A very good trip

Word reaches us from our supermarket spies that one of their customers received £10,500 this month - for slipping on a grape. But the Ambulance chasing lawyers seemed to do even better, pocketing £18.500. Only goes to show how dangerous these grapes are - much better to keep them safe by fermenting them.

Ripe for Change

The American Association of Wine Economists (no less) has analysed climate data from1992-2009 and decided that the rise in the alcoholic strength of wine is primarily man-made. Climate warming might have lead to an increase of 0.9% but the actual average increase is 1.12%. At WineDrop Towers we never doubted that the rise was man-made. Even the French are paying much more attention to ripeness of grapes and now tend to harvest as late as possible. Fuller, riper wines are more crowd pleasing and
because of the riper fruit often have more alcohol. In particular Robert Parker,
whose palate is much reputed in America, likes big and forward fruit. Such has
been his influence that the French even have an expression for being mentioned
in his publications - être 'parkerisé'! The problem is the rest of us have been
well and truly parkerisé too and French wine is not like it used to be...

Raise the bottle - then sink your ship, or is it the other way round?

We understand that a record price was paid for a 200 year old bottle of Veuve Clicquot that was found in a shipwreck in the Baltic Sea of Finland's Åland archipelago during the summer of 2010. The buyer was from Singapore and spent 30,000 euros on his purchase. Indeed it seems that such was the auction's success that the islands are said to be thinking of holding a similar auction on an annual basis. Quite how this would work is not entirely clear but would seem to involve sinking a ship first. Still, forewarned is forearmed, so anyone finding themselves cruising in the Baltic would do well to ensure the Captain gives a wide birth to the Åland islands - particularly if there is Champagne on board.

We are all flying now...

News that the Meat Trades Journal has discovered that about 17% of meat eaters think pork wings are a real cut of meat, makes us worry that either genetic modification has gone further than any of us here realised or that we really do believe that pigs may (not might) fly. And what wine to accompany Pork Wings Sir? Well if only on the grounds that one impossibilty deserves another we can only recommend the Flying Kiwi Pinot Noir..

Warm advance creates delay

As the UK bathes in the sunshine of what could perhaps be called an Indian Spring, most French vineyard areas are reporting that their vines are are at least a fortnight in advance of usual. But worries persist about a late frost which could be dangerous or even fatal to grape crops. As the vines race to flowering the vignerons are in turn racing to catch up - or as one wag put it; if the crops are early then the farmer is always late.

Wine Tunes

We understand that an Austrian winemaker, a certain Markus Bachmann (perhaps the clue is in the name?) has invented a special speaker that exposes fermenting grape juice to classical, jazz or electronic music. The sound waves, he claims, produce better-tasting wine. Aside from the fact that he is a former French horn player (although brass players are normally reputed for their beer prowess) he says the wines seem to get more fruity - as, it must be admitted, many of us do when we listen to music.

Mr Bachmann has teamed up with six other Austrian wine growers to produce so-called Sonor Wines, priced - and maybe this is the clue - north of 19 euros a bottle and including a 2010 pinot blanc "infused with Mozart's 41st Symphony". Whilst the sound waves may indeed have an effect on the fermentation, the waves created by the price might be of a different kind - especially when across the Atlantic a Mexican producer also claims to use music, but he says he cannot be sure any of it works but is completely confident that it does ..er...no harm.

Sweet or Savoury?

A wine critic, one Eric Asinov, writing in the New York Times has suggested that detailed tasting notes are a waste of time because "one critic’s ripe raspberry, white pepper and blueberry is another’s sweet-and-sour cherries and spice box". This contains a considerable element of truth and is one of the reasons why we at WineDrop towers do not indulge in too much florid prose in our own tasting notes. He continues "But the general character of a wine: now, that’s another matter. A brief depiction of the salient overall features of a wine, like its weight, texture and the broad nature of its aromas and flavours, can be far more helpful in determining whether you will like that bottle than a thousand points of detail. In fact, consumers could be helped immeasurably if the entire lexicon of wine descriptors were boiled down to two words: sweet or savoury." He goes on to say that rather than actually requiring sugar in "sweet" wines or none in "savoury" they should be applied to the tasting impression and that wines with lots of weight would count as sweet and lean and minerally wines would count as savoury. An interesting idea that has erm, legs, but perhaps "heavy" or "light" might be an easier description?