Curious Small Sip #41: Aussie Sparkling Shiraz
Not the most common wine to be found in a kitchen cupboard or home wine rack, Australian Sparkling Shiraz is something we are shouting about from the rooftops this Christmas.
Small sips
Curious Small Sip #40: Eiswein
Mother nature’s sweet, sweet nectar. So sweet, in fact, it can have almost double the amount of sugar as Coca-Cola. Eiswein has its origins in the Rheingau Valley in Germany, where research suggests that it was the mishap of a particularly cold winter in 1794.
Curious Small Sip #39: Aragón
The Aragón wine region is a tough, arid place in the northeast of Spain, sandwiched between two significant mountain ranges: the Pyrenees in the north and the Iberian System to the south. The massive basin between the two is home to four wine making regions.
Curious Small Sips #38: Tempranillo
The Tempranillo grape is a treasure from Spanish soil. Drought-resistant, thick-skinned and resilient—all reasons why it is one of the top five most grown grape varieties in the world. Tempranillo boasts dominant flavours of red fruits, cherry, fig and earthy cedar.
Curious Small Sips #37: Carbonic Maceration
Originally discovered by French scientist Michel Flanzy, and later perfected by Beaujolais négociant, taster and chemist Jules Chauvet, carbonic maceration is a winemaking process used to create a style of red wine that is lively, fresh and fruity on the nose; and soft and light on the palate.
Curious Small Sips #36: Champagne
Ah, Champagne, the Rolls Royce of the wine world. This radiant prestigious wine was developed from sparkling wine said to have been first discovered by Benedictine monks in 1531. The monks bottled some wine before the fermentation process had finished—a lucky mistake that resulted in a bubbly.
Curious Small Sips #35: Alsace
Welcome to International Wine Region Ping-pong. Alsace has been bounced back and forth between France and Germany numerous times, and currently lives in France.
Curious Small Sips #34: Racking
Racking is part of the production process in wine, but maybe isn’t what you think it is. The word racking itself originated from the Old English term ‘rakken’, which means skins, pips and stalks of the grape.
Curious Small Sips #33: Chardonnay
Remember that über-popular, good-looking kid at school who was really good at everything, and we mean e-ve-ry-thing? Well, that’s Chardonnay. Chardonnay probably originated in France as a cross between Pinot Noir and Gouais Blanc.
Curious Small Sips #32: Douro
The Douro Valley is the world’s largest mountainous vineyard. Carving through the north of Portugal, the Douro River, also known as ‘The River of Gold’, has been a winemaking hub since the 3rd century AD, rising in prominence as a exporter of wine in the late 17th century.
Curious Small Sips #31: Merlot
Poor Merlot. Imagine being one of the greats of the winemaking industry, but nearly always being talked about in the context of either a) another grape or b) worse still, a movie.
Curious Small Sips #30: Marlborough
Known for its distinctive Sauvignon Blanc wines that practically shout “Kia ora!" (Hello!) from the glass, New Zealand’s Marlborough region is tucked up on the northeast corner of the country’s South Island.
Curious Small Sips #29: France
France has 11 major wine regions, spread over different climate zones, allowing winemakers to create various wine styles, depending on the grapes, weather and the local terroir.
Curious Small Sips #28: Pinot Grigio
Pinot Grigio is an incredibly adaptable grape, making it one of the most popular among winemakers globally. (Which accounts for its frankly ridiculous number of aliases: 227 in total.
Curious Small Sips #27: Abruzzo
Abruzzo lies between the Adriatic Sea and the Apennines in the cradle of the two massifs of the Gran Sasso d’Italia and the Majella. The land can be roughly divided into two areas: the mountainous interior, which constitutes over 65% of the entire regional territory and the coastal region.
Curious Small Sips #26: Casablanca Valley
The Casablanca Valley is an important wine growing region situated between Santiago and the port of Valparaiso and is officially part of the Acongagua region of Chile, although the wines are very different here than in the northern vineyards.
Curious Small Sips #25: Sangiovese
This ancient variety dating back to the Etruscan era is Italy’s most planted grape and is particularly common in Tuscany in Central Italy, down to Campania and Sicily in the South.
Curious Small Sips #24: Tuscany
Tuscany, known as Toscana in central Italy, is a famously undulating and beautiful area noted as being the birthplace of artistic geniuses Michelangelo, Giotto and Da Vinci, science boffin Galileo, and opera singer Andrea Bocelli.
Curious Small Sips #23: Wine Lake
It sounds idyllic doesn’t it? Who wouldn’t want a dip in an antioxidant-rich body of violet-tinged Cabernet Sauvignon or slightly sparkling Chenin Blanc? Alas, the real wine lake is actually far less glamorous than that and won’t offer any anti-ageing solutions.
Curious Small Sips #22: Mendoza
Just the small matter of a mountain range stands between Santiago in Chile and the wine region of Mendoza which is arguably Argentina's most important wine growing province which accounts for over 70% of Argentina's production.
Curious Small Sips #21: Malbec
Malbec is a dark-skinned grape that is most associated with the high-altitude (up to 3,000 metres!), desert vineyards of Argentina's Mendoza region. The variety is in fact originally from southwest France, where it is still widely cultivated today, especially in Cahors.
Curious Small Sips #20: Carménère
Carménère’s story is by now well known. Originally found in the Médoc, Bordeaux, it wasn’t replanted in the region after the ravages of phlloxera (that pesky vine-killing louse) in the late 19th century.
Curious Small Sips #19: Chile
Chile is a very long and narrow country on the west coast of South America that, after years of overproduction of cheap and forgettable table wine, has slowly and confidently built a reputation for competitively priced varietal wine of a high standard.
Curious Small Sips #18: Riesling
Much maligned and misunderstood, the powerful little white grape Riesling (pronounced Reece-ling according to Jancis Robinson if you are stickler for pronunciation) is one of Germany’s most important grape varieties.