Irancy

I had earlier blogged that a certain Greater China Wine Book had set me a target of a new grape to try - Cesar from Burgundy. In that  entry I departed with "Time to check the importers", which I have to confess I never got aroubd to doing. Yet Simmonet-Fevre was exhibiting at the Vinexpo at the end of May and so I went and visited the, to try my luck.

They did not have the varietal Cesar there but did have Irancy which is made from 95% Pinot Noir and 5% Cesar. The Cesar gives more tannic structure to the wine. The Irancy was purple ruby in colour with a strawberry jammy nose. The sweet strawberry fruit continued onto the palate with the jammy notes much muted. There was an acid but mildly tannic backbone, finishing on mainly an acid note. I suppose 5% Cesar just gave enough tannic lift to the backbone to make it noticeable.

A fortnight of old wines

Sometimes things just happen a certain way. Following on the way a secondary theme of fortified wines (and a tertiary theme of old wines) at last year's Wine Fair, I ended up tasting 7 wines of 50 years or over in the fortnight starting 16th May. First there was the 20th Century Madeira tasting in which the surprise was the 1795 Terrantez donated by a friend, then there was the Taylor's pre-launch tasting of the 1863 single harvest port.

So in order of increasing age, I had tasted Taylor's 1964 Single Harvest Port, 1958 Bual, 1922 Bual and 1908 Bual Madeiras from d'Oliveira, the 1863 Taylor's Single Harvest Port, Taylor's Scion Port (from 1855) and the Barbeitos 1795 Terrantez Madeira. Quite an amazing collection of old wines!! Now I had tasted a number of other wines of similar longevity; wonder if there is enough to write a little book in appreciation of old wines?!

Dal Forno Romano Amarone Monte Lodoletta 2006

I had this wine yesterday in an enjoyable dinner with friends.Now Dal Forno Romano is one of the top producers fo Valpolicellas, Amarones and Reciotos and we all had high expectations of this wine. The passion and care which makes this a top Amarone is undeniable, but the different grapes used is also a reflection of this pursuit of quality. One of the three common grapes in Valpolicella - Molinara was abandoned and replaced by older varieties such as Croatina and Oseleta.


The wine was a deep purple ruby with a sweet pruney acid nose and whiffs of vanilla oak. The palate was sweet plummy fruity with wood notes and tannins, and the sweet fruitiness and mild acidity lingered on into the tannic backbone, right till the finish. It matched the slow cooked beef ribs perfectly!!

Sweet Graciano

Grapes are often known by many synonyms. Graciano is also known as Tinta Miuda in Portugal. Normally used for dry reds in Lisboa and Tejo, I nevertheless found a late harvest example from Quinta da Alorna at last week's Vinexpo. Picked late and with fermentation arrested bu the cold weather (and then presumably sterile filtered so that fermentation does not restart when warmed), the wine then spends 4 months in used French barrels before bottling.

The wine was a limpid runy with just a hint of lilac and had a sweet orangey berry nose. The palate was sweet with berry fruit, a little acid and surprisingly for a wine of 11% alcohol a hint of alcoholic heat. That heat persisted through the backbone of acid right to its finish.

Bual 1908

This was the oldest wine in the 20th Century Bual Madeira wine dinner that I had already blogged about (also here). This Madeira was aging in barrel for a full century until it was bottled in 2008 (presumably for sale). This is the usual way with Madeira although my 1863 was moved to a glass container at some point when it passed its half century and then bottled from this glass container.

The wine was deep mahogany in colour. The nose was smoky with plenty of vine fruits and acid. It was very smooth on thye palate, retaining the raisiny smoky character, but with additional citrussy acidity for accompaniment. The acid smoky elements persists to provide sterling support as the backbone.

Masi Osar 2005

I mentioned that I had tasted another of the Cantina Privata Boscaini wines when I blogged about the Mazzano Amarone last week. That was the Osar 2005 which I tasted in a PWC dinner in 2012 featuring unusual Italian grapes. Osar is made from 100% Oseleta, a rare indigenous red grape in Veneto related to Corvina and Rondinella which nearly went extinct. It was low yielding and thus fell out of favour at a time when the phylloxera blight was devastating vineyards all over Europe. Recent interest in indigenous grapes helped in its renaissance.

As for the wine, it was a deep ruby with a sweet fruity nose. The soft fruity palate had hints of dilution, but the mouth watering acidity which emerged mid-palate rendered good support with an astringent dose of drying tannins bringing up the rear as its finish.

Vinexpo Asia-Pacific 2014

This happened at the Convention Centre on Tuesday to Thursday of last week. As a trade only exhibition, I can only try and wangle or borrow an admission badge for entry, the latter of which I did. However, I had a busy week at work and was scheduled to be on call one day, so I only had two very short sessions after work to go around the exhibition - perhaps a total of 3 hours in all! Nevertheless I got to try the Burgundy grape Cesar, and thought I tasted another two new grapes, but Tintilla de Rota turned out to be Graciano, and the Muscat Oliver from Zurich was how the Swiss calls Irsai Oliver from Hungary.

I also went to 3 wine dinners and another tasting last week. The latter was the Taylors tasting of old ports, already previously mentioned. The last wine dinner also featured fortified wines - 3 sherries from the Gonzalez Byass portfolio, which now includes table wines and even Cava.