Award Winning red wine from South Africa

The 2004 Somerbosch Cabernet Sauvignon is just about ready to be enjoyed now. This wine had an amazing intensity when tasted in 2006, which has now calmed and mellowed into a beautiful rounded elegant red wine. Matured in mainly French oak barrels, so that tight rich full style of toasty oak is now in perfect harmony with the intense spicy cassis ripe fruit. This wine is sensational with roast lamb or richer meats as well as a strong cheese. Awarded a GOLD MEDAL at the Michelangelo Wine Awards in South Africa. The winery has now sold out in Stellenbosch, so we have the last few cases remaining in the UK. A great deal at £99 per case including vat. Send orders direct to: sales@bellawines.co.uk

Chateau La Grave Harvest starts

Just heard that Chateau La Gravehttp://www.chateau-la-grave.net/ at Badens have started their harvest last night. They pick their white grapes...mainly Sauvignon Blanc during the night and very early morning, when the temperature is much cooler. The grapes will arrive in pristine condition at the winery.

Chateau La Grave is unusual in the Minervois area to have so many white grapes planted. They seem to benefit from the very cool breezes that come down from the North passed the city of Carcassonne. Their wines are always very clean and cool with delicate flavours. Look forward to tasting them later this year after fermentation or early next year.

Domaine Les Eminades Cebenna 2005

Colour: Intense, opaque deep garnet red.
Nose: Intense, spicy, mature, ripe, dark, brooding, serious, rich, mocha, alcohol intensity evident.
Palate: Deep, ripe, intense layers and layers of clean dark damsons and dark mature fruits.
After: A long smooth slightly smoky finish. Balanced tannins. This wine will develop further but is excellent now (with a bit of air in a decanter?)

Cebenna is the best wine produced at this very small and very hands on wine estate run by the passionate husband and wife team of Luc and Patricia Bettoni. They have small parcels of ancient Grenache, Carignan and Syrah vines scattered around the St. Chinian hills. Their enthusiasm is enormous, their dedication is charming. They are converting to total organic certified viticulture (however they have been practising organic principles for many years.) Certainly a wine estate to watch for the future.

I had to stop cycling this morning to take this snap. Sometimes the natural environment confounds you. 5 minutes later the sun was shining and the lights were on! The camera says 6.02am..but I can confirm that it was 7.02am in France. This picture is looking East (as we are northern hemisphere!) towards the rocky outcrop of La Clape and the coast beyond. The mediterranean sea is about 30 km as the crow flies. Summer is drawing to a gradual close.

A cloud! Harvest starts soon.

Max took this picture last night. I think this was the first cloud that we saw all day! Fantastic weather with a cleansing vent du nord.
Lots of clearing up work in the vineyards all weekend.
The harvest here in the Languedoc will start soon (some whites are gradually being picked). Lots of grape analysis and chin rubbing and general decision making will take place over the next month. Although the lack of water is an ongoing problem and there are rumblings that this will reduce the quantity significantly, the omens are looking good.

Bordeaux saves France

I found this interesting article written by Sophie Kevany recently.

International sales of the exceptional Bordeaux 2005 vintage have saved French wine export figures for the first half of 2008. Figures released last week, for the period January to June 2008, show a fall in French wine export volumes of 8.72%, but an almost equivalent rise in value of 8.16%, compared to the same period in 2007.

Broken down by wine category the figures, compiled by France’s national agency for export development, Ubifrance, show a clear drop in exports of cheaper wines, and a rise in demand for more pricey ones.

Exports volumes of lower category vin de table wines for the period fell by 35.65%, and value by 19.53%. Exports from the more expensive Bordeaux region on the other hand fell by 1.52% in volume, but rose by a significant 42.5% in value.

Hervé Henrotte of Ubifrance said the significant rise in Bordeaux values was partly explained by sales of the exceptional 2005 vintage, now being delivered to retailers and consumers.

However, the overall export trend, Henrotte said, was away from simpler, cheaper wines and towards higher priced, more sophisticated ones.

“In America and the UK people are moving away from varietal wines and towards more complex ones, particularly the young, urban drinkers,” he said. “They are not buying a food product, they are buying a moment of pleasure.”

Henrotte also said the dive in volume and value of the cheaper wine exports was partly a correction on last year. “During much of 2007 exports [of these wines] rose significantly during the ban in Russia on imports of wine from Moldova,” he said.

However, the high value of the euro against both the dollar and sterling also played a role he said, as well as the fact that at this lower level, there was a lot more competition from other wine making countries, and consumers were more price conscious.

Cabernet Franc is rarely seen on a label alone. It is normally blended with Merlot and Cabernet Sauvignon for classic Bordeaux blends, or made as superb wines in the Loire region.
However this little beauty comes from an historically fascinating wine estate on the outskirts of Beziers in the South of France....Baronnie de Bourgade. The wine estate was owned by Baron Gilles de Latude and his English wife Ruth Parker until very recently. Gilles and Ruth have now sold up and are enjoying themselves on a 'Grand Tour' of France. They worked relentlessly to develop their original and stylish label 'Les 3 Poules'. They were extremely successful with this wine, winning international acclaim and trophies, awards etc. But sometimes the energy exerted in growing grapes and producing wine....let alone the marketing/traveling and eventual sales are too much vis a vis the financial return.
I wish Gilles and Ruth good luck, and will closely monitor the future wines from this property under the new ownership.
The Cabernet Franc here was from the 2005 vintage. It has a superb deep spicy nose with ripe autumn fruit balanced with a classic Cab. Franc cut capsicum earthy character. No oak aging for this wine, so the palate is pure fruit with a grip from fruit tannins rather than heavy wood. A clean and well balanced wine for early drinking rather than long cellaring. A universal food match wine, but lovely with barbecue meats and cheese.