Wine matching: Twice baked Bleu d’Auvergne soufflé
The recipe
Unlike its once baked cousin, the best thing about this bistro classic is that, thankfully, you don’t need to worry about the soufflé sinking. This makes the light, cloud-like dish a breeze for making at home as the first-cooking can be done a day ahead and then finished off just before serving as they bounce right back up on the second cooking.
The word soufflé comes from the French souffler and means ‘puffed up’. Although this one is left to cool it is made in exactly the same way as if served straight from the oven. It begins with a ‘roux’ sauce where butter and flour, and then milk are cooked together until thickened. Then the egg yolks are stirred in, and finally whisked egg whites are added to lighten the mixture. From here you can fold in other flavourings, which can be sweet or savoury, and in this case it is blue cheese.
You can use any type of cheese here, and this varies seasonally as well as regionally in France. I have plumped for a combination of blue cheese and grated Parmesan as I find this gives the finished soufflé a lovely rich but not overtly blue cheese flavour. I also prefer to use a less robust blue cheese sometimes such as St Agur; however if you are a true blue cheese aficionado then by all mean substitute Roquefort.
Often a twice-baked soufflé is served covered with cream and heaps of extra cheese especially in the winter months when we hanker for comfort food. I prefer it as it is here; a lighter dish served with a salad of rocket leaves, toasted walnuts and a slightly sweetened mustard and cider vinegar dressing. This balances the richness of the soufflé perfectly. It is ideal as a starter or it could just as easily be served as a light lunch with some crusty bread.
A few tips when cooking this and other soufflés... Make sure you grease the insides of the ramekins well (and here dust evenly with Parmesan). Once the mixture is in the ramekin dishes run a knife around the edges of the soufflé before it goes into the oven as this will ensure it rises evenly. Don’t be tempted to open the oven before the designated time to ensure a lighter result.
Serves 6
60 g butter, plus extra for greasing
75 g plain flour
1/2 teaspoon Dijon mustard
500 ml milk
4 large eggs, separated
125 g bleu d’Auvergne, crumbled
60 g freshly grated Parmesan cheese
50 g rocket leaves
50 g walnuts, toasted and roughly chopped
dressing
3 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
2 teaspoons cider vinegar
1 teaspoon Dijon mustard
1 teaspoon sugar
salt and pepper
Preheat the oven to 180c. Lightly grease 6 x 200 ml ramekin dishes and dust the insides of the dishes with 2 tablespoons of the grated Parmesan. Transfer dishes to a deep baking tin.
Melt the butter in a small saucepan, add the flour, mustard and salt and pepper and stir well until the mixture comes together – this will almost be immediate and beat over a low heat for 1 minute. Gradually pour in the milk, whisking constantly until the mixture comes to the boil. Simmer very gently for 2 minutes stirring until the sauce is thickened. Cool for 5 minutes and beat in the egg yolks, one at a time. Stir in the blue cheese and half the Parmesan and transfer to a large bowl.
Whisk the egg whites in a clean bowl until soft peaks form. Fold a spoonful into the cheese mixture to loosen slightly and then fold in the remaining whites until evenly combined. Spoon into the prepared dishes and run a knife around the edges. Pour boiling water into the tin to come half way up the sides of the dishes and bake for 20 minutes until risen and browned. Remove soufflés from the dish and leave to cool.
Run a small palette knife around the edges of the soufflés and invert into a greased baking dish. Scatter over the remaining Parmesan and bake for 15 minutes until golden. Meanwhile whisk the dressing ingredients together. Arrange the soufflés, salad leaves and nuts on serving plates and drizzle over the dressing, serve at once.
The wines
Marquis De Pennautier Vin de Pays d’Oc Viognier 2014 (£10.49, Thirty Fifty)
If there’s one type of food that can produce the most divine – and disastrous – wine matches, it’s cheese. Different varieties of cheese call for specific styles of wine, and when it comes to blue cheese, sweet wines often work well. An apricot-flavoured white like Sauternes would normally be a good option, but it would be too sweet and luscious if the cheese is prepared in a soufflé.
The rich Viognier grape also offers stone fruit aromas but is usually dry despite its rounded texture, making it a more balanced match. The impressive Château de Pennautier in Cabardès in the Languedoc has been in the de Lorgeril family since 1620, and this Viognier is a honeysuckle-scented, medium-bodied example.
Jean-Luc Colombo Côtes-du-Rhône Blanc ‘La Redonne’ 2013 (£12.99, Waitrose)
The Viognier grape originally comes from the Rhône Valley, but is now planted all over the world. Unlike Chardonnay and Sauvignon Blanc which have found worldwide success, Viognier rarely performs as well as it does on home turf. It can be heavy and overly alcoholic when grown in the wrong places.
Rhône stalwart Jean-Luc Colombo makes this delicious example that retains a sense of freshness alongside its classically full, ripe character. It’s blended with one third Roussanne, another local Rhône grape that gives the wine a touch of pear and honey alongside the ripe apricot fruit that would work well with this dish.
Domaine François Villard ‘Les Contours de Deponcins’ 2012 (£14.99, Berry Bros. & Rudd)
The village of Condrieu is the original home of Viognier; a jumble of steep, corrugated granite terraces at the northern tip of the Rhône wine region. The terrain makes for backbreaking work, and plantings of the variety nearly died out completely in the 1950s. Thanks to a dedicated group of growers it was brought back from the brink and is now flourishing. Condrieu is one of the world’s greatest, most distinctive white wines. Unfortunately for us it has prices to match.
François Villard is one of the masters. This particular wine, however, is made from vines that lie outside of the official Condrieu demarcated area, so is similar in style but not quite so pricey. It’s rich and concentrated, with fresh, juicy peach and ripe apricot fruits with a touch of almond. It would make a luxurious match for the soufflé.
