We have 2 new wines of the week. A fantastic alternative to Pinto Grigio from New Zealand called Woollaston that is down from €19.49 to €15.99. “It has sweet pear and apple notes and is weighty and rich and full of flavour with excellent length. It is off dry and a little honeyed, the acidity balances the concentrated fruit and adds a zesty flourish”.

The Red also comes from the Southern Hemisphere, Woodstock from the McLaren Vale region of Australia. Normally €15.99, it is reduced down to €12.99 for the week. This wine is a “sublime red blend loaded with dark chocolate & berry aromas followed by savoury tannins on the palate. A burst of juicy grape flavours showing dark berries, black currants and a touch of spice”.

We have 2 new wines of the week and they are brand new to the Red Nose Wine stable of wines. We have a new Bordeaux that is a great introduction to this most famous of regions. It is called 58 Guineas Everday Claret. On the nose, fresh and forward, lively red fruit backed by good depth – true claret typicity, youthful but unmistakable. On the palate, round medium-bodied, perfectly balanced flavours of youthful red fruit with claret backbone, easily enjoyable on its own or with food. It is down from €9.99 to €7.99

The white is a cheap and cheerful Spanish white called Mont Marcal Blanco. It is a great value Spanish white from Penedès. Crisp & fruity, this is a real class act with or without food. Pale yellow with green hues, the bouquet is intensely fruity, with notes of ripe apples, white flowers and a tropical fruit. On the palate it is equally fruity, well structured, soft, fresh and round.

This is a wine is ideal as an aperitif or to accompany light dishes of fish and shellfish, pasta and rice dishes, white meats, salmon and even cured cheeses. It is down to €6.99

If we wish hard enough, the summer will come. We must be positive. Buy it here

So here is my contribution to the optimism. I am putting up a little mix case for €44.99 and it has some cracking little wines that are superb for the BBQ… There are spicey Reds, Crisp whites and even a little bubbly. These are among the most popular wines in the shop and are offered here with a big discount.

Buy the wine, and the sun will come !!!

Wines in the mix include :

La Granja “Pig” Tempranillo
Grandiose Sauvignon Blanc
Santa Gloria Merlot
Mirabello Pinot Grigio
Borgo Prosecco Frizante
Gassac Classic Red

It took me ages to like Chilean Wine. I can admit that now that I finally like it. I had tasted some really good stuff at the higher end of the price range but the cheaper stuff was always a little bit too “different” for me. I was and am a lover of French wine and in particular the Languedoc and Provence, as well as Rhone Valley when it is affordable. Chilean wines are different and all the pleasure tends to be at the start of the bottle, unlike a good French wine, where you sometimes have to work for it. I can handle delayed gratification, so i like a bottle that evolves as I drink it.

Anyway, I started to get to know Michael Kane from that wonderful Cork wine shop called Curious Wines. He introduced me to Santa Alicia and I finally got the whole Chilean thing. He was kind enough to let me import with him on his next order. Since they have arrived they have been a HUGE success, and to celebrate, I am offering 20% off for the month of June. Prices start from €6.39 so hurry up and get your fill before we pull them offer. The range on offer includes:

Santa Gloria - Cabernet – Merlot – Sauvignon – Chardonnay down from €7.99 to €6.39

Santa Alicia Reserva- Cabernet - Merlot - Carmenere - Sauvignon Blanc – Chardonnay - down from €9.99 to €7.99

Santa Alicia Gran Reserva - Cabernet – Merlot – Sauvignon – Chardonnay down from €12.99 to €10.39

Milantu Special Blend which is a blend of Cabernet Sauvignon 48%, Cabernet Franc 34%, Carménère 18% is down from €18.99 to €15.19

Last week’s article title ( How Old is Too Old? ) has just come back to bite me. I am writing this in my kitchen after returning from a quick spin on my new bike. I only went into town to post a few letters, but I am struggling for breath. The Fethard Road hill nearly killed me. To think I once ran a marathon.

