Sunday, 29 June 2008

German Wine

I tried some German wine recently. A big mistake. I know this sounds harsh but its been a good 10 years or more since I last had a go and sadly not much has changed. Okay, I was trying a range of Riesling's from different countries so I felt compelled to include one from the Pfalz region. I will blame Jancis Robinson. I was watching and old series of hers wine tasting around the world and she just happened to mention that she was a big fan of the Riesling grape. Now I am a big fan of Jancis so in for a penny... Off to Waitrose and quickly I found bottles from Australia , New Zealand and the US. Their German section consisted of about 2 wines which did not bode well.

I picked a snazzy label, not the traditional German label with more words than Mein Kampf for me! The Naked Grape, I kid you not, was a real dissappointment. All of my age old prejudices came flooding back and Jancis was public enemy number one. Sweet, sickly, lacking in finesse, structure and frankly any bite. What a shame. It might take me another 10 years before I try again but I do agree something with Jancis, the Oz Kiwi and Yank Reislings were outstanding.

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