steel and marked NV but all from 2009-harvest grapes. It is an elegant sparkler that developed some savouriness and a food friendly rasp with some air and was served with canapes of smoked salmon paté on toast and a warm beetroot gazpacho.

An oak-aged fizz with more toastiness and complexity would have stood up better to the salmon, and although both were lovely, it did not quite work as a match.

Overall, I thought all the food and wines were good-to-excellent, but the best match was with the red wine, whilst the white matches were "almost, but not quite".

All the wines are from Istria which despite being on the Mediterranean results lower alcohol levels due to sea breezes and the cooling Bora winds.

Trevor and Judith in Pula, Istria

Starters

Our first course was a creamy risotto with peas, seared squid rings and truffle oil - appropriately Mediterranean it was light, creamy and delicious.

The accompanying wine was a Piquentum Malvazija 2011. It is a natural wine, for which there is no set definition but which generally means all-natural processes with wild-yeast fermentation, no added substances and low winemaker intervention.

A straw yellow colour in the glass, it was bright and clear with a nose of mossy clay, salinity and seashells.

On the palate, there is good freshness and acidity (it is fermented in stainless steel) and minerality, with a complex, developed character that feels older than current vintage.

It also had something else slightly elusive about it that I find in many natural wines - a depth of flavour and texture.

Our next starter was baked bream with red pepper stuffed cabbage and a Coronica Gran Malvazija from 2008.

100% Istrian malvzija with 10 months' ageing on the lees in stainless steel and a further 10 months in French oak, it was weighty, complex and evolved beyond its years.

Its leesy complexity, muskiness and a fullness on the palate gave it an aged character beyond its mere four years of age - Old School and geeky, it was Very Good Indeed.

The fish was perfectly cooked and the little parcel of typically eastern European stuffed cabbage was very well done, but the food did not match and demanded something fresher, crisper and more modern in style.

Main

Over the main course of lamb paprikash with chateau potatoes, Judith explained that they supply wines to a number of Michelin-starred restaurants and here I could see why - the Roxanich SuperIstrian 2007, again a natural wine, was Rhonesque and complex with vanilla spice, bramble and black cherry fruit and tobacco; the texture is ripe, soft, full and peppery.

A blend of 40% Merlot, 40% Cabernet Sauvignon and 20% Istrian Borgonja, this was a really lovely wine -  accomplished, vibrant and exciting with a strong, outgoing personality that will match easily with the sort of characterful food one hopes for at a good restaurant.

The lamb paprikash was rich, tender and full of flavour with the meat falling apart; as a match, it was absolutely spot on.

Dessert

Dessert was a wonderful berry torte with lavender ice cream matched to Cattunar White Muscat 2008; 100% white muscat grape of Momjan (a small village in northern Istria, the only place where this muscat is grown, apparently), the wine had a herbal, aromatic nose of rubbed sage with white flowers - on the palate, there is crisp acidity and floral ripeness but the finish is more off-dry than fully sweet.

This, unfortunately, broke the golden rule of dessert wines: that they must be at least as sweet as the food - and preferably more so.

Although delicious, the dessert overpowered the wine which felt tart on the finish when tasted with the sweetness of the food.
I feel Trevor's suggestion of poached pears would have made for a more successful match - a lighter, sharper, less intensely sweet dish was required here.

---xxx---

Overall, this was a superb and hugely entertaining dinner; Trevor and Judith were excellent hosts, the food and wines were uniformly excellent and there was an interesting mix of guests with a blend of youth and experience.

If the food and wine matches were not always spot on, this was more of a minor niggle than dinner-party carnage.

The wines from Croatia were for me a revelation; not just merely something new and quite interesting, they were seriously impressive and a sign that Croatia is a place to watch - especially with EU accession due next year.

Whether the wines are typical of what is happening in Croatia generally or more a reflection of Trevor's own preferences I do not know.

But as he pointed out at the beginning of his talk, in 2011 Croatia won more Decanter awards than Chile or Argentina; and these things do not happen by accident, of course.

With something of a captive market at present, Croatian wines are not cheap - especially at the bottom end.

By contrast, the value is to be found at the top end, where broader reputations have not yet been made and prices increased accordingly.

Tickets for the dinner cost £55 per head; I attended as a guest of the hotel.

Other related articles
Champagne Dinner at Hotel du Vin
Noval Dinner at Hotel du Vin

Links
Pacta Connect - website, twitter
Hotel du Vin - website, twitter

Two More Eastern Mediterranean Wines from Marks & Spencer

Earlier this year, Marks & Spencer launched a new Eastern Mediterranean range of wines - priced at around £10, these sometimes hard-to-pronounce wines from oenologically obscure countries would have to be good to tempt buyers away from more familiar bottles.

I've been reviewing them in pairs and these two whites from the Adriatic are definitely worth seeking out.

Quercus Pinot Bianco, 2011 Goriska Brda, Slovenia

Of all the former Yugoslav-nations, tiny Slovenia sees itself as the least Slavic, preferring the moniker of "Little Austria".