Recipe based on a version by Louise Pickford. First published in Living France magazine.
A month steeped in Rhône
November is my favourite month. It’s when I research and write my annual Rhône Special Report. I spend two weeks travelling around the region, visiting countless producers and tasting around 1,000 wines to build up an impression of the latest vintage – 2014 this time around. Then it takes a further couple of weeks to produce the final 55-page report. It might sound weighty, but it’s professionally designed (i.e. not by me!) and split into digestible lists, top tens, and contains dozens of colour photos of the region and its winemakers.
When people ask me what my favourite wine region is of any country, it takes no reflection on my part - the answer is immediate. I've been visiting the Rhône for 12 years, and writing about it professionally for Decanter and timatkin.com (who kindly publishes the report) for the past three. If I'm in the mood for an upright, structured red I instinctively look to the Northern Rhône; for generous, rich reds the Southern Rhône is hard to beat; not to mention the delicious, food-friendly whites from both ends. Value is important to me, and the Rhône provides plenty of characterful, terroir-driven wines for under £20. And unlike many other classic regions, interesting wines from serious producers in the most exclusive appellations are still relatively affordable. Hopefully this report will lead other wine lovers to the best of all of these.
Producing the report is a considerable undertaking but no-one pays me to do it – I want to be able to offer reliably independent advice. So this is one piece of writing I have to charge for (but if you click through you can follow a link to a free copy of my 2013 report).
Download my 2014 Rhône Special Report here.
International Wine & Spirit Competition Blogger of the Year - I won!
Is four years a long time in blogging? I suppose it is. After all, every blogger gets it from time to time - you're trying to get to sleep one night and the question bubbles up from the darkness... "Hang on a minute - am I just totally wasting my time keeping this blog going?" It's awards like this, and positive comments from readers, that make me keep at it. I'm really pleased that people are still enjoying it and that more and more winelovers are finding their way to the site. Here's to the next four!
A new style of wine list
The UK restaurant scene has never been more rich and diverse, not just regarding the types of food on offer, but also with the choice of wines. This is partly thanks to the diligence of the restaurants themselves of course, but there is another group that deserves our recognition: the small independent wine importers that ship the wines to our shores in the first place. These intrepid wine lovers scour the globe to source the very best bottles for our cafes, hotels and restaurants to draw from. Since they only sell business-to-business however (or if they do sell direct to consumer they often don’t shout about it), they usually go unthanked and unnoticed by the wine drinking public. I'm hoping that our new wine list at The Table will give them some well deserved time in the limelight.
The Table is an award-winning independent restaurant near London Bridge run by the inspiring Shaun Alpine-Crabtree for nearly a decade. Since day one he has loudly championed its suppliers, whether it be sources of sustainable fish or working with homeless charity St Mungo’s which provides daily boxes of herbs and vegetables. I've worked with Shaun on-and-off for five years, and when he asked me to put together a new wine list to go with his new menu, it seemed natural that we should acknowledge our wine suppliers with the same enthusiasm.
So every six months we’ll be working with a different independent wine shipper, dedicating the whole wine list to their discoveries in order to showcase what makes them special. This unique approach will put the spotlight on these unsung heroes of the UK wine scene and allow us to keep the list fresh and constantly evolving in tandem with the menu. The first supplier we’re working with is Swig, widely considered by those in the know as one of the best in the business (particularly when it comes to their range of modern South African wines which is second to none). I’ll let them introduce themselves:
“We are a small tribe. Population: six.
We believe we have the three attributes required of any successful wine merchant: integrity, experience and a keen gag reflex!
We feed on a rich diet of positive feedback and reflected glory, but ours is a fragile ecosystem and we will perish if people don't bang the drum on our behalf. Word of mouth is our only form of advertising so we hope that, once you have tried our wines, you will feel inspired to tell a friend.”
After tasting through their range, I've selected a range of different styles, regions and grape varieties to create a balanced but lean wine list of six reds, six whites, three sparklings and a rosé – with most available by the glass. You can see it here, just click on the Drinks List button: The Table Menus. The new menu and list is now live, so next time you’re in the area, be sure to pop in for a bite to eat. And a glass of wine, obviously.
Image used by kind permission of Saffron Powell Brown of We Love Food It's All We Eat.
Do you want wine with that?
I still remember the first time I was offered a glass of wine at the hairdresser’s. I thought this was a great idea until, on picking it up for a second sip, I spotted a few hairs of various colours that had floated into my glass on hairdryer crosswinds. Wine may not be suited to every environment, but it’s increasingly common to find it sharing a space with other types of product or activity: in bookshops, in coffee shops, at music festivals and even at the driving range. And not just average branded stuff; wines to get excited about. The internet has jolted wine out of its traditional habitat of the wine bar and off-license, and as the high street reinvents itself in the face of this challenge, wellsprings of wine are popping up in a variety of unusual places.
The web has made wine shops work harder to prove their worth. With pressure from online retailers with huge ranges, low prices and next-day delivery, it’s no longer enough for a high street retailer to simply line a room with shelves of wines and pray that people will visit. The new generation of modern wine shops offer what the internet can’t – a more complete wine experience, with wines to taste, to drink by the glass or bottle, with or without food. And as wine shops become more akin to wine bars, the converse is also true; more and more wine bars and restaurants now sell wine to take away.
The traditional division between bar and restaurant (on-trade) and shop (off-trade) is dissolving. It has been replaced by a new dichotomy: online vs. offline. On the one hand there are retailers whose business models depend on the internet such as Naked Wines and Fine+Rare; on the other, there are generalist offline wine spaces exemplified by Vagabond in London and Loki in Birmingham. But this is just the beginning; as the division between on-trade and off-trade disappears, we are also beginning to see different types of hybrid space, combining various retail and entertainment propositions.
