De Martino, Las Cruces, 2008

Tuesday, June 5th, 2012

£17.99 is a lot to spend on any bottle. For a Chilean wine, this is like spending £20 on a burger. It better be bloody, and it better be bloody brilliant.

This De Martino is a field blend and, at 13.5%, sensibly low in alcohol for a Chilean red. Predominately Malbec with a fair bit of Carménère and other grapes chipped in from various corners of the field, it tastes of rich smooth chocolate, red apples and glacé cherries with pepper. I know what you are thinking and no, it’s a compliment.

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La Capitana Carmen̬re 2005 РBig Yellow Taxi

Saturday, October 18th, 2008

When I was a kid growing up in Cheadle Hulme, a post war suburb of Manchester, there were shops everywhere.  Within just 10 minutes walk of a fair sized shopping centre in the village, was another conurbation of shops based around the Kenilworth pub.  On one t-junction there was a chemist, a newsagent (RS McColl), a greengrocer, a post office, two bakers, two butchers (Breens’ and Pimlott’s), a toy shop (Playland), a Chinese takeaway, a Shell garage (gas station), a hardware shop, a small grocer and, rather bizarrely, a garden centre (Spreadboroughs – donkey’s years ahead of its time).

Thinking back, it’s amazing that we allowed Tesco and the other major supermarkets to put virtually all these businesses out of business.

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