learn more about wine

.. Does that count?? LOL -The wine was absolutely feral I simply could not drink it otherwise.

Previously this goal was to get the WSET level 2 qualification, but now that I’ve taken the exam (haven’t had the result yet) I want to use it for more general comments and tasting notes.

Last night I had a call from G who had just opened the bottle of 1974 cabernet sauvignon from California which a friend had given him a while ago. Said friend knows a lot about US wine and said that the ones made before 1977 are different from the ones made after that date – before 1977 they were built to last.

Naturally I went downstairs to see what it was like. Absolutely sensational! It was up there with the best clarets I’ve ever had. In particular it had a kind of velvety richness to it, with a sweet finish which first reminded me of sultanas, then fruitcake, and then as we moved onto the next glass took on a hint of black treacle.

Although I’ve been a fan of Ridge and Napanook for ages, this took it to the next level. I’ve never had Ridge Montebello, their flagship wine, but it beat the French clarets at a well-known blind tasting and the French were very upset. Now I can understand just how good Californian wine can be.

The good news is that we’ve found a bottle of the 1973 from the same place for less than £30. I realise that’s a lot of money for a bottle of wine, but this stuff is actually worth at least £100. 1973 is my and G’s vintage but was generally rubbish in vinous terms, so I think we might have to get hold of it to drink at our summer celebration….

I tend to stick with a wine I know I like… I need to try new things and see what else is good!

and if nothing else, studying for it has made me realise what an appalling wine snob I am. The questions on France and Germany and sherry I can answer with ease. I’m also reasonable on Italy, Spain, New Zealand and California.

As regards Australia, I can just about cope with Barossa Shiraz, but that’s about my limit.

As for Chile and Argentina, I’m hopeless! I’d never heard of the Rapel Valley before taking this course, and I’ve never tasted wines made from Carmenere or Torrontes and can’t honestly say that I’ve felt any the worse for it. But they come up all the time in the questions! I begin to suspect the Wine and Spirits Educational Trust is somewhat biased!

The examiners don’t seem to be very interested in South Africa which is fine by me although in her latest column Jancis said there are some gems there, and it entertained me this afternoon to get my lovely South African super-minion to say “Vergelegen” in the correct manner which involved a lot of hacking up of phlegm (the difficult person was out of the office at the time, otherwise that would just have been too much phlegm for one office to handle).

There is also a disturbing absence of questions on Madeira, which is a specialist subject of mine. Perhaps I should write in and complain.

but fortunately I have a knowledgeable friend who sends me emails like this, which he found on an American website. It made me laugh so I thought I’d share!

Q. Karen, what’s the best wine with chocolate chip cookies?

A. This is my kind of question. Cookies are my favorite dessert and I serve them all the time – even after an elegant dinner party. Chocolate chip cookies are harder to pair well with wine than one might think. That’s because chocolate itself is a very profound flavor that’s highly complex, bitter, spicy and sweet all at the same time. Nonetheless, one wine is indeed absolutely perfect with chocolate chip cookies: malmsey Madeira. You just have to taste the rich vanilla, brown sugar, tawny, nuttiness of a great malmsey Madeira next to a chocolate chip cookie to be converted for life. Malmsey, by the way, is the sweetest style of Madeira and it is the one you should buy. The dry styles of Madeira won’t work as well. I usually serve Blandy’s 10 Year Old Malmsey Madeira, and when I bake the chocolate chip cookies I put walnuts in them too to make the match even more outrageous.

Mmmmmm….. :)

I’m a server at a restaurant, the only thing that I’m having problem with now is names of the wines..and I’m totally stucked when people asked me how does it taste like or what do I recommend..So I answered “Oh, I’m sorry..I’m only 18.” and give them a friendly wink back.

I usually stick with red but I’ve been drinking a little more white recently. I know what I like but I don’t know how to describe it or how to pick it in a store. I reaaaly want to do a wine appreciation course although it’s around $120. Once our budget is successful for the next couple of months I might build it in so we can do it together – or it may have to wait until we get back from our US tour.

...this year, is to try many different wines, note my favourites, compare them, and develop a taste for pairings.
The latest treat for dessert on Burns’ Night was a South Australian vin doux: The Bothie, 2005, from Torbreck.
It was a good wine to savour on its own. It was scented heavily with apricot and peach, rich but not unctuous. I would like this one again.

that the particular course I wanted to do, which began in February and was on Tuesday nights, seems to have disappeared from the WSET website. No idea why that happened – maybe it was fully booked or something. None of the other courses running in the near future are on evenings that suit me, and I don’t really want to take off 3 days holiday to do it, so I’ve decided to go the distance learning route and have just signed up.

This means doing it in my own time, which shouldn’t be a problem! It’s also considerably cheaper, although I will have to buy the relevant booze myself. Level 2 is pretty basic, to be honest, so I hope to sail through it fairly fast – by the end of Feb perhaps.

When I began investigating these qualifications, the one that appealed the most was level 3, but you can’t do level 3 unless you have level 2 or some wine trade experience (I assume going to lots of my friend’s wine tastings doesn’t count…) so I see getting level 2 as a means to an end, and look forward to attending some actual classes for level 3 later in the year.

...is my favourite mid-evening thing these days. WelcomebacktoShinrock bought me a demi-bouteille after a hard Saturday of extra work. It smelled of peaches and minerals, soft and floral.