It’s funny to hear people say how they found a wine when they were abroad that was absolutely out of this world. So good in fact that nothing they have tried since has compared or even come close.

I can see where they’re coming from. When you’re somewhere new and amazing, surrounded by good company, good food and a sense of well-being, life just doesn’t get any better. And doesn’t the wine taste amazing!

I believe it’s the simple things that can prime us to experience something differently, particularly when it comes to enjoying wine. One of those things is music, and after reading the findings of Dr Adrian North, Professor of Psychology at Heriot Watt University in Edinburgh, I’m more convinced than ever of how your surroundings can play such an influential role.

I’ve heard of experiments conducted in a supermarket where they play French music only for French wine sales to increase as a consequence, and Spanish music only for Spanish wine sales to increase. Professor North’s study was different. He recruited 250 participants, gave them a free glass of wine (Chardonnay or Cabernet Sauvignon) and instructed each person to go into a room to drink it. They were not allowed to converse with other participants and they had about 5 minutes to finish the glass.

There were ten rooms, five used for the white wine drinkers and five for the red wine drinkers. Each of the five rooms featured one of four types of music (or no music) that played on a continuous loop. The music was described as follows, and each participant could choose which description to match to their experience of the wine: 1) powerful and heavy 2) subtle and refined 3) zingy and refreshing 4) mellow and soft

Sure enough the data firmly pointed towards a force at work. The results were all compared with the room with no music. The choice of descriptive used ranged between 25% and 60% higher than in the ‘no music’ condition, showing a tendency towards a specific description in each of the rooms. It was more obvious with the reds, the 60% statistic coming from the ‘powerful and heavy’ music condition, and 25%, the smallest (yet still significant) increase of the study, for ‘mellow and soft’. In the whites, it was 40% higher for ‘zingy and refreshing’ compared to the ‘no music’ condition.

Professor North concluded that the music shifted the perception of the wine in the direction of the mood expressed by the music by an average of 37.25%, therefore, background music can significantly influence your perception of the taste of wine. My own conclusion is that music isn’t the only thing that can prime us in a similar way.

Source: Wine & Song – The Effect of Background Music on the Taste of Wine (Prof. A North, Heriot Watt University)

As we’ve seen with the Irish summer over the last number of years, weather patterns are becoming more and more difficult to predict. We had one of our mildest winters, while Europe had one of their harshest in recent times. The arctic sea ice has reached an all time low, and with more melting ice the natural flow of the oceans currents have been disrupted, affecting temperatures and weather patterns inland. Global warming is here, and whether or not man is the root of the problem, it’s something we’re having to contend with now.

Last week I posted on how good the 2012 vintage has been for Australia, and Bordeaux seems to have enjoyed yet another great year, of which there’s been plenty in the last decade, so in the world of wine its not all bad every year, but there’s no doubt that more producers are encountering less reliable years.

Champagne is one region having to deal with a tough 2012 vintage. It started with frost in April which wrote off about 10% of the regions stock, with some areas losing up to 40%. Hail followed in June and then milder, wetter weather moved in and encouraged disease, with oidium on the Chardonnay and mildew on Pinot Noir and Meunier becoming a common problem.

Naturally, Champagne has had a turbulent 4-5 years with the inset of the recession. More people have moved to the cheaper alternatives – Cava and Prosecco. But there is hope that demand from India and China will show in the coming years, and according to data from TNS, Champagne and sparkling wine is set to double its market share in the UK and overseas, thus pushing into the share that still wine holds. This has largely come from young and new drinkers who see bubbly as more than just a celebratory drink. The low cost of Cava and Prosecco has made sparkling wine more accessible.

While Champagne is down, it is certainly not out. Demand, although it has decreased over the last number of years, is still there, and if there are any questions over standards, one thing these people don’t do is compromise quality. They simply can’t afford to.

Oh yes they did. And wouldn’t you know, only in America. The Counter, a California based burger bar, has concocted three wine based milkshakes, the most popular “wine shake” being made from Pinot Noir, cherries, chocolate and vanilla ice cream.

The other two wines shakes available are Sweet Peach, made from sweet white wine with peach nectar and vanilla ice cream, and Mimosa, a twist on a brunch classic and like a boozy orange Creamsicle. It comprises white sparkling wine, orange juice and vanilla ice cream. They are available at The Counter branches in Santa Monica, Marina Del Rey, Century City, Toluca Lake, El Segundo, Torrance and Hermosa Beach. Or you could try to make them in your own home if California isn’t on your list of places to visit anytime soon.