Take independent wine merchant Borough Wines. They have six shops dotted around London, most of which also sell wines by the glass. Their seventh shop, opening this summer, will be in the seaside town of Hastings, 50 miles southeast of the capital, in the bohemian America Ground quarter. Co-owner and marketing director Corinna Pyke, who grew up in Hastings, says that “we’re very community focussed… it’s a really exciting area that needed a slightly different offer”. As well as a wine shop and bar it will also be a bookshop. She hopes that combining themes in this way will lead to a relaxed environment where people will want to linger and browse, and is especially attractive to sole customers as “people can feel intimidated going to a bar on their own”. The new venture will be managed by wholesale director Jess Scarratt and her partner, author Michael Smith.
Brewer and wine merchant Adnams have ten Cellar & Kitchen stores across Suffolk, Norfolk, Essex and Lincolnshire, and are soon to open their eleventh in Bury-St-Edmonds. Their shops sell beer, wine, kitchenware and some specialist foods. Sourcing wines has shown senior wine buyer Alastair Marshall that “there is tremendous crossover everywhere”; the neighbour of one of his Côtes-du-Rhône suppliers is a grower of rose garlic, so they ship that over too. They even do a ‘garlic nouveau’ offer. “People are more interested by diversity” he says, “and it’s all part of the table, part of living, if you like.” It’s certainly rare to meet a wine lover that’s not also into food.
Wine and sport may not be obvious bedfellows but there is crossover here too. Greenwich Peninsula Golf Course hopes to attract wine-loving golfers with 600 wines to choose from, to be enjoyed at the driving range, in their fine dining restaurant or at retail prices to take away. If festivals are more your idea of fun, then try Wilderness in Oxfordshire. They take food and drink as seriously as music, with ‘long table banquets’ prepared by chefs such as Angela Hartnett and Raymond Blanc with wine supplied by Berry Brothers & Rudd and Sager & Wilde. If you can’t make it to either of these, don’t worry – Starbucks are soon to start serving wine from 4pm in certain branches.
Some of these businesses started life within the wine trade, some from outside of it, and they all have their own reasons for diversifying. Some are hoping to attract new customers; others simply want to enhance customer experience; several want to extend customer visits, or get extra use out of a site during quiet periods. Diversification on the high street isn’t specific to wine of course. Urban Outfitters stores, for example, major on clothes, but also sell music, gifts and homeware. But once you’ve got past licensing issues, there are clear benefits to including wine in your overall offering; it has mass appeal, puts customers in a relaxed mood and encourages them to stay and engage with other elements of the business while they finish their glass.
Whatever their reasons, that wine is seeping into new areas of the high street is good news for wine lovers – provided the quality is high (Starbucks doubters can see their list here – with producers like Vavasour from New Zealand and Joseph Mellot in Sancerre, it’s better than you might expect). Not only does it give us more opportunities to enjoy wine, but it enriches our shopping or drinking experience by providing related interests, whether it be books, music or kitchenware, for us to enjoy while we’re at it. It’s an offline equivalent of second-screening that suits the diminished attention span of the internet-weaned wine lover.
As high street sites seek to maximise takings to cope with rising rents and rates, I suspect we’ll see more of these collage sites that sit somewhere between the specialist and the generalist, that package up two or three subjects that provide an enjoyable experience aimed at a broad but defined segment of locals. Alistair Marshall agrees “I think we’ll see more interesting diversification popping up over the next couple of years.” But trust me – let’s draw the line at the hairdresser’s.
First published on timatkin.com.
A Rhône diary - week 1
Sunday 25th October
November is a lovely time to visit the Rhône. It’s still sunny but the air has been drained of heat. After some typically eventful French driving fun from Marseille Airport, I arrived in Châteauneuf-du-Pape in search of dinner. It’s a small town, and quiet this time of year. There was only one restaurant open, so I installed myself and decided on the duck breast, which I ordered ‘a bit pink’. I tucked into my practically raw duck breast with a glass of red, happy to be back in the heart of Grenache country. I’m here to research my annual vintage report for timatkin.com, the distillation of dozens of visits and over 1,000 wines. It’s going to be a busy couple of weeks.
Monday 26th October
Got up early and paid a quick visit to Le Château - what remains of a former pope’s party palace at the top of the town. There’s not much left – two huge stone walls propping each other up with crows nesting at the top. The countryside below was a hazy blue and church bells clanged in the distance. I made my way down to the Fédération des Syndicats des Producteurs and spent the morning working through a host of red Châteauneufs. Later on I paid a visit to Château de Beaucastel to taste through the component varieties of their reds which have yet to be blended. Their finished whites are phenomenal this year. Next stop Château Rayas – this quiet wooded glade is a genuinely unique spot and feels like nowhere else in Châteauneuf. The Grenache here has a piercing intensity of flavour even though it’s remarkably pale in colour. Dinner with Véronique Maret from Domaine de la Charbonnière (some of the best value wines in Châteauneuf) and Daniel Coulon from Domaine de Beaurenard (an exceptional biodynamic domaine) to get their take on the vintage.
Tuesday 27th October
A steady day’s tasting today. I polished off the remaining reds then had lunch with Michel Blanc who runs the Fédération. He’s a good-humoured guy, younger than you might expect, with endless projects on the go – including a wine bar in the middle of the town that’s due to open in 2017 and a big tasting at next year’s London Wine Fair. I started working through some whites today, which was a pleasure – 2014 is a very good year for white Châteauneuf. It deserves to be appreciated more widely – some, such as Chante Cigale’s 2014 white is wonderfully fresh with no heaviness and can be drunk happily with or without food. And they can age: Daniel from Beaurenard opened a bottle of his white 1984 (a pretty poor vintage all told) and it still had lots to give. At the end of the day I met with Didier Négron who makes the wines at Roger Sabon. A really sound guy, very down-to-earth, and makes some of the best wines Châteauneuf has to offer – and you can pick them up their Cuvée Prestige for less than £40 a bottle. There’s still a lot of value to be had in Châteauneuf.