Red Nose Wine runs the Paris marathon ( don't ask who the other guy is - took me 8 miles to lose him)

A Bike for All Seasons

I think 37 might be too old after all. I got the bike from fellow Tweeter and blogger Barry Meehan ( of World Wide Cycles fame ) and he passed me as I cycled. Luckily it was on the decent into town so I was still able to save face and feign complete comfort on my first bike journey for twenty years. To be fair, my derriere was unaffected by the odyssey. I bought a good saddle.

Barry tries to take my picture on bike but I am too fast & he takes the guy on the bike behind me instead

Apart from the obvious fitness issues it also took twenty minutes to feel my thumbs again. The next time I will bring gloves. I am so sick of winter. Dearest Mother Nature, you have made your point, now please turn up the temperature in the swimming pool you call Ireland. As the late great George Harrison once sang, “it’s been a long, cold, lonely winter”. We’ll give you until Valentine’s Day and then we want decent weather all the way through until November.

A fit vine?

Is there such a thing as a fit wine or more relevantly, a fit vine? Do vines reach a peak in terms of their fruit production and does it vary depending on yield, grape variety and location? I know many of you have stayed awake at night wondering about this very thing. I am here to try and explain this to you so you can sleep soundly at night.

Very old Shiraz

With this tone of not quite taking oneself so seriously, I shall proceed. I spoke before of a wine that I had tasted from Australia that was made from Shiraz vines that were planted in 1843 in the Barossa Valley. How would these compare to a young Shiraz from the same area? For the purposes of research I tasted both on the same day and these are my thoughts.

The big difference for me was the older vine wines had the classic spices and black fruits you would expect from Barossa Shiraz but it also had an earthiness and denseness and lovely acidity that really balanced out the wine. The younger vines produced a much more fruit forward style with lots of energy but none of the earthiness that I personally love in a wine. I know the 1843 Shiraz importer and if any of you want a bottle, I can put you in touch with Mr. Kane.

Where are all the Old Vines gone?

Vines will keep giving fruit if well cared for but as the years progress, the yield does diminish and aggressive pruning is important. What you start to lose in intensity and power, you get back in complexity and depth. There has been a lot of EU driven subsides for French farmers to rip up old vines and some really great Carignan ( which benefits greatly from older vines ) has been lost. It’s not just Ireland where the EU are causing chaos.

Where the old vine is planted is also relevant as old vines in Oregon might only be 25 years, in France it could be 80 years but in Australia ( as in the Freedom ) it is 168 years, although this is extreme.

Phylloxera in France

You must remember that France had the phylloxera infestation in 1855 and American rootstock was required to eventually replant the decimated vineyards. It took France a long time to recover. For trivia lovers among you, the only European grape that is natively resistant to phylloxera is the Assyrtiko grape which grows on the volcanic island of Santorini, Greece.

But we move away from the core of the article with this talk of destructive parasites. On a completely separate issue, I hope you all have noticed that I have veered away from discussing banks and politicians these last few articles.

An Election in Wine

I am running a competition in the run up to the election where people guess how many seats will be won ( or lost ) be various parties. The culmination will be a special offer for election night where we will all be at home watching the events unfold. If ever there was a time for a good bottle of wine, the election night is it.

The Election Candidates

Obriers de La Péira back in stock

Speaking of which, the Obriers de La Péira wine that Lar Veale of the Sunday Tribune described in December as “quite simply the best wine I have had all year” is back in stock, or should be by the time this article is published. On the back of Lar’s kind words, the wine sold out online within a few hours.

Tribune Review Obriers Dec19 2010

I have also managed to get some of the 2005 vintage as well as the 2008 but as before, stocks are limited as this is an allocation wine. I literally had to beg for some more wine from the winemaker. You will not taste a better wine under €20 .

Don’t forget to log onto the blog at www.rednosewine.com/blog or follow the ranting on Twitter – www.twitter.com/rednosewine

Please have a look at our Facebook site and ‘Like’ Us so we can share all the photos with you. Feel free to share this page with your friends and enemies.

