Wine of the Week 70 – the perfect party fizz

Sometimes, particularly during the party season, you find yourself needing lots and lots of fizz – I know that I do. If you are as impecunious as me then this can give you a slight problem, as sparkling wines can be very expensive. The bill soon mounts up if you want to drink lots of it yourself let alone letting your guests hoover up vast quantities of the stuff.

The problem becomes tricker still if like me you are not drawn to Prosecco. Much of the time I find Prosecco dull, overly floral and somewhat sweet, certainly sweeter than it ought to be, so with a few notable and sadly expensive exceptions – Bisol (especially their Bisol Jeio, Adami and Nino Franco for instance – then Prosecco is hardly ever something I want to drink. I prefer the cut of bracing acidity that leaves sparklers made by the traditional method so cleansing and refreshing. Of course the best examples of traditional method sparkling wines can be wonderfully complex and fine with that brioche, biscuity and nutty character, but that tends to come with the more expensive wines.

There is help at hand though, there are some excellent and incredibly good value sparkling wines available and one of the best, it’s positively cheap in fact, is a Cava and I think it is so very good for the price that I have made it my Wine of the Week.

Cava vineyards – photo courtesy the Cava Regulatory Board.

Arestel Cava Brut
Cavas Arestel
Sant Sadurní d’Anoia
Catalunya
Spain

I think Cava gets a bad rap with people focussing on the lower end of the price spectrum – although that is exactly what I doing here. There is actually plenty of very fine Cava out there, but there is also no use denying that the cheaper versions can provide some of the best value sparkling wines in the world. This example is made by Vid Vica and is a blend of the three classic Cava grapes Macabeu, Parellada and Xarel·lo aged on the lees in bottle for 9 months. Surprisingly it is actually a proper Cava house and not just an own label.
This seems really very good for anything like the asking price, it’s certainly a cut above most cheap Cava and perfect when you just want to keep drinking fizz in quantity, like at a party. It is soft, dry and apply in flavour with a touch of pear about it too, it also has a nice mouthfeel with none of that soapy quality cheap fizz can have. It is also clean, fresh and fruity with none of the earthy flavours some Cava can have and there is nice acidity keeping it refreshing without being tart – 84/100 points, this scores especially well for value, but really it is very well made and very drinkable.

Available in the UK from Lidl for the amazing price of £4.79 per bottle.

PS: I have just discovered that Aldi also offer a Cava for £4,79, so will try a bottle of that very soon too.

My Favourite Wines, Top Discoveries and Experiences of 2011

I feel like a respite from all the self indulgence that the Christmas holidays force upon me and feel my thoughts turning back to wine. As the New Year is coming up fast I thought that I would attempt to tell you about my wine highlights for the year.

Most of my top wines have been written up here on my Wine Page, but some have slipped through the net and are new today. Please always remember that this is an entirely personal list, but I hope you enjoy it and that it gives some food for thought.

Sparkling Wines

I was really spoiled for fizz this year, 2 Champagne tastings stand out in particular:

Champagne:

Veuve Clicquot Yellow Label Brut Non Vintage based on the 1953 vintage
This whole tasting was extraordinary and provided a wonderful insight into a type of Champagne that it is all too easy to take for granted – read about it here.

1995 Perrier Jouët Belle Époque
In February I was lucky enough to taste four different vintages of Belle Epoque out of jeroboams, the 1995 was the standout wine for me, but they were all superb – read about it here.

Franciaorta – sparkling wine with a future

The lovely Azienda Agricola Villa

I have long wanted to try the sparkling wines of Lombardy’s Franciaorta region, so I leapt at a chance to attend a tasting and dinner hosted by the Azienda Agricola Villa.

It was quite an event and it took place in the wonderfully stylish Dego just off Great Portland Street near Oxford Circus in London. This is an Italian restaurant and wine bar that is incredibly chic and nothing like your normal stereotypical Italian eatery.

A Touch of Europe or Local Terroir?

The Hermann J Wiemer vineyard & winery

This was one of my favourite winery visits of my recent trip to New York. The Hermann J Wiemer winery made wines that really thrilled and spoke to me, as their literature states ‘wines in the finest European tradition from the heart of the Finger Lakes’.

I am not convinced that their wines are made entirely in the European tradition, but they do have a delicacy and a finesse that is very attractive. In my opinion though these are Finger Lake wines rather than European and I think that is how it should be.

A Fine Cava

There is a great deal of cheap Cava available. So much of it is so cheap and always on some sort of implausibly low price deal that you could sometimes be forgiven for thinking that Cava was the Spanish word for cheap sparkling wine.

Strangely it means the exact opposite. Cava actually means cellar and was introduced as the Spanish legal term for a quality Sparkling wine made by the Traditional Method – the same process used in Champagne.

Domaine Carneros – haven of calm and elegance

Whilst in the Napa Valley I was fortunate enough to be invited to visit Domaine Carneros. This is a dramatic and beautiful winery surrounded by vines and perched on a hill overlooking the rolling Carneros countryside.

It was created in 1987 as a partnership between US wine company Kobrand and Champagne Taittinger. Indeed Claude Taittinger had been looking for a suitable site for a Californian sparkling wine vineyard since the 1970s.