Wednesday 28th October
Stéphane Vedeau from La Ferme du Mont dropped in while I was tasting the remaining whites. He brought a cheeky sample of his Clos Bellane Côtes-du-Rhône-Villages Valréas ‘Les Échalas’ 2012 – a dry, botrytis affected, 100% Roussanne reminiscent of rose petals, pear, honey and citrus. He only makes 6,000 bottles, but get some if you can, it’s unique and fascinating. In the afternoon I paid a visit to Vincent Avril at Clos des Papes to research an article for Decanter. He’s great company and a generous host; he opened countless bottles including a 1990 Clos des Papes rouge that I’ll never forget.
To Avignon that evening to meet up with Michèle Aubéry from Domaine Gramenon who makes biodynamic wines from the most northerly vines in the Southern Rhône. She bought the estate in 1978 with her husband Philippe Laurent which contained some very old vine Grenache where they set out to make something a bit different. Marcel Lapierre of Beaujolais was a friend and influence, and they were one of the first exponents of natural wine in the region. Philippe died unexpectedly in 1999, so Michèle was left to bring up her three children and run the estate with no formal wine training. Her son Maxime-François trained in winemaking, and in 2006 returned to the domaine. The wines have an incredible freshness and purity, even in a tricky vintage like 2014.
Thursday 29th October
With all the Châteauneufs put to bed, today I started tasting all the other wines of the Southern Rhône at the Maison des Vins in Avignon. I started the day sending some urgent emails on a French keyboard (the very definition of frustration) then dived into the reds. A mixed bag, but some very good wines. The afternoon and evening were dedicated to Vacqueyras. A visit to Serge Férigoule at Le Sang des Cailloux, owner of one of the best estates (and most effervescent moustaches) in the Southern Rhône, whose wines were beautifully fresh and as drinkable as ever. I spent the evening with Eric Bouletin from Roucas Toumba. There has been a Bouletin in Vacqueyras since at least 1518. He’s a talented and thoughtful vigneron who pays great attention to his 15 hectares of organically farmed vineyard. Like his hand-drawn labels, his wines are a neat, accurate and accomplished portrayal of Vacqueyras.
Friday 30th October
After finishing the remaining Southern Rhône wines I paid a visit to Frédéric Alary, 10th generation winemaker at Oratoire Saint Martin (above), one of the best estates in Cairanne. His top white, Haut Coustias, is particularly good in 2014. Comparing 2014 to 2004, he opened one of his reds from this vintage; fully evolved and remarkably complex, full of leather, forest floor and hung game. With wines of this quality, no wonder Cairanne is soon to be promoted from Côtes-du-Rhône-Villages status and given its own appellation. That evening I met up with Olivier Klein of Domaine la Réméjeanne, an organic estate on the west bank of the Rhône near Lirac. They had a tough vintage, losing 40% of their crop to hail, so only made their more basic cuvées in 2014. This estate always punches well above its simple Côtes-du-Rhône appellation and are worth seeking out.
Saturday 31st October
After averaging 100 wines a day, I need some down time. Being an incorrigible wine geek, I went here:
And shopped at Le Vin Devant Soi, a small independent wine shop with the best range of Rhône and Provencal wines I’ve ever seen, loads on Enomatic and really friendly and knowledgeable owners. Avignon is one of my favourite cities, and is the perfect base for visiting the Southern Rhône. It’s a short drive to Châteauneuf, and most of the other main winemaking hotspots are an hour’s drive away tops.
Sunday 1st November
Exercise. Salad. No wine (well just a glass). And preparing for the coming week: Gigondas on Monday, then up to the Northern Rhône for the rest of the week. Plenty of tasting, and visits with Combier, Chave, Sorrel, Faurie, Delas, Jaboulet, Clape, Guigal, Jamet, Emmanuel Darnaud, Francois et Fils…
For full notes on the wines and everything you need to know about the vintage, my full report will be available via timatkin.com late November/early December. For a free copy of the 2012 report, click here.
Romania: getting back on its horse
Standing at the baggage carousel in Timişoara Airport in western Romania, I was approached by a friendly fellow traveller. “You here for the IW Conference too?” he said. “Erm… International Wine?” I speculated, surprised that I hadn’t heard of it. “No, International Welding” he replied. Fortunately I wasn’t; I was there to explore some of Romania’s principal wine regions and take the pulse of its wine culture. With some ambitious producers, appealing local varieties and centuries of expertise, despite its debilitating recent history the prognosis is good.
In Bordeaux Airport you’re greeted by a miniature living vineyard; in Timişoara Airport there are large posters advertising hot dip galvanising. This is a European country where infrastructure is still an immediate concern. In 2009, the presenters of Top Gear visited Romania to ride across the country’s motorways, only to run out of road by 11am on the first day. Things have improved since then, but the total amount of highway still only amounts to 683km (in a country the same size as the UK, albeit with one third of the population). The locals certainly make the most of them however; driving here is just as exciting as a ride at Alton Towers and you’re only marginally more likely to lose a leg. There is a palpable feel that Romania is making up for lost time.
Winemaking in Romania dates back perhaps as far as 6,000 years, but much of the twentieth century was a write-off; the first half wracked by two world wars, the second half lost to communism. Vineyards were nationalised under the communists, changing the course of its wine culture from one of quality to one of quantity. They came to power in 1947 and were only ousted in 1989. Romania’s wine culture was wounded, but it is recovering. Vineyards are being returned to their original owners, brand new wineries are springing up thanks to EU funding and foreign investors are getting wise to Romania’s potential.