The Counter is a pretty cool concept. Grab a clipboard and choose from an extensive list ingredients that allow you to build your own gourmet burger. They claim, “Our 312,120+ different burger combinations make every burger as unique as each customer. Rarely is the same burger made twice in one day.” Sounds like my kind of place. America is the land of burgers, one of my great finds in California, with the guidance of my sister, was the In-N-Out Burger. I’ve yet to enjoy The Counter experience.

Source: The Counter

In Argentina Jesus juice is the name given to red wine mixed with cola. In Spain it is known as calimocho, where the cocktail is said to have originated. I am ashamed to say, even as a reasonably well experienced wine drinker (although I know I’ll never stop learning) I have never mixed red wine and cola. Nor lemonade and white wine, which I believe is another popular mix.

Simon Creasey writing for The Guardian last week reported on the popularity of still wine cocktails, with some of the world’s major producers having a go themselves. Jacob’s Creek, Hardy’s and Banrock have all launched limited edition ranges, perhaps to merely test the market, including strawberry & white peach Bellinis and Sauvignon Blanc infused with peach and mango.

Creasey also reported on a new fortified wine called Spodee (pictured), made with high proof moonshine, that you mix into cocktails, like a spirit. Moonshine is the name given to illicit high proof spirits (usually around 95% alcohol). The name was derived from early smugglers who produced and distributed illegal distilled products by night (in the light of the moon). Spodee gains inspiration from Depression era Hooch – strong, sweet, easy-to drink beverage made from a mix of country wine and whatever else was lying around the farm-fruits, herbs, spices and of course moonshine. This version is 18% ABV and comes in an old timey milk bottle.

There’s making rough wine palatable, and then there’s the classic cocktails. I had my first Prosecco Bellini at the weekend. This white peach nectar mixed with Italian bubbly was made famous by Harry’s Bar in Venice (or the other way around), which was a well known haunt of Ernest Hemingway and Orson Welles. In 1948 Giuseppi Cipriani created the Bellini which was inspired by the 15th century Venetian painter Giovanni Bellini.

Good cocktails are hard not to like. As for Jesus juice, I’ll make a judgement on that when I’ve tried it. It’s on my bucket list.

It’s something that probably never comes into your mind when buying a bottle of wine, at least not consciously anyway, but it is something I notice every week in the shop when I’m helping customers make a choice that’s going to have them come back to us again.

Wine Intelligence’s new packaging report the familiar 750ml bottle is still by far the most popular choice for consumers, as opposed to bag-in-box, Tetra Pak, plastic bottles and smaller sized glass bottles. These vessels may be better embraced in the future, just as screwcap took time to become the norm.

Packaging does matter, from the label to the shape of the bottle. It’s funny how most people love our dinky bottles from Borgo Magredo (pictured, right), which hold the same amount of wine as the standard 750ml Burgundy shaped bottle, but I would guess maybe one in ten are put off by purely by the shape. It’s unfamiliar and perhaps they don’t trust it.

From the quality point of view, the shape of bottle has no bearing whatsoever. I’ve heard all sorts of funny old wives tales since I’ve been in this business. I think everyone in the trade has heard the punt or indent theory at least once. It’s hard to believe that some people are put off by a flat bottomed bottle believing that the quality of the wine is dictated by the depth of the indent at the bottom. Surely if that was the case, every producer would be making this feature standard on all of their bottles?

The following is a rough guide to the most popular shapes, but there are not hard and fast rules:

The Burgundy shape has gentle sloping shoulders, like this Chablis. These sturdy, heavy bottles are commonly used in Burgundy and Loire, as well as in the New World for Pinot Noir and Chardonnay and in Italy for Barolo.

Rhone style bottles are similar to Burgundy, but may have a coat of arms on the neck. The shape might be a little more slick and feminine too. Domaine le Sang des Cailloux Vacqueyras is a good example.

Bordeaux bottles have straight sides and tall shoulders, just like the Sirius Bordeaux. It is widely used in the New World for producers using Bordeaux grape varieties, and in Italy for Chianti.

Champagne bottles are built for a purpose, considering the pressure is around three times that of the average car tyre. Thicker glass with a deep punt on the underside and sloping shoulders, like the elegant Duval Leroy Brut Champagne. Sometimes they can be a bit vain – La Femme Champagne.

Then we’ve got the tall, narrow bottles from Alsace and Mosel, and this is where it’s worth seeking advice and it can go from dry to super sweet and anything in between. The Rhine can sometimes be distinguished by its brown coloured glass. Lastly, fortified wines range from the standard Port bottle to slender 500ml sherry bottles.

So, the purchase decision shouldn’t be based on the shape of the bottle, or the prettiness of the label for that matter, but as a helplessly easy-to-influence consumer myself, I know it’s hard to stick to that rule. As long as one can trust the shape.