In the north of the country, it shares the same terroir as Austria's Styria, but this wine is from the Adriatic coastal region, not far from Italy (hence the Italianate grape name) with the vineyards cooled by sea breezes.

On the nose, it is citrussy and toasty with slightly floral notes and a touch of spice.

On the palate, there is ripe orchard fruit with rounded acidity; it feels mouthfilling with apples, pears, quince and medlar fruit - a touch of thick-skinned yeastiness and some spice.

Long on the palate and mouthwatering with a persistent rounded finish, it is well-made and balanced.

A versatile food wine, match with roast chicken or pork, hard yellow cheese or creamy mushroom pasta

It's actually rather lovely and proves a favourite not only with the rest of the CWB family, but also of M&S Wine Specialist Trading Support, Elizabeth Kelly

Golden Valley Graševina, Slavonija, Croatia

My memories of working in Croatia in the late '90s are of Italian levels of corruption and inefficiency; the country seemed to be on its knees with little hope of going anywhere any time soon.

With a stagnant, barter-based economy, making good wine seemed a low priority and I decided not to expect much from this beautiful but troubled country.

Fast forward just over a decade and I tasted a Gold Medal-winning Graševina at the IWC Taste of Gold event last year and, what do you know, here's another good one, too.

Herbaceous and aromatic on the nose, there are some ripe tropical notes.

The palate is mouthwatering and rounded with vibrant zesty acidity and tropical fruit; it is long with good savoury depth and a persistent finish.

Again, it feels balanced, well made and very pleasantly drinkable.

Match the aromatic notes with green herbs, such as mozzarella with pesto, white fish with a herby broth or roasted pork or chicken with a rosemary and sage rub.

Recommended wine

Both wines are very pleasant indeed and worth seeking out - for me, the Slovenian Quercus has the slight edge, but don't let that stop you from trying the Graševina as well.

Links

Marks and Spencer - website, twitter

Other related articles

Croatian Graševina tasted at IWC Taste of Gold
More on Slovenian wines generally

Austrian wines at IWC Gold - and a Croatian sticky‏

At the recent IWC Taste of Gold event in London, I bumped into Tim Atkin MW and asked him what he had been impressed with. He mentioned a couple of stands but the one that caught my attention was the Austrian reds.

They were on my "to see" list anyway as I am a big fan of Austrian wines, but typically just the whites. I reviewed some reds at the LIWF a few weeks ago after talking to Jancis Robinson MW at an earlier Austrian event where I had done only whites and she had done only reds.

Some had been very good and really enjoyable, but a few others, whilst technically well-made, had, to me, shown up some of the limitations of Austria's indigenous grape varieties.

But here was another MW saying that I must check out the reds and so I headed off.

I started with a Blaufränkisch from Velich - based in low-lying, warm Burgenland, Velich makes some superb dessert wines and a Burgundy-style Chardonnay that I bought regularly when I lived and worked in Vienna.

Blaufränkisch tends to produce somewhat Italian-style reds with lots of rasping cherry fruit acidity and, all too often, not too much else. This one, however, was rather more complex and interesting - still light and juicy, it had smokey, toasty aromas, bramble fruit and some oakiness with soft tannins and a creamy texture. It has also won the Blaufränkisch Trophy.

Next came a wine I had tried previously at LIWF, Kamptal-based Kurt Angerer's Zweigelt Granit from 2008 (the last really warm year in this part of Austria).

Zweigelt is a cross of Blaufränkisch and St Laurent (itself a relation to Pinot Noir), so the wines tend to be light, aromatic and cherry-esque. This one had lots of cherry fruit, but also blackberry, some spicy pepperiness and a real depth of flavour.

It was also proving particularly popular with visitors on the evening and has three Trophies - Zweigelt, Niederoesterreich and Austrian Red.

I then moved on to a couple of sweet wines starting with a Croatian wine from producer Ilocki Podrumi. The grape variety was given as Graševina which is the local name for Austria's Welschriesling, something of a workhorse grape but capable of being interesting if well made.

Floral and highly aromatic on the nose, it is reminiscent of a headily perfumed Pinot Gris; the palate is weighty and ripe showing marmalade and touches of intense, pungent botrytis balanced with good acidity.

Next was a Lenz Moser Prestige Beerenauslese from 2008. Lenz Moser is something of a legend in the Austrian wine industry - there is a system of vine-training named after him and his range of wines is immense, even if they are aimed more at the supermarket than the independent merchant.

He is based in Lower Austria but has clearly been spreading his wings as this BA is from Burgenland which is warmer and produces more intensely sticky dessert wines. Ripe, tropical and marmaladey but with good refreshing acidity, it is another lovely dessert wine from this region and, amazingly, retails for under a tenner.

Recommended wine

Overall, my favourite wine here was the critics' and general public's choice - the thrice-awarded Zweigelt Granit from Kurt Angerer. £20.49 from Noel Young Wines.

Links

Noel Young Wines - http://www.nywines.co.uk/

Velich - http://www.velich.at/

Kurt Angerer - http://www.kurt-angerer.at/

Ilocki Podrumi - http://www.ilocki-podrumi.hr/

Lenz Moser - http://www.lenzmoser.at/de/