The Fashion of Wine.

Is there such a thing as a fashionable wine, a wine that is in vogue? Well yes there are wines that have there moment of glory a fashion that is spread both by word of mouth and what people see other people drinking.

If you look at the array of fine offerings available today such as the fine Germanic Mosel and Rheingau Rieslings, The French wines of Alsace and Gruner Veltliner wines of Austria. These are all fine wines in there own right, high quality and made with the greatest of care and are held in very high regard by the trade, you would probably find that they are in the main bought and drunk by those in the trade or certainly the more astute wine drinkers out there. All of the wines mentioned have one thing in common, they have all suffered in the the past with a bad press for one reason or another.

The Germans in the 70's and 80's were guilty of flooding the UK market with the well known over sweet and vastly inferior Liebfraumilch, to the extent that it seems to be all that the UK wine buying public remember, so German wines are now associated with cheap over sweetened wines.

Alsace wines have just never been fashionable, maybe because they are bottled similarly to their German neighbours.

The Austrians had a scandal in 1985 when millions of gallons of Austrian wine suspected of being laced with diethylene glycol, a component of antifreeze, had been removed from stores in Austria and other countries around the world.

All of the above wines are big underdogs in the fashion stakes and as such have to work much harder to maintain a foothold in the marketplace. They are made to a very high standard and offer great value for money.

Lets look at what is fashionable in the wine world at the moment? Pinot Grigio, a bland and horribly mass-market produced Italian white wine. Big jammy over confected commercial new world reds. also new world, over oaked Chardonnays.

So what do you chose, to be with the in crowd, or with the wine trade.


Go on, try something different.

Going to Gozo.

Gill and I are returning to Gozo, for 2 weeks of rest and relaxation. I have just checked the weather forecast and all is looking well for the duration of our stay.

"If God had really intended men to fly, he'd make it easier to get to the airport". George Winters