The revolution of 1989 started in Timişoara as it happens; the main concourse these days feels prosperous and cosmopolitan, but you can still see the bullet holes in the buildings. It’s the principal city of the Banat region on the border with Hungary, and from here we drove across flat, grassy plains to the town of Recaş to visit ex-state winery Cramele Recaş. It was bought by Bristolian Philip Cox in 1998, and he funded this trip for me and four fellow wine writers. “I didn’t want to buy the whole thing, we just wanted 50 hectares” he says. He ended up buying 600 hectares of vineyards and a winery and has since built quite an empire. He now owns 935 hectares and a national network of 150 franchised shops selling his wine. He produced 10 million bottles in 2014 and is aiming for 12 million this year. “I like it in Romania, you can get a lot done” he says, with considerable West Country sang froid.
He’s been exporting for 10 years now but admits due to the unenviable perception of Romanian wines in the UK “most of our products are designed to look international and designed to fit a niche… people aren’t buying them because they’re Romanian, they’re buying them for quality, price and packaging.” Like many Romanian wineries, Cramele Recaş concentrates on commercial international varieties for their bread and butter, but they have finally turned the corner with indigenous Romanian grapes and secured some big UK listings. For wine lovers this is good news: some of these varieties have serious potential.
If the indigenous grapes of Romania have anything in common, it’s a slightly aromatic, perfumed character. This can be either gentle or pronounced among the white grapes, many of which are vinified either dry or with a degree of residual sweetness. The reds too have a slightly perfumed aroma in the same way the Syrah or Gamay sometimes does in cooler climates. If you’re looking for some interesting Romanian delicacies to pair them with, you could try tripe soup, pig brains or bear testicles (I only got to try one of these). Here is a basic guide to what to expect from the indigenous grapes.
Whites
Feteascǎ Albǎ – peachy, aromatic, floral.
Feteascǎ Regalǎ – aromatic, floral and spicy (pink peppercorn), reminiscent of Gewurztraminer. Slightly tannic. Crossing of Feteascǎ Albǎ and another local grape called Grasă.
Tămâioasă Românească – Muscat family, floral (rose) and grapey.
Crâmpoşie – Fresh green apple character and steely acidity.
Reds
Feteascǎ Neagrǎ – fairly structured reds; plums, red berries, liquorice, spice and distinctive floral aromatics.
Negru de Drăgaşăni – less common; dense but fresh blueberry, blackberry and violet flavours, somewhere between Gamay, Syrah and cooler climate Malbec.
Another newcomer to Romania who is convinced of the qualities of the local grape varieties is Mark Haisma. He previously made wines at Yarra Yerring in Australia, before setting up as a negociant winemaker in Burgundy and the Rhône. His is involved with new winery Dagon Clan in the Dealu Mare (‘Big Hill’) region, further south near the capital Bucharest. “Our aim,” he says, “is to reflect the huge potential of the land out there by using local and international varieties to make wines that can stand on the international stage… we believe Romania should not just be viewed as a backwater where mass production of cheap average quality wine is produced. It should be seen as a place with a massive winemaking history that can be proud of its winemaking and its land.” On the strength of his other winemaking projects I can’t wait to try them.
I visited two wineries in Drăgaşăni to the west of Dealu Mare, Prince Ştirbey and Avincis, both of which have been returned to their rightful owners post-Communism. Prince Ştirbey had been in owner Baroness Ileana Kripp’s family for around 250 years when it was appropriated by the communist state in 1949. They were returned to her and her husband Jakob in 1999, so they travelled back to Romania to rebuild the estate. She left Romania as a child; though she loves the region, going back to the country where the state poisoned her grandfather and stole the family’s land was “like psychoanalysis” she says. “Our great luck,” says Jakob, “is that the vineyards were still in good condition.” Both they and Avincis have rebuilt, invested heavily and are now making impressive wines from both indigenous and international grapes.
Jakob mentioned that 60% of bottled wine in Romania comes from just three producers, but the shape of the industry is changing. Restitution of vineyards is resulting in a lot of smaller estates coming online that are forced to focus on quality rather than quantity to survive. To these are added a rapidly growing number of entirely new enterprises – some estimates run to 120 new wineries last year alone. I was told by one winery owner that although Romania doesn’t manage to spend its entire EU funding for other industries, the wine industry easily works through its yearly budget of €42m. Exports are on the increase, and in the UK at least the wines are increasingly popular; large independent merchant Tanners confirms that if sales continue at the current rate it will sell more Romanian wine by volume next year from its standard range than Bordeaux.
Romania remains a reliable source of well made, good value wines made from international varieties (Pinot Noir is a notable example), but we are witnessing a rebirth of its traditional wine culture. On the strength of what I encountered, it still has some way to go, particularly when it comes to consensus on which varieties work best on specific soils. But Romania isn’t a country learning the ropes for the first time; it’s a former athlete returning to health after injury. After 65 years on the bench, there can’t be many even in Romania that remember her on peak form. But there are a growing number of dynamic individuals and estates determined to get her back there.
Eight Romanian wines worth tracking down
Whites
Prince Ştirbey Feteascǎ Regalǎ 2013 (Drăgaşăni, Romania; 12.5%)
Oddbins, £12.50, good value
Bright, fresh, floral; jasmine and pink peppercorn. Good concentration of flavour, nice bright acidity and some tiny textural tannins. And good length. Touch of honey and lychee. Somewhere between Sauvignon Blanc and Gewurztraminer in style. Very good. 90 points.
