Tag: Yetti & The Kokonut

Winter Wine Round Up

I haven’t done a wine round up for several months but the period around Christmas and New Year is always a significant one in terms of bottles opened and enjoyed with family and friends. The festive season provides a good excuse to open special bottles or something a little out of the ordinary and somehow the wines take on an additional significance when they are accompanied by great food and good company. Here are a few short notes on some of those that made a significant impression.

Arnot Roberts. Watsons Road Chardonnay. 2014. Napa Valley. USA. A Californian Chardonnay of such perfect balance. Intense flavours of lemon, stone fruit, almond and a touch of butter. There is a real elegance here. A savoury edge to the finish. Excellent and a real favourite around the table. This wine is a great example of what chardonnay can do in California when it is not overly oaked.

Bergstrom Old Stones Chardonnay. 2015. Oregon. USA. A lovely balance of orange, pear and stone fruits with a touch of gunsmoke. Fresh acidity and a touch of vanilla. Very nice.

Hamilton Russell Vineyards Chardonnay. 2014. Hemel-En- Aarde. South Africa. Yellow gold in appearance, clear and bright. Nose is tropical, nutty, lemon citrus and spicy vanilla. The palate is delightful, nicely balanced with good acidity to balance the rich fruit. The mouthfeel is slightly creamy and there are lovely flavours of tropical pineapple and almond marzipan. A lovely lemon zesty finish. Excellent stuff.

Yeti and the Kokonut. Savagnin. 2018. Adelaide Hills. Australia. Pale yellow, slightly hazy with aromas of lemon, pear and a slightly almond nuttiness. The palate is dry with nice texture and balance and a lovely lemony finish. Delightful, very nice indeed. Just wish I was in the Australian sun drinking it!

Chateau de Fieuzal. Pessac Leognan. 2010. France. A great depth of colour and slightly closed on the nose. The palate however is very expressive with black fruits, tobacco and a touch of liquorice. There is a softness and touch of sweetness to the palate. Excellent and very popular.

Chateau La Fleur Petrus. Pomerol. 1995. France. Wonderfully intense nose of black fruits, liquorice and menthol. The palate is full, rich and with lovely balance. An incredibly long finish. Superb.

Grahams 1983. Nose is complex with berries, dried fruit and fig. Drinking beautifully, rich but well balanced with a lingering finish. Wonderful.

Dows 1985. Stunningly good. Expressive, rich, savoury dried fruits with a touch of spice and soft tannins. This is drinking very well.

Chateau Sigalas-Rabaud. Sauternes. 2003. This is absolutely delicious. Such a well balanced wine, it has honeyed sweetness, citrus, almond and an excellent texture. Very very good.

New World Natural Wines

The monthly tasting at Bunch Natural Wine Bar on Berry Street in Liverpool had as its focus natural wines from the New World. While New World wines have a considerable share of sales in the UK the natural wines are perhaps not very well known and not so often encountered. This may be for a number of reasons but principally production is often small, in relative terms, and many wineries can sell their production within their own country. Couple that with the fact that natural wines are often made with little or no sulphur dioxide at bottling  means that they perhaps do not travel as well, especially over the huge distances from Australia and New Zealand. With these facts in mind it was a tasting that I very much looked forward to.

Naturalist Pet Nat. Cambridge Road. 2016. Martinborough. New Zealand. A blend of Sauvignon Blanc and Pinot Gris from Martinborough at the southern end of the North Island. The varieties are vinified separately using wild yeasts then blended together prior to bottling. There are aromas of lemon, pear and stone fruit which make this a very inviting drink. Dry but with a slight creamy texture thanks to the gentle mousse. Well balanced and with a lingering finish of lemon and a touch of bread yeast. Visit their website here

Since I Fell For You. Gewürztraminer. Ovum Wines 2016. Oregon. USA. Taking its name from a Nina Simone song this is a well made wine. Bags of floral, rose petal, lychee notes give way to tropical fruits. Medium bodied but rich in texture it is creamy with a hint of sweetness. The finish is long and floral. There is a purity of fruit here and a lovely freshness. This really is very nice. Visit their website here

Riviera Del Notro. Roberto Henriques 2017. Bio-Bio Valley/Itata. Chile A blend of Muscat, Semillon and Corinto. All have been vinified separately with skin contact; the Muscat for 5 months, Corinto for 7 months and the Semillon for 3 weeks. The wine is yellow/green with the slightest haze. There are intense aromas of grapes, roses and honeyed tropical fruits and this is reflected on the palate but with a slightly medicinal flavour. There is some volatile acidity. The wine improves a little in glass developing a smokey character. Very dry and a finish that lasts almost forever! A marmite of a wine, I became more of a fan as it opened out. Visit their website here

B’Rose. Yetti & the Kokonut. 2017. Barossa Valley. Australia.  David Geyer and Koen Janssens began their label as recently as 2015 and now make a range of low intervention wines from grapes sourced from the Barossa and Eden valleys in South Australia. This rosé is an unusual blend of Gewürztraminer (vinified on skins), Cabernet Franc and Grenache. It is a glorious salmon pink colour with aromas of strawberry fruit with a few floral notes thrown in. The palate is light, juicy red fruit, slightly off dry in style. My sample had warmed a little in glass and would have benefited from being a little more chilled but this is not an unattractive wine that would certainly go down well in the garden on a hot sunny afternoon. Their range is well worthy of further investigation.

Rockwell Red Blend. Minimus Wines. 2016. Oregon/Washington. USA. Winemaker Chad Stock started the Minimus label in 2011 with an underlying philosophy to embrace experimentation in winemaking and to continually strive to explore all the possibilities available in this region of North Western USA. This is the second vintage of Rockwell, a blend of 40% Tempranillo, 26% Sauvignon Blanc, 14% Viognier, 16% Syrah and 4% Chenin Blanc. This is a very unusual blend with lots of red fruits, floral, smokey, candy floss. There is a slight sweetness on the front palate but it is dry on the finish with some grippy tannins. There is an awful lot going on here – a crazy blend that actually works very well. Smooth, very drinkable and a lot of fun. Try it and you may be surprised just how much you like it. Visit their website here

Terracura Syrah. Silwervis Wines. 2015. Swartland. South Africa. Winemaker Ryan Mostert has made a New World wine which is very much Old World in style, reminiscent of the great syrahs of the France’s Rhone Valley. The nose is a little closed but there are hints of berry fruits and smokey spice. The palate is dry with dark berry fruit, leather and peppery spice. The finish has some lovely brambly fruit. This wine needs a little time to soften a little at the edges. Very nice now but put a bottle or so away for a few years and it will be well worth the wait. Visit their website here