September 2020 – Red Rioja Our latest tasting by Zoom was to compare and discuss traditional red Riojas. We were delighted to welcome some IWFS members from the north west, an advantage of getting together technologically, without travelling! The three wines suggested, easily obtainable from Majestic, were all from the Rioja Alta region, in traditional/classical style, with extended ageing in …
LONDON WINE TASTING – Chardonnay by Zoom
August 2020 – New World “Rich and Oaky” Chardonnays We tasted and compared three New World Chardonnays at different levels of complexity, all described as “rich and oaky” by Zoom. Participants had been advised in advance of the wines, all available from Majestic, so that they could have them delivered from their local branch. In the early 1970s Chardonnay accounted …
LONDON WINE TASTING – Pinot Noir by Zoom
July 2020 – Pinot Noir – or, your choice! Our first tasting by Zoom was a very informal social event, with Pinot Noir as the optional feature, for us to drink and chat about what we were enjoying drinking during lockdown. Alan led our discussion, while we drank at our own pace! He had brought along four bottles that he …
LONDON WINE TASTING: Vieux Télégraphe
June 2020 Last year IWFS London Branch held an five-star fine Châteauneuf du Pape wine tasting. However, we couldn’t taste all the top wines, and Domaine du Vieux Télégraphe was not among them, although we did have a wine dinner featuring this domaine. Fortunately for us, we had one bottle of the great 2001 vintage left. We had no excuse …
LONDON WINE TASTING – Chateau Musar
May 2020 Another month of lockdown slips by. I’ll be missing the sociability of comparing several wines connected by a theme, and learning as we go, for a while yet. We opened a bottle of Chateau Musar 2000 the other evening. “Eccentric wines, which have baffled and bewitched,” as Pierre Mansour of the Wine Society has described the wines, from …
IWFS LONDON BLOG – Wines during Lockdown
April 2020 No wine tastings for me to report on while we are all in lockdown. In the circumstances we are doing our best to enjoy drinking wine chez nous – and observing the proprieties by occasionally keeping a day or two alcohol-free. I used to have a big book made for the purpose with pages of columns, to record …
IWFS LONDON WINE TASTING – Mature Champagne and English Sparkling Wines
March 2020 The last wine tasting I got to before lockdown was on How Sparkling Wines Mature, presented by Bernard Lamb. This tasting of ten bottles explored champagnes and English sparkling wines, vintage and non-vintage, at different stages of maturity. Generally with age, sparkling, wines lose fizz and freshness and gain depth of flavour and complexity. But it is …
IWFS LONDON WINE TASTINGS – China, France and South Africa
February 2020 The events I attended this month illustrated different approaches to wine tasting. The wines for our Chinese wine tasting were a selection from a lot bought at auction. They are not exported to the UK, so we did not know what they would cost, and could not assess their value that way. The labels in Chinese provided no …
IWFS LONDON BLOG January 2020
From a fine dinner in Mayfair to a bistro supper in Pimlico, two contrasting events this month, both delightful. Early in January we dressed up for formal fine dining in elegant Belle Epoque style surroundings, recently refurbished, at the Savile Club, based in an elegant 18th-century house in Brook Street, Mayfair. This is a social ‘gentlemen’s’ members’ club. Many celebrated …
IWFS London Blog December 2019
As it’s the end-of-year, please indulge my reminiscing about some of our events in central London over the last twelve months. We held a Dinner in January at Tredwells in Covent Garden. This is a restaurant in the Marcus Wareing group, focusing on contemporary British produce, whose Chef Patron is Chantelle Nicholson. The four courses were each matched by appropriate …