As Christmas and the end of the year approaches, instead of writing about yet another wonderful restaurant meal or wine tour that I’ve been privileged to enjoy during the year, I’m offering you a chance to participate in Menu for Hope. What is Menu for Hope?Menu for Hope is an annual fundraising campaign hosted by… View more
I’ve just tweeted this, so I should post it here too – do follow my tweets, they are lots of fun! Special Xmas Offer tweeters & bloggers: up to 20% off subscriptions using code D1WL08 – also valid for gifts. Pass it on. Just working on all the updates to the 46 French micro-region guides… View more
High time I paused for a while to consider the blues. Only just discovered this classic. It beats me how I can have spent all these 30 years interested in wine and the blues and still missed it: [youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TnU5dx1Es7Y&hl=en&fs=1] So how did I find Sticks McGee sings Drinkin’ Wine Spo – Dee – O –… View more
French wine lovers buy their wines in a different way to British wine lovers and probably Americans too. For a start, with a vastly improved motorway network in France in less than four hours Parisians can reach Champagne, Alsace, Burgundy, Bordeaux or the Loire Valley, so it’s hardly surprising that they travel to wine regions… View more
From Thursday 23rd – Sunday 26th October at the Wine Show in London a little company named JuraWine will be showing a range of wines from one of my favourite Jura producers, Stéphane Tissot (catch phrase: “la vie est belle” – life is beautiful). The range will include a fine Arbois Vin Jaune 1999, that… View more
For this coming week only, Selfridges’ up-market and comfortable Wonder Bar in Oxford Street, London is offering a great deal with 25ml tastes of a range of 52 Decanter Trophy winning wines. At the launch I enjoyed sips of a Castillo de Molina Sauvignon from Elqui, Chile; Wild Earth Pinot Noir from Central Otago, New… View more
For a long time, I’ve had a very dull fascination with postcodes. I used to hate British postcodes because they are so hard to type – with letters and numbers mixed up. On the other hand, they have the great plus that each postcode covers a maximum number of around 100 properties, sometimes even just… View more
The place to go is right in the old town of Besançon in the French department of the Doubs, between Alsace and the Jura. Book a table at Christophe Menozzi’s restaurant of the same name and then simply ask to see him (or the sommelier if he’s not there) and discuss your wishes – you… View more
One of the biggest pleasures of working in wine has always been meeting passionate people, especially when visiting wine producers in situ. Recently I had the chance to meet two contrasting giants owning vineyards on the Saar River, part of the Mosel winegrowing area. Each one demonstrated a true passion about their very special piece… View more
Wine Travel Guides has been live for a whole year now and the feedback has been great – when a subscriber writes to me saying how useful the guides are with his wine trip planning, it makes it seem all worthwhile; when I have a good week for subscriptions, it’s even better! I’ve been wavering… View more
