Grogger

A colleague asked me for some advice on finding a dry Riesling, so I thought I’d post the email here, just in case you might be looking for something similar.

Hello,

Forgive me if you know this already, but I think the best places for dry Riesling is Clare Valley and Eden Valley near Adelaide. Anything with those appellations on the bottle will be dry, zesty, limey and zingy! I’m sure there are some good German/Alsace dry Rieslings, but I’m less confident knowing how to pick them.

Look out for Knappstein, Peter Lehmann and Grossett producers, and my favourite is the Pewsey Vale Riesling, but can’t find it in any supermarkets. What’s great about Eden/Clare Valley Rieslings, is they are super fresh and dry to enjoy young, but have enough acid to age for a long time into something even more interesting.

Try…

Pewsey Vale Riesling
From N. D. John

The Lodge Hill Riesling 2012 Jim Barry, Clare Valley (nice label)
From Majestic

O’Leary Walker Polish Hill Riesling
From Ocado

Henschke Julius Riesling 2009 (if I had the money!)
From Tesco

Also, Austria tends to make white wines in a much drier style, so check out…

Loimer Seeberg Riesling (Loimer make great wines!)
From Tesco

And maybe try a Gruner Veltliner, which tend to be VERY dry!
From Waitrose

Hope that helps,

Ed
x

Here’s a selection of wines that we’re been fortunate enough to sample recently, with quite a big Spanish influence…

Gotes del Priorat, a kind gift from our boss who had enjoyed it at a restaurant the previous evening, and brought in the rest for us to taste. Ripe, juicy and a bit smoky, the perfect match to barbecued meaty things.

During a delightful meal at Moro, we were lucky enough to spot Castell del Remei’s Gotim Bru on the list. It was a favourite from our college days (no money for food, plenty for good quality vino) and was as delicious as we remember, a supple frech Rioja alternative. An ideal house wine (if we could ever afford a house) and an elegant label.

The Bodegas Macià Batle was deeper and richer and a good match the the charcoal grilled lamb we were tucking into.

More from Spain, this Manuel de la Osa from La Mancha, enjoyed at the Clerkenwell Kitchen, was a big jammy blend of Syrah, Graciano, Tempranillo, Cab Franc and Merlot.

All of these wines represent what we most like about Spanish wine. Gutsy blends of classic Spanish grapes and traditionally French varieties, ripe fruit flavours and bags of food friendly fun – hunt them down and crack them open.

A gift from a friend who we explored the Hunter VAlley with, this was a premium cool and very smooth Shiraz – thanks Su!

And finally, the debris from the ‘Same Grape, Different Flavour’ wine tasting we hosted at the Clerkenwell office of Figtree/Prophet. Riesling, chardonnay, pinot noir and shiraz from different part of the world were all compared, contrasted and heartily glugged. We’ll go into more detail in another post, but the Les Gravieres Crozes-Hermitage, with big meaty blackcurrant flavours, was our standout winner.

Cheers!

Well, it’s spring: that time of the year where the makes a brief cameo, we scrape the mould off our Birkenstocks and D&AD release their award nominations. As always, it’s a mixed bag of genuinely good work, advertising back-patting and a sausage fest.

Here’s our round-up of wine stuff that is in-book and up for an award:

Mysterium Wine
Agency: Spotlight, Client: Jidvei

A super-gold Aztec-style printed bottle with a spot UV varnish that reveals the name of the wine under a black light.

Rasurado
Agency: Morales y Euba (Moruba), Client: Arar

Very funky barber-pole graphics for this Rioja. BUT we have seen this visual before and we don’t think this design has ever actually been applied to a real bottle. We certainly can’t find any stockists or any images beyond what we’ve seen on design blogs.

Stina
Agency: Bruketa & Zinic, Client: Jako Vino

A very simple white label, debossed into thick uncoated paper, provides a ‘canvas’ to be painted on by drips of wine from the bottle.

Well, they’re all quite nice really, but nothing really earth-shattering concept-wise. And we have a real problem with entering mock-ups to be judged as real work.

However, the best wine-related entry has to be this project, selected in the writing for design category…

The Wine That Sold Beer
Agency: Colenso BBDO, Client: DB Breweries

Riffing on the idea that blokes don’t really care much about wine and would rather have a beer, these bottles were placed in New Zealand wine shops. On closer inspection they are coupon to receive money off DB beer.

Although not nominated for an award, we’d also recommend watching this advert from the same campaign.

A clean, colourful and very cool identity and website for Keizo, a new online wine merchant founded by two sommeliers. It’s great to see a wine brand employing contemporary design, and the website also includes an entire section on Madeira – that’s classy.

Design by Visual Fields and Pixel Pudding

Simple typographic packaging for Fidesser wines from Austria.

Designed by Erwin Bauer