Prince Ştirbey Tămâioasă Românească 2013 (Drăgaşăni, Romania; 13.0%)
The Wine Society, £9.50, good value
Pure rose, but not overly intense; fresh and in bloom. Full bodied, with a rounded texture. Lovely acid balance and fairly long, more fruity than floral on the palate, then a perfumed finish. Elegant and moreish. 89 points.
Cramele Recaş ‘Sole’ Chardonnay/Feteascǎ Regalǎ 2014 (Banat, Romania; 13.5%)
The Wine Palate, £9.75, fair value
Evident oak on the nose, lots of fruit on the palate. Rounded texture with some layering of flavour – vanilla, macadamia nut, little lick of caramel. Quite punchy in flavour with some florality on the background. Very drinkable. 88 points.
Avincis Crâmpoşie Selecţionată 2013 (Drăgaşăni, Romania; 13.5%)
Theatre of Wine, £11.50, fair value
Intense, sappy and mineral. Steely impression on the nose, like a hard Chablis. Rounded on the palate but with piercing green apple acidity. Saline finish. 88 points.
Reds
SERVE Terre Romana Cuvée Charlotte 2011 (Dealu Mare, Romania; 14.5%)
Not currently available UK.
This winery was established in 1994 by Guy Tyrel de Poix of Domaine Peraldi, Corsica, and produces an impressive range of wines. This blend of Cabernet Sauvignon, Merlot and Feteascǎ Neagrǎ Rich is blood red in colour with a rich, intense and inviting nose. Some chestnut, and just taking on a touch of VA complexity. Rich on the palate, plenty of fruit concentration. Good acidity, firm though slightly furry tannins. Long finish. Some truffle, dried leaves. Made in the Bordeaux mould, but done very well. Lots to enjoy here; balance, complexity, length, ageworthiness. Impressive. 91 points.
Prince Ştirbey Negru de Drăgaşăni 2011 (Drăgaşăni, Romania; 14.5%)
Oddbins, £14.50, fair value
13 year old vines. 300l Romanian oak, 30% new, for 14 months. Earthy, liquorice, blueberry and blackberry, with subtle, balanced use of oak. Medium to full-bodied, lovely tangy fruity acidity and ripe supporting tannins. Very well made. Some length. Elegant, fresh and juicy. 90 points.
Cramele Recaş ‘Calusari’ Pinot Noir 2013 (Banat, Romania; 12.5%)
The Halifax Wine Company, £6.95, very good value
Pale, transparent colour. Clean, tangy Victoria plum skin with a touch of tobacco leaf. Touch of tannin. Light, clean, drinkable and typically Pinot Noir. Nothing flashy, but an enjoyable mid-week Pinot. 87 points.
Asda Wine Atlas Feteascǎ Neagrǎ NV (Banat, Romania; 13.0%)
Asda, £5.97, good value
Made by Cramele Recaş. Similar to Pinot Noir in fruit character, with a perfumed element. Dry, light-bodied, crunchy cherry and raspberry fruit with a slightly perfumed finish. Touch of fig skin on the nose. Chill it for 20 minutes in the fridge for added definition. 86 points.
First published on timatkin.com.
Mr Vine September Panel Tasting: the results
September’s panel tasting took place at Winemakers Club, a wine bar/shop/events space that occupies the site of the original Oddbins shop in some dark, atmospheric arches under the Holborn Viaduct in central London. Four out of five of the winners were Italian this time round, but all very different in style.
First place: Luigi Maffini ‘Kratos’ Fiano 2014 (Campania, Italy; 13.0%; £14.50, WoodWinters)
Some say the white Fiano grape will be the next big thing in the UK, and classic examples like this one show why. It’s an intense and persistent wine, with no-nonsense apple, pear and apricot aromas and a herbal twang. Starts off subtle, but finishes with a fresh, dry, mineral edge and a burst of flavour. You could drink this all night and not get bored. 90 points.
Second place: Tenuta Mara ‘Maramia’ 2012 (Emilia-Romagna, Italy; 13.5%; £41, WoodWinters)
This is the first vintage from this ambitious new biodynamic estate. They only make one wine, and no expense is spared; they even serenade the Sangiovese vines with Mozart. Who knows if that makes any difference, but the care and effort the take really shows through; this is a genuinely fine wine that really speaks of its origin. Autumnal aromas like dried leaves and truffle spill from the glass, alongside red cherry and dark chocolate. It’s lively and tangy, robust yet refreshing, ethereal but long in flavour. It has a high price for sure, but this is delicious and has real substance and interest. 91 points.
Third place: Luigi Maffini ‘Kleos’ Aglianico 2012 (Campania, Italy; 13.5%; £14.00, WoodWinters)
Another winner from expert winemaker Luigi Maffini, this time from the robust red Aglianico grape. It has baked blackberry, blueberry and stewed plum fruits inlaid with cigar tobacco and cinnamon. In the mouth it has real presence and texture; it’s full-bodied, savoury and very dry. It’s a big black bull of a wine that needs hearty food to be best appreciated. 89 points.
Fourth place: Le Fonti Sangiovese 2012 (Tuscany, Italy; 13.0%; £9.89, Cadman Fine Wines)
There are two Sangioveses to bring to your attention this month; this one may not have the brilliance of the Tenuta Mara, but then it is less than a quarter of the price. It’s like a beginner’s guide to Italian Sangiovese – expressive cherry and herbal notes, crisp acidity and an elegant lightness of touch. Not the most concentrated, but it’s very decent for under a tenner. 87 points.
Fifth place: Domaine Baron Sauvignon Blanc Vieilles Vignes 2014 (Loire, France; 12.5%; £8.99, Cadman Fine Wines)
Sauvignon Blanc can be samey, but this one from the Touraine is more luscious and interesting than the norm. It’s relatively ripe, fruity and opulent for a Loire Sauvignon – fans of New Zealand examples will get it immediately. Plenty of grapefruit and green pepper with a hint of smoke; not the most subtle, but very enjoyable. 88 points.
