Beautiful clear skies, sunshine and heat, surely the perfect weather for wine grapes? But is it? Temperatures in Continental Europe in summer 2017 have been regularly above 40° Celsius; the continental climate is known for being extreme, with very hot summers, but this year it seems that it is hotter than ever. The heat wave, nicknamed Lucifer, is wreaking havoc on many crops including
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Do elaborate descriptions of wine make us think a wine tastes better?
I was drawn to an article in The Independent which reported a study that concluded that elaborate descriptions of wine on labels can make us think that a wine tastes better - and make us spend more on wine. The article suggests therefore that this is a clever marketing trick.
Tasting Notes
As
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To write well about wine, to engage with an audience and do that consistently over many years is no mean feat. These days, many aspire, but few are chosen. Hugh Johnson has been at it now for 55 years. His latest book, subtitled Good Bits from 55 years of Scribbling, does exactly what it says on the tin. Right from the start, he grasped that
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Some facts about New Zealand Wine
The New Zealand Marlborough Sauvignon Blanc ocean
There is more to New Zealand wine than Marlborough Sauvignon Blanc and yet Sauvignon Blanc still accounted for 72%* of New Zealand wine grapes harvested in 2016 ; most of those came from Marlborough. Amazing especially when you consider that the grape was only planted in Marlborough in the 1970s.
So the
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"Natural wine" is a term that has been bandied about over the last few years but it is open to very loose interpretation.
It is regularly used as a substitu te for "organic" and / or "biodynamic", two terms which themselves are also often confused . Several other words are also freely used to embrace the three concepts of natural, organic and bio-dynamic - raw,
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Following my blogpost about the alcohol content of wine READING WINE LABELS : THE ABV OF WINE I have produced the infographics below as a guide to high, medium and low alcohol wines.
As there are many elements that can affect the alcoholic content of a wine it is a general guide: you may find some surprises on there.
Firstly the BIG wines:
The wines
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After the popularity of my two wine blogs
on sulphites in wine and
on wine provenance , I've been asked to take a look at other wine label information. So in this blog I'll look at
the "ABV" percentage - what is that all about?
What does ABV mean?
I'm sure you are aware that it relates to the alcoholic strength of the wine
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