Confessions of a Wino

My 1986 Hand of God driven campaign to avoid everything from the land of Peron ended for two reasons.  Firstly, I finally forgave Maradona.  Lurching from national crisis to personal crisis, he cuts a sorry figure on the world football stage these days.  Secondly, Argentina produces some of my favourite wines and, at my age, there is little point in cutting ones stem off to spite ones Riedel Vinum.

This Malbec from Catena Alta is a prime example.  It is quite expensive, although nowhere near the 37M euros that Maradona owes the Italian tax authorities.  Is it worth it?

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I’ve been most impressed by nearly all the Wine Society’s own brand wines.  Then I saw this bottle by “Hand of God” which seems to be ripping off the Wine Society’s brand – I had to investigate.

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Anyone got an update on Diego Maradona?  Regular readers know that I hate the Argies with a passion normally reserved for mindless football thugs.  However, when it comes to wine I try to make allowances, and it just so happens that my thuggery dissipates faster than the bubbles in a bottle of cava, once an open bottle of Argentinean wine is placed on the table.

I love the Faldeos Nevados Malbec, so I really should have tried the Bonarda from the same producer earlier than this.  Bonarda, is not, although it sounds so, the name of an Italian porn star, but an indigenous grape of the cheating football nation.  Albeit not the cheating football nation that brought you the Mano de Dios, it originated in Italy!  Enough of the football insults, what was the wine like?

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Jeff and I were in London for the Challenge Cup Final at Wembley.  Those of you not from Perpignan, Australia or the north of England will not understand Rugby League so let’s move on.  In any case RL was not the only sporting occasion of interest that day.

August Bank Holiday weekend in the UK and Chelsea FC (lucky home win against Portsmouth – David “Calamity” James to thank) knocks the glorious Man City (unlucky defeat away at the Arse) off the top spot of the English Premier League.  So we thought we better nip down to Chelsea and see what all the fuss was about.

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Well the English football season is back and what better way to celebrate Man City’s stunning victory over West Ham, than with an English wine review? 

This wine was made from a grape variety about as well known as most of the Man City first team.  For those not in England, Sven-Göran Eriksson has been on a buying spree across the globe bringing in players from Bulgaria, Brazil, Italy, Spain, Switzerland, and Bosnia & Herzegovina.  Names like Elano, Bianchi, Geovanni, Garrido, Fernandes, and Schonburger.  Oh no, hang on, that last one was the name of the grape used to make this Three Choirs Stone Brook 2005.

 

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At my local sandwich shop I have been lunching on fruit, sandwiches, and crisps (hey if you’re American I mean chips, ok?).  I am not particularly loyal to any brand of crisps so I was tempted by an offer from Seabrooks which suggested that by collecting 8 packets I could send off to claim a pint sized mug.

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Somewhere roughly east of the Eden Project in Cornwall you may stumble across Newquay and Watergate Bay.  Here you will find another highly commendable charity establishment.  Fifteen Cornwall is Jamie Oliver’s project to give young (and often disadvantaged) young people the opportunity to make something of their lives, by learning how to cook very very expensive food.

As it was the first anniversary of the opening of Fifteen Cornwall and this marked the graduation of the first batch of trainees we thought it would be rude to turn down the opportunity to try the highly popular place.  OK then it wasn’t exactly a personal invite from Jamie but it was nice to be there.

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I am always interested in fairness.  So I buy wine from a variety of sources.  OK I admit I am biased towards the Wine Society and the Sunday Times Wine Club but I also like Majestic and I have been formulating a growing respect for the various supermarkets.

You may remember (or you may have forgotten) my post on Torrontés where I lauded the second grape of Argentina (in my opinion, and second to Malbec), and you may remember my fondness (not) for the self styled Hand of God, Diego Maradona himself.

But this time I am afraid Argentina loses in the quarter final.  Asda’s wine buyers have impressed me greatly at times but the Argentinian Torrontés (Asda forgot the accent on the e) Famantina Valley 2005 was a nice drinkable wine but really not memorable and no distinct flavours at all.  I can tell you that Torrontés normally has the most distinct flavour of apricots -ahhh memories.

Memories?  Actually I prefer mammaries……but’s that’s a story that would not meet the strict decency requirements of a serious wine blog.

In the interests of fairness in my search for the best cheap Malbec I unearthed this little number at Tesco.

Now you might presume that Anubis comes from Egypt but in fact it is from Middle Earth (aka Argentina).  I can prove this is the case because I discovered that Susana Balbo (aka Balbo Baggins) had a hand in making this wine.

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I admire Malbec because it is classy, very tasty and compares well to many old world wines.  But there is another Argentinean grape that makes wine so far from the norm it makes me shiver.  It’s even better than a cup of tea (or did Boy George already do that line?)

The grape is Torrontés and as far as I know it may have originated from Spain.  Now Spain as we know are football’s great under achievers, whereas Argentina cheat, for example the “Hand of God” incident in the 1986 World Cup.  So I am going to assume that the grape came from Spain and that the Argies stole it.

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