Confessions of a Wino

I used to buy a case or three of New Zealand Sauvignon Blanc a year and always Jane Hunter featured in the centre. But zingy cat piss can only bring on so much excitement, and the last couple of years have seen almost zero feline urolagnia staining the Wino doorstep.

However, the grand old grape of Riesling, revered by so many winos, is also widely grown in Middle Earth. Mix an awesome winemaker with awesome materials and the mouth waters. The Ruby Murray came by moped from The Sharma in Heckmondwike. Jane Hunter is widely available. My bottle was delivered by the Wine Society for £11.95.

The wine is incredibly appley. Shut your eyes and you could be eating a crisp Royal Gala. A hint of flat champagne when first opened (too cold, straight from the fridge), it evolved as the apples warmed and added nutmeg, elderflower, and cream. It is an apple strudel in a glass. Definitely worth a try if you used to like Kiwi SB and you think Blue Nun was under-rated.

It’s been a while since I slavered over a Dog Point and its Cats’ Piss flavours.  The main reason is that the Wine Society (who I slagged off royally in the same post)  hasn’t stocked it for a while and I have been way too lazy to look elsewhere.

One of the problems of writing about feline urolagnia is where to place the apostrophe.  I mean how many cats do you want to fill your pissoir?  Or is it more pure, and less disgusting, to think of a single cat’s pee as the sole occupant of your bottle?

Actually this is quite tart.  In addition to cats, there is evidence of gooseberry and grapefruit and just a little too much tongue tingling, lip squelching, palate stripping acidity.  Whilst I have since made up with the Society, personally I am a bit disappointed with the wine.  There are much better Kiwi SB’s around at a lower price than the £12.95 that my bank manager credited to the Wine Society.

I am deeply unfashionable by nature, and may be the last wino on the planet who still finds Cloudy Bay a good slurp and even (gasp), value for money!

Over the last few years, I’ve been experimenting with drinking it at different stages of youth.  I have just opened a 2007 and discovered a wrinkly old fella.  Tastes flat and tired,- no zing or spring in its step.  Notes of cardboard, straw and sour lemon.

Conversely I find baby Cloudy Bay, on release, a bit uninspiring.  Almost too fresh and grassy.

So I have concluded that my favourite time to drink this Kiwi standard is about 12-18 months after release where I find the classic cats’ piss, gooseberries and lots of fresh zingy grapefruit.

Has anyone tried this with other Kiwi Sauvignon Blancs?

Good evening credit crunchers, how are your bank shares doing?  Yes I know, mine too.  With the sole exception of HSBC.  With a much higher than average capital ratio, HSBC shares have risen 4% this year, whilst other banks (e.g RBS, HBOS) have tanked to one fifth of their recent value, and my old mate, Mr Bradford is owned by the British Government whilst erstwhile Mr Bingley has emigrated to Santander in Spain.  Luckily I sold B & B at about £2 while the credit crunch was a mere cream cracker.  They traded at 20 pence on the day they were nationalised.  I would have sold all my shares, but which bank could you trust your cash with?

It is not just banks, all capital expenditure has been frozen at a corporate and personal level.  How many people do you know buying a new car at the moment?  A new phone?  A new TV?  Heating oil?  Food?  Chateau Latour?  Nope.  The world is frozen with fear and we are riding an apocalyptic stallion of self fulfilling prophecy into a deep depression.

And if you want to dig yourself out of a depression, you will need cheap alcohol as your spade.  You could do worse than trying to cheer yourself up with this New Zealand Sauvignon Blanc, at £8.95 from the Wine Society, a mere fraction of the price of the Cloudy Bay you used to drink in better times.

Auntsfield Long Cow 2007 is pale, grassy and full of cats’ piss.  (For the keen grammatinarianisticians amongst you, the pungency is such that I think there was more than one cat).  The acidity, though, is good and there is plenty of white fruit.

For the few remaining bulls amongst you, if your bank shares are still heading south, (and you can no longer sell them short), why not take a long position on this cow?

……..miaow, miaow, miaow, miaow, miaow!

Craggy Range Te Muna Road Sauvignon Blanc 2007 is the very metaphor for cats’ piss on a gooseberry bush.  Except these Martinborough cats mistook a pineapple tree for the green and prickly one.

Available from the Wine Society at £12.50.  It’s a good slurp but I think there are better value SBs available from New Zealand, and indeed, the Wine Society.  Check out John Hancock’s Trinity Hill at only £8.50, for example.

The title may sound like a cryptic crossword clue, but it simply refers to the last time I tried Dog Point Sauvignon Blanc, the 2006 vintage, which was a superb example of this varietal’s clichéed ability to smell of cat pee.  I was pleased to receive a bottle of the 2007 recently as part of a mixed case so I wondered if I should hide the neighbour’s cat (on heat) before I opened it.

I know some of you beat up on Kiwi SBs and find them the height of 1990’s fashion – so last decade man – yawn, yawn, yawn.  If you are one of those, or you are not into feline urolagnia, switch off now.

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OK so I’ve slagged off New Zealand Sauvignon Blancs.  Well actually, far from having slagged them off, I’ve merely suggested that French Sauvignons, and in particular, those from the Loire Valley should be given a 2nd chance.  But I’ve always expressed my admiration for NZ Sauvignons, and Cloudy Bay is my favourite so far.

So when I was offered the chance to buy a mixed case of Kiwi SBs from 2006, including a bottle of Cloudy Bay for only £109, I jumped at the chance to make a few comparisons.  An opportunity to retest my theory that the French are moving ahead again in quality and VFM.

The first bottle I tried was Dog Point 2006.  But this was no dog!

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I saw the musical recently at Leeds Grand Theatre – it was so so.  This post is nothing to do with musicals though.

Regular readers will know that I am a new member of the Wine Society in the UK and have been experimenting with various wines, mostly the Society’s own brands.

At £7.50 the Society’s New Zealand Sauvignon Blanc 2006 is less than half the price of Cloudy Bay but way more than half the quality.

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