Confessions of a Wino

I found Palacio de Monsalud at the Sunday Times Wine Club.

It is inexpensive (£7.42 per bottle) and I think it arrived in one of those bin end cases that always looks great value but invariably disappoints on balance.  The smell on opening was prunes.  A heavy thick set wine that reminded me of Port, despite only 13% alcohol.  Some spice in the form of French mustard may have been false interest introduced only by the smear of Dijon mustard on my pork sandwich.

At first I assumed the wine was spoiled but as it developed I think it just tastes crap as a matter of course.

I suppose, not surprisingly for a wine that smells of Port, it went better with cheese than anything else.

But I thought that Spanish wines were supposed to be great wines at great value to us Brits.  There was nothing here to inspire me to write anything interesting or informative….sorry.

I was idling through my Google Analytics stats wondering who on Earth (other planets are available) reads this website and how they stumble across it?

Clearly many use Google, and compose some search string or other that chances upon a random thing I have written.  It amused me to see that the most commonly used search string (2.1% of total visitors) to find Confessions of a Wino in the last month was “Freixenet pronunciation”.  It proved that Google was quite clever to read my text to at least some degree semantically.  Perhaps more important, though, was the marketing lesson….or maybe not.

Does it help to have a brand that 90% of people cannot pronounce?  Does that make people go to the trouble of finding out?  Or does it just inhibit them from asking for your product, if for example, like many sparkling wines, it is behind the counter?

For the record, my mate Paul, who can speak Spanish having spent 7 years there, says it is pronounced Fresher-Nett.  And if you don’t want to ask for it, cases of 6 are available from your local Costco.  Fill your trolley…

It is 15th January 2008 and I am at the end of my New Year detox.  I am not sure whether it is time to celebrate or commiserate.  Maybe I am a tad masochistic but I enjoyed it more than ever this year.

Nonetheless, this afternoon at a board meeting I had a large black coffee, and I would have eaten some chocolate biscuits had they been on offer.  For lunch I had a fat filled chicken mayonnaise sandwich.  Tonight, I felt I ought to complete a hat trick of poisons.  I felt obliged to sack my temporary tee-totalism.

I was ill over Xmas so didn’t drink much anyway.  However, on NY eve I got totally mullered on champagne and that is the last alcoholic drink that passed my lips.  So, to celebrate the end to my New Year dry period, I thought I might start again where I left off, and open some bubbly.

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Word had reached my royal ear that 1994 Riojas may be getting past their drink by date so I immediately opened this beauty, one of the few remaining in my rack from the great year.

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Although not of the Catholic faith, I feel the need to confess.  To you.  I have sinned.  I am guilty as charged.  What is my heinous crime so dark and mysterious?  I am a beginner.  No, really! At everything?  Truly, everything!

Maybe it’s an age thing.  I love my job and pretend that I know lots about enterprise software but the truth is that every year that passes I double my knowledge on that subject.  At that rate of acceleration, it makes me realise how little I actually know.  For example, if my knowledge keeps doubling every year, then in ten years time I will know 1024 times more than I know right now.  That proves that I know virtually nothing.  And so it is with wine, my other “specialist” subject.

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Taking a bus from Banús, Paul managed to work out that we needed to get off after 11 stops.  “This looks very like the centre of Marbella!” I shouted as we passed the 5th bus stop.  Paul made us stay on board and was awarded the title of “knob of the holiday” when we finally alighted in the slums, some 2.5 kms past the centre.

On reflection though, I always say if you want to experience the true culture of a place, go into the back streets where the locals live.  We found Bar Parquesol on the Avenida Navel Una first - very “local”.  The owner of the tabac/newsagent across the street was cheerily drinking his profits at the bar.  Overheard voices were unsurprisingly Spanish and I imagined the word mañana being the most common in use.  We had a couple of beers then decided to move on to the more touristy part of the port.

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More on Puerto Banús, and this was an afternoon sojourn to the Salduba Pub, right on the Port entrance.

The house wines we tried were a 2006 Rosé - BACH Vina Extrisima.  Quite pleasant if basic.  Timid flavours of strawberries and ice cream.

The next was a red wine:  BACH Crianza 2002.  Bloody awful. with strong flavours of napalm, vinegar and strawberries.

Both were house wines but the rest of the list was uninspirational.  Go to the Salduba by all means, but I’d stick to beer.

Salduba Pub, Muelle de la Ribera, 29660.  Puerto Banús (Málaga).  T: +34 952 811 092

La Bocana is a great waterfront bar just at the entrance to the harbour so you can watch all the idiots powerboating in and out, in what Jeffo calls their “penis extensions”.

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It’s taken me ages to get round to posting much about the lads’ trip at the end of June 07.  You remember I left you while we were eating lunch on the first day.  Well a man of my stature (weight that is) needs to eat at least twice a day so the evening found us at Vila do Grove, just behind the Hotel Andalusia Plaza.

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When we arrived at St Alban for Sunday lunch there were only three other tables occupied!  This despite the day being the biggest sporting day in the UK calendar - men’s final at Wimbledon, Tour de France starting at Trafalgar Square (just round the corner) that morning, British Grand Prix at Northampton (Silverstone), and me dancing at Live Earth the night before (and that is a rare occasion).  This despite the fact that St Alban had telephoned us the day before to push our booking back from 2:0pm to 2:15pm - hmmmm.

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