Mr Vine is a free iPhone app that helps you discover and buy the kinds of wine you like from a marketplace consisting of over 1,000 wines across a dozen different independent UK wine shops. Each month, a panel of five drinks experts (Richard Hemming, Helena Nicklin, Nathan Nolan, Zeren Wilson and me) meet up to taste a selection of wines available via the app in order to sniff out some gems. We score the wines out of 100, provide a tasting note and – perhaps most importantly – pick our top five of the night. These won’t necessarily be the highest scoring, just the wines we feel most excited about bringing to your attention.
For more info on the app and how it works, check out mrvine.co.uk.
Wine matching: cherry clafoutis
Recipe
350g cherries, pitted
3 tablespoons caster sugar
2 tablespoon kirsch
For the batter:
60g plain flour
½ teaspoon baking powder
3 free range eggs, lightly beaten
60g caster sugar
200ml milk
100ml single cream
½ teaspoon vanilla essence
icing sugar, to dust
crème fraîche, to serve
serves 12
Place the pitted cherries, the kirsch and the sugar into a bowl, stir well and leave to infuse for 2 hours.
Preheat the oven to 180c. Place the batter ingredients into a food processor and blend until smooth. Transfer to a jug and leave to sit for 20 minutes.
Grease a 20-25cm baking dish, spoon in the cherries and their juices and pour over the batter. Bake for 30 minutes or until puffed up and golden. Remove from the oven and leave to cool until just warm. Serve dusted with icing sugar and serve with crème fraîche.
Wine matches
Château Maurus Sauternes 2010 (£6.99 for 50cl, Lidl)
I love the versatility of clafoutis. You can make it with so many different fruits as they come into season from spring through to autumn, but the start of the run is in May with cherries. Sweet batter and ripe fruit calls for an equally sweet wine, but nothing that will overpower the subtle perfume of the cherries, even if bolstered by kirsch.
Sauternes, the most famous sweet wine of France, is made from a blend of Sémillon, Sauvignon Blanc and Muscadelle grapes in the Graves region of Bordeaux. It often works well with rich, egg-based fruit dishes, but some would be too powerful for this dessert. This apricot and honey-scented Sauternes is lighter in style and has plenty of freshness that will complement the clafoutis. It’s also exceptionally good value.
Château Jolys Jurançon ‘Cuvée Jean’ 2011 (£11.99 for 50cl, Waitrose)
Jurançon is a relatively obscure region in South West France in the foothills of the Pyrenees but the wines, both sweet and dry whites, are well worth seeking out. The sweet versions are made primarily from the equally obscure Petit Manseng grape, and although the wines are intensely flavoured they are fairly lightly weighted with a vivid freshness.
The Château Jolys ‘Cuvée Jean’ is made from grapes which are left to concentrate on the vine well into November before being picked by hand. It has a vibrant intensity of tropical fruit flavour and a hint of coconut. It’s beautifully balanced; sweet but not sickly.
Domaine des Bernardins Muscat de Beaumes de Venise 2013 (£16.00 for 75cl, The Wine Society)
Muscat comes in many guises across the south of France; the Beaumes de Venise appellation is situated in the southern Rhône. Quality can be variable, but Domaine des Bernardins is one of the masters. This fifth generation family estate is now run by Elisabeth and Andrew Hall, and their son Romain is the winemaker. Alongside the classic white Muscat grapes they use a rare red-skinned version that adds depth to the fragrance.
This unctuous but fresh example is sweet but balanced and has great length of flavour. It has juicy apricot and peach flavours but what will really make this pairing work well are the lifted bergamot and orange blossom aromas that will chime with the fragrant cherries in this dessert.
Based on a recipe by Louise Pickford. First published in Living France magazine.
“Where are the new people? Come on, step up to the plate.” An interview with Oz Clarke
Growing up in 1980s Britain, there wasn't much wine on UK television, but I still have clear memories of Oz Clarke’s boundless enthusiasm on the BBC’s Food & Drink show. I was too young to drink but even so it made an impression. Oz is still on our screens today, and in the intervening years he’s employed press, radio, events, books and social media to spread the word. I can think of no other wine expert who has enjoyed such a lengthy career in mainstream UK media: he has a unique perspective.
Earlier this year I accompanied Oz and some fellow wine writers on a press trip to Romania (from left to right: Oz Clarke; John Wilson, Irish Times; Leslie Williams, Irish Examiner; Philip Cox, Cramele Recaş Winery; me). It turns out his fame isn't restricted to the UK; it would be hard to imagine Barak Obama getting a warmer welcome at some of the wineries we visited. With his reedy, resonant voice retained from his days as an actor he cuts quite a statesmanlike figure. So I was surprised to hear he once lived in a squat in one of the roughest neighbourhoods in London. During the flight back to the UK I spoke to him about his journey in wine so far and how wine in the media has changed over the past three decades.
Oz has always been an incisive taster; he captained the wine tasting team during his years at Pembroke College, Oxford. So when he heard about a national wine tasting championship shortly after completing his studies, as a poor student he entered in the hope of winning some prize money. He came second, beating Sir Hugh Greene, then Director of the BBC, and the ex-Home Secretary Reginald Maudling.
But more importantly it kickstarted his writing career: “A bloke sidled up to me after I’d got my prize for coming second and said ‘I’m starting a wine newspaper called What Wine? – would you like to write a column for it?’” He seized the opportunity, writing a series of “sensationalist columns for enough money to take girls out to dinner”. But “it finally failed to continue when I wrote a beautiful lyrical piece about the Mosel Valley and how I’d been sitting watching the sheep gambolling in the vineyards and the ladies in their dirndls downing jugs of Riesling and I’d obviously never been there.”