For anyone who would like more information and can’t make it into the shop, please feel free to contact me at info@rednosewine.com

“Life is much too short to drink bad wine”

TWEBT 5 happened last night and Red Nose Wine were the supplier.
I didn’t know how it would go and if people would like the wine. I completely forgot that the top of the cork said 2007, and the year is one of the questions. Whoops! For the rules of TWEBT, see Brian Clayton’s blog.

I asked everyone to open it up a little early, so at 8pm I did the same. However, I knew the wine, so felt it only polite to start ahead of the group. ( They had to wait until 9pm). The wine is question was a Cotes du Rhone from Nicholas Boiron, maker of the award winning Chateauneuf du Pape wines. It was also from great 2007 vintage so it had a lot of body and very pure fruit. In fact, when deciding on which wine to use for #TWEBT, it was these recent comments from Robert Parker, that made up my indecisive mind – “last call…2007 Cotes du Rhone’s among the best values I have ever tasted but disappearing, and replaced by less successful 2008s and 2009s”.

Gary Gubbins and Nicholas Boiron C de Pape 2009

I really wanted to put in a Loire Cabernet Franc, or maybe a Chenin Blanc, but felt it important to give the crowd something they might be familiar with and enjoy across the board. There were some very nice comments about the wine and I think for the most part everyone enjoyed it. There was a very interesting Whiskey tasting going on it parallel. Most people got old world, and higher end of alcohol spectrum but it took a long time to get the 3rd grape variety, Cinsault. To be fair, its only 5% of the mix. The newly anointed @grapes_of_sloth, Paul Kiernan was very aggressive with his guesses. He tweeted with the air of a man with his WSET diploma in the bag. I got so carried away with it all, I even offered a free bottle of wine to the person who guessed the right grapes in the right order of magnitude. A bottle will soon be on its way to @JoannaSchaff – Congratulations.

Anyway, all in all a great night and I was delighted with the response to the wine. While not to most adventurous selection, I think it goes to show that if you look for it, there really are top quality wines from the south of France at a great price. With the sale on, this wine is a steal at €13.05 ( 10% off ). Other similar wines are on sale with 15% and 20% off.

Big thanks to Brian and Kevin for inviting me… we all await Twebt 6.

The weather remains, and the poor old barbecue is wrecked. It never knew work like this before.

SALE SALE SALE

The sale has been very popular and the 20% and 15% wine have really been well taken up. If I am to pick my own stars among that batch, I would say

The Pont de Brion Graves - down from €15 to €12 and from the mythical 2005 Bordeaux vintage.

The Chateau Margui Blanc – down from €18.50 to €14.80 and in many a Michelin Star restaurant the world over.

The Michel Bailley Pouilly Fume – down from €19 to €15.30 – we had this last weekend and it drinking perfectly. High end Sauvignon from the Loire.

In Red, the some of the standouts include :

Twiggy - the famous Montepuliciano d’Abruzzo wine withe a piece of vine on the bottle – down from €17 to €14.45

The Cantina di Montalcino Sangiovese – Chianti without the price – down from €14.50 to €12.33

The famous New Zealand Muddy Water Pinot Noir- down from €28 to €23.80

This is all about while stocks last, so now is as good a time as any to stock up. Beat the recession pricing.

Have a great weekend and don’t forget Twitter Blind Tasting ( #twebt) on Sunday night at 9.
You can still buy your mystery bottle for €14.

Gary

Bye Bye Badman… Bye Bye

There is no getting away from it; it’s a poor World Cup. The only consolidation is that France are in turmoil and on the way home. I am still not over Thierry Henry and his magic hand. He is of course the reason why I am not bringing in a range of wines from South Africa. Could there be a better time to convince the South African Wine board that you want to make their wines number 1 in Ireland but need to do some serious reconnaissance. A quick look at my calendar and it seems that the months of June and July 2010 are free Mr. Trade Ambassador. The plan was foolproof, until Thierry did his worst. So, since Ireland is not there, I will snub all other wine producing countries that are there. France, Germany, Italy, Spain, Portugal, Greece, Australia and all the rest – I reject your wines, for at least one article.