Providing you buy the right wine at the right time, not a case of Hardy’s Reserve or some battery acid in a counterfeit bottle of Petrus (it does happen… a lot), and sell at the right time before it has gone well beyond its sell by, there will be some fat cat somewhere to snap it up, give you a healthy return and either drink the lot or simply hoard it for an eternity. That’s the idea anyway.

In reality, you need to know what you’re doing if you’re involved with wine as an investment. It’s not the silver bullet for investors (what is?), even for those in the know. The graph, below, is from Liv-ex, which is widely acknowledged to be the fine wine industry’s leading benchmarks.

Here, we can see fine wine investments are not immune to market conditions. The big dip after August 2008 – that was the crash following the collapse of Lehman.

After the crash centrals banks around the world started to print vast amounts of money in an attempt to revive markets. This created a number of bubbles, including the wine bubble, hence the recovery enjoyed until June last year.

To put things in perspective, the LA Times reported a Chinese buyer spent $540,000 in September 2011 on a single lot of 300 bottles of Chateau Lafite Rothschild at a Christie’s auction in Hong Kong. Based on the Liv-ex index, that investor has lost around 27% of his investment so far. (source: testosteronepit.com)

Of course, this is not to say the market won’t recover, but the great thing about wine as an investment is you can always drink it. And in my opinion, that’s a safer and more enjoyable option.

To conclude, I’ll leave you with this email I received from my dad this morning, entitled “Interesting facts on Investments”.

If you had purchased £1,000 of shares in Delta Airlines one year ago, you would have £49.00 today

If you had purchased £1,000 of shares in AIG one year ago, you would have £33.00 today.

If you had purchased £1,000 of shares in Lehman Brothers one year ago, you would have £0.00 today.

If you had purchased £1,000 of shares in Northern Rock three years ago, you would have £0.00 today

But, if you had purchased £1,000 worth of beer one year ago at Tesco, drank all the beer, then taken the aluminium cans to the scrap metal dealer you would have received £214.00.

Based on the above, the best current investment plan is to drink heavily & recycle.

Ahem, enjoy alcohol responsibly and in moderation!

I thought our (or Santa Alicia’s) attempt at the worlds biggest bottle of wine was honourable. Pictured, our six litre bottle of Santa Alicia Reserva Cabernet Sauvignon – next to my coffee mug for easy size comparison.

Then I saw this: Thirty foot long, eight foot wide and weighing a colossal three tonnes, Chinese wine company Jinding had what is now officially the world’s biggest bottle of wine on show at the Sixth Yantai International Wine Expo held in Shandong province last month.

I feel clumsy enough trying to pour a 1.5L magnum at the dinner table, but I wouldn’t even entertain the idea of using this monster at the next house party. Apart from anything else it would frustrate the life out of my wife having to demolish the living room wall of our town house to get the blasted thing anywhere near the kitchen table. And would you even be bothered trying to decant that?

Not the most practical, but I suppose nothing beats a bit of positive PR. But I am slightly confused about the use of the very British term ‘Claret’ here. Has this Chinese company produced its very own Claret in the only place I thought it was possible to produce Claret (Bordeaux), or is it a Chinese made and bottled wine which has barrowed the name? Perhaps someone can enlighten me.

Protecting the origin of wine is important for a lot of regions, especially in the Old World. When producers of sparkling wine in the USA started using the term ‘Champagne’ on their labels, the French didn’t take to it too kindly. Pourquoi?

Wine, by nature, is very regionally sensitive. Once you get above the mass volume of the most popular wines on the market, a surprisingly large number have characteristics typical of their region, and sometimes specific to a particular sub-region, or even vineyard, or part thereof.

The sparkling wine of the Champagne region in France earned itself not only a good name, but a great name. There’s nowhere else in the world where one can produce wines of the same quality. Even if the sparkling wines of southern England and even Tasmania are stylistically quite similar, and the quality is good too, the best have still to surpass the famous French region.

It wouldn’t be right to call a bubbly from the USA, or anywhere else for that matter, ‘Champagne’, unless it’s actually from Champagne. It is protected by a european regulation called Protected Designation of Origin (PDO). This european law protects the names of local products made in Europe, and as well as covering wine, it protects foods. The cheese industry in Europe benefits hugely, keeping quality high, ensuring people know what they’re buying and giving producers the best chance to do business. Products such as Stilton in the UK, Gorgonzola and Parmesan in Italy, Feta in Greece, Roquefort and Camembert in France all receive a protected status.