From here Oz moved into acting, but always kept a hand in wine. “I was at the National Theatre when I was squatting in Manor House, on the 8th floor of a council block. I had to go into the theatre to wash in the morning... I didn't have a telephone, hot water, electricity, I had nothing.” At the same time as playing various roles in the West End, he joined the English wine tasting team that went on to beat Germany and France. The press lapped it up: “because I was an actor I was always on the front page of the papers in costume with a glass of wine and I became known as the actor who knows about wine”.
His tasting prowess got him noticed again, this time by the editor of a national newspaper. “I got this phone call asking if I’d like to meet the editor of the Sunday Express. ‘Well you obviously know about wine’ he said ‘but can you write?’ It was one of those times when you could either say ‘Oh I don’t know’ or you can say ‘yes!’ So I said ‘yes – I can write’. And he said ‘would you like to be the Sunday Express wine writer?’ Straight from nothing into a Fleet Street job. And that was because of being part of the English wine tasting team and having my face on the front of the papers.” From here it was a natural next step to start writing wine books.
Grabbing opportunities with both hands is a recurring theme when talking to Oz. “There was a new TV show called BBC Food & Drink and they were going to do a blind wine tasting live in front of an audience. The bloke who was supposed to be doing it had terrible cold feet and dropped out at a day’s notice, and the producer said ‘Get me that actor who knows about wine!’” Oz rushed to the studio the next morning.
Oz stood on stage in front of the audience. They could see the name of the wine but he couldn't. “I saw this golden coloured wine in front of me and I thought well that’s got to be an Australian Chardonnay. I’d done pantomime and I started playing the audience: ‘look at that colour, it must be from somewhere hot’ – a little tittering in the audience – and I said ‘well there are hot places like France and Italy’ – silence – ‘but I think it’s more likely to be from the southern hemisphere’ – another little titter. “Eventually I got to a point where I was able to say ‘I think this wine is made by a chap called Murray Tyrrell, it’s called Vat 47, it comes from the Hunter Valley near Sydney in New South Wales and you can get it in Waitrose for £2.99.’ The place erupted! And I remember coming off and the producer Baz saying ‘that was fantastic, I didn't know we could make wine tasting into showbiz. One thing though; you realise you forgot to taste the wine?’”
Oz went on to be a regular on Food & Drink, and also at the annual BBC Good Food Show. Events are still important to him. “I'm doing Taste of London, London Wine Week, Three Wine Men – we do between four and six of those shows a year. Three Wine Men particularly I like because you have to meet your public, you’re just tearing round the room all the time meeting the public; meeting the public and learning from them. I learn a bit through social media but I learn more by having people in front of me, taking selfies and chatting: what’s the kind of stuff that you like, what does wine mean to you?”
Although Oz runs his own Twitter account, at nearly 50,000 followers he finds it hard to find the time to interact online as much as he would like. He’s witnessed the birth of Facebook and Twitter during his career; does he feel that there is more wine in the media today compared to when he started out? “No, less I’d have thought. There wasn't social media when I started out, there was a lot of television and radio, regularly doing wine, wine was in the studio all the time, bottle after bottle of wine being opened in radio stations, half an hour of national radio, chatting away with wine in front of us all the time. I don’t think that’s nearly so much the case now. Political correctness has spoilt some of it, times change… Political correctness about bad behaviour, nervousness about litigation, and nervousness about anything that is not relatively conformist. Again, that’s another reason why one ought to slightly welcome people like the natural wine brigade.”
Oz is no stranger to controversial wine trends like natural wine. When New World wines were reaching our shores for the first time, he was one of the first to champion these new styles. “The 1990s was a fantastic time to be a wine writer because there was a revolution going on all around us… I suffered immense disapproval all the time from the establishment, they couldn't bear the idea of a young whippersnapper coming in and saying there was a new thing that they didn't like. Their little cosy world was being turned upside down by people like me and Jilly Goolden. They did not like it a bit.”
And he’s still open to new styles. “What’s happening on the fringes of wine, involving either the natural wine people or what has come back from Georgia, the qvevri wines and the orange wines, these are all exciting things.” What he is less keen on is the militant positions of some natural wine supporters. “It’s when they get an AK47 out, aim it at me and say ‘you’re wrong and I’m right’, that’s when I find it less amusing. I think some of the people that are in that camp, they don’t seem to want to take anyone else’s point of view… and it’s a real weakness in a person’s position if they can’t take pleasure in what someone else thinks that disagrees with you.” Nonetheless, this proliferation of new styles is providing plenty of new topics to write about.
Finding an outlet, however, is another question. “In a funny way there’s a lot more to write about now. The wine world is much, much wider, but I’m not sure editors want you to write about it. A lot of editors seem to just want a shopping list… it’s a very easy way to get copy down, but it’s not very interesting, it’s not very enjoyable. It’s like writers that all they do is write wine tasting notes. I think that must be such a boring life… If your wine writing just ends up like that you’re missing out on all the beauty of life of which wine is just a strand.”
I wasn't old enough to drink when I first watched Oz on Food & Drink. But what I saw sowed a seed that became a lifelong passion. I'm sure that many other UK winelovers owe him the same debt of gratitude. After several decades “banging the drum” about wine, his love for it remains undimmed. But despite the growth of blogging and social media, he clearly feels that wine is less visible than it once was. “I think the outlook for wine is very optimistic, the fact that we are in another golden age of wine, but I don’t think we’re in a golden age of communicating about wine… Where are the new people? Come on, step up to the plate and try and amuse and entertain an audience, so they walk away thinking ‘I've learnt something about wine’ as well as having a smile on their face. Not easy to do.”
Oz Clarke’s new book The History of Wine in 100 Bottles is out now.