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Brothers in Arms – Grüner Veltliner

Where shall I aim my trusty pen, or even laptop I hear you ask? As coincidence ( or strategic cunning ) would have it, I am listening to the sound of music, yodelling from the mountain tops and crashing at high speed on ill fitting skis ( in my mind ). Yes, I am in Austria, for they also did not make it to the World Cup. The cunning part is that I have been working on a deal with another importer to get some of Austria’s finest wine, at an affordable price. A couple of weeks ago the deal was done and these last few days saw the introduction of a very price conscious Grüner Veltliner into Red Nose Wine on a special deal. It normally prices at about the 17 euro mark but by buying a decent amount of it, we got a deal and now have it on the shelf for 13.50 euros. I think that the wine drinking public of Tipperary agree, because everyone who tasted it bought it.

So, Thierry, from the Hills of Austria, this is for you …

This anti World Cup gesture is our silent protest against Mr. Henry and the corridors of power in UEFA and FIFA. At this stage I think I may be obsessing a little bit, but I really had the whole trip planned out. There are a bunch of winemakers expecting me this week in South Africa, and all they will get are a bunch of Frenchmen who would dismiss their wines out of hand. I used to love going to public wine tastings in Paris. Everyone is an expert and the local barber, postman or electrician would analyse some poor winemaker’s wine to an inch of its life. They would make recommendations from everything to the length of time in oak, cork taint to the exact picking dates. The same wine could easily get five completely different opinions. Good luck with that Mr. South African winemaker.

Anyway, I do believe I was supposed to be talking about anything but France or their wine. So, what is Grüner Veltliner? It is a grape variety that finds its home in Austria. I have heard it described as a wine that has the nose of Riesling, the refreshing taste of Sauvignon Blanc and the fruits (apples and peach) and lusciousness of a Pinot Grigio. That’s not far away for the wine we have on offer, but I have tasted other versions that I couldn’t agree with that as a description. It really can go from a refreshing style wine to a full bodied age worthy wine. Austrian wine accounts for 1% of the world’s production and has 120,000 acres, which is comparable to half of Bordeaux or double New Zealand. The family who make the Laurenz V wine (the one I brought into the shop recently) have been in the wine business since 1124, so this is what you might call “Old School”. It lies on the same latitude as Burgundy, and that is no small calling card. Why isn’t Austrian wine more popular? There was a delicate incident, and I am being very generous with that description, a number of years back. Without getting into the full details, the words Austrian wine and antifreeze were synonymise. They still struggle with the stigma, but the strict quality control regulations put in place after the scandal makes them arguably the cleanest wines in the world now. I was truly shocked at the popularity of the wine in its first two days, so I am glad to find I am not alone in my admiration for this most underrated country and grape variety.

TWEBT – A Twitter thing

A very interesting event is happening next Sunday, July 4th. It is a Twitter Blind Wine Tasting. Basically a mystery bottle is wrapped and made available for purchase. Red Nose Wine have the honour of being the supplier for the 5th national tasting. At 9pm on July 4th, everyone (from all over Ireland) will simultaneously open their bottle and post their comments on Twitter to be seen and shared with all other people participating in the blind tasting. 5 questions are asked by the organiser and after random guesses; they are answered by the supplier. Who will come out on top? Tune into Twitter and follow #TWEBT to find out.

Red Nose Wine are making room for the news wines we have found, and are having a massive sale starting this week. There will be very serious wines and not so serious wines to be had, at clearance prices.

Don’t forget to log onto the blog at www.rednosewine.com/blog or follow the ranting on Twitter – www.twitter.com/rednosewine

For anyone who would like more information and can’t make it into the shop, please feel free to contact me at info@rednosewine.com

“Life is much too short to drink bad wine”

NO ROOM FOR NEW WINES

We are clearing out stock to make room for the new wines we have been sourcing.

There is 20% off many wines, 15% off more !!!!

That includes the new wines that just arrived. Serious wines on Sale !!!!!

Call in quick before the best wines are gone. It will be going online at the end of the weekend, so mailing list members have the first choice …. While stocks last

There are some real gems in the heavily discounted section… call back over the weekend to see the online offers as they go LIVE !!!