The American administration eventually came to an agreement with the EU over the Champagne debacle. However, traditional makers of sparkling wine in the US who made this kind of wine before the administration accepted the European law can still call their wine Champagne. It is only the new sparkling wine in the US that cannot carry this great name on their label.

In recent news, Australia’s producers of apera (a fortified wine, essentially Australian sherry) and topaque (Australian dessert wines) had their submission to have the new wine category terms ‘apera’ and ‘topaque’ entered into The Macquarie Dictionary, a publication which is nationally and internationally regarded as the standard reference on Australian English. The inclusion of these new terms has been prompted by an official trade agreement between Australia and the European Union that sees topaque replacing the term tokay in Australia and apera replacing sherry.

The Macquarie Dictionary definitions:

Apera: A fortified and blended wine of Australia, ranging in taste from dry to very sweet. See sherry.

Topaque: A rich, sweet, complex dessert wine of Australia

“Ah come on, don’t be daft!” is what you’re most certainly thinking. But it’s true. This September will see the transformation of a plot of urban concrete at Dublin’s IFSC into a living breathing Australian vineyard in the city.

The project is being engineered by one of the biggest global wine brands – McGuigans. Comprising rows of 60 year old Semillon vines in a turf soil, with an adjoining cellar bar and shop, complete with tractors, barrels and winemakers, the temporary vineyard will remain in situ from the 4th – 9th September. It has already been tried in Sydney, Melbourne and London in previous years, gathering plenty of interest from curious onlookers.

So what about permanent vineyards? Could Ireland itself ever be taken seriously as a wine producing nation, just as neighbouring England is now grooming a reputation for world class sparkling wine and very acceptable white and red wine? After all, the European Commission officially lists Ireland as a wine producing country.

Unfortunately, despite what the European Commission thinks, Ireland’s climate is, as we all know, pretty miserable. I mean surely I’m not the only one that dreams of a lengthy retirement in the south of France for nothing more than being able to enjoy the outdoors more, without being worried about a drenching or battling severe wind chills as soon as you step out the door. When we have the weather, there’s nowhere better, but unfortunately it’s rare. Very rare.

You only have to have lived in London for a short time to realise how drastically different the climate is, and that’s what separates a region of good winemaking potential and a region of not so good winemaking potential. I’ll not get into the reasons behind the differing weather systems, despite southern England only being a stones throw away from us in relative terms, but that hasn’t stopped some ambitious Irish winemakers giving it a go, even if it is with the use of poly tunnels.

Cork is a particular hot spot:

The Blackwater Valley Vineyard is located in Mallow, with five acres of vines. Even smaller is the Longueville House vineyard, also in Mallow. This is a mere 1.1 acres of vines, including Muller Thurgau and Reichensteiner, made into wine just for the restaurant. In Kinsale you can find the Thomas Walk Vineyard.

wineintro.com (Lisa Shea)

Picture sourced from shelflife.ie

What’s a couple of hundred thousand dollars for a bottle of wine when you’re a billionaire? Sure, why not. A bottle of wine once owned by the 3rd US president Thomas Jefferson is an attractive asset for those with a bottomless pit of cash. And it’s from Château Lafite, the famous French wine estate now owned by the Rothchild family. But of course, the big question. What are the chances it’ll be corked, or simply gone to vinegar? Very possible, but there’s yet a bigger question that must be asked. Is it a fake?

Back in 1985 a member of the Forbes family paid $156,000 for one of these bottles. That’s a lot of money now and it was even more money back then. It was purchased from Hardy Rodenstock at Christie’s Auction in London. At the time it was the world’s most expensive bottle of wine. Soon after questions began to be asked about the authenticity of Rodenstock’s find. The pop band manager turned wine collector was known for unearthing extremely old and exquisite wines, although his reputation was being questioned. After this, in 1992 a German court found that Rodenstock had knowingly offered adulterated wine for sale.

Now billionaire William I. Koch is involved in a lawsuit against Christie’s in which he accused the auction house of fraud over his purchase of four wines – the same wines sourced by Rodenstock and said to have been owned by Thomas Jefferson, and with the same telling signature on the bottle “Th.J”. Koch purchased the wines back in 1987 and 1988 but only discovered the controversy surrounding them in 2005. The Monticello report from 2005 revealed that Jefferson ordered an entire year’s supply of wine in a single purchase. The orders from 1787 to 1792 were intact and none reflected purchases of the “Th.J” wine.

Koch is said to be worth around $4 billion so I’m sure he’ll get over it, however, the mystery remains. No one really knows for sure if the wines are fake or if Rodenstock was pulling a flanker. To help shed more light on the matter a book called The Billionaire’s Vinegar – the mystery of the world’s most expensive bottle of wine – will make for a fascinating read.