May 2012
10 posts
9 tags
WINE OF THE WEEK #075
Hi everybody,
I am sort of in a Bordeaux vibe lately and I am starting to get familiar with the grapes, the differences in the soil, the vintages and even the different AOC’s.
The wine I am going to taste today holds the AOC “Médoc”. This is the AOC closest to the sea at the north-west top area of the left bank. What is particular for me is the classification “Cru...
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WINE OF THE WEEK #074
Aaagh, it feels good to be back behind my portable, ready to write another wine review!
As you’ve seen here on my blog, I just got back from a short trip to Bordeaux. A week after I decided to blog about Bordeaux wines, I suddenly got invited to visit the region. Obviously, it was impossible to say no to winery visits, dinner parties and more. But, one thing was hard for me : not be...
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WINE OF THE WEEK #073
Excited, I am. Curious, are you?
The 1st bordeaux wine is here, and I have no clue at all what to expect. I just have no experience whatsoever with the typical grapes or Bordeaux in general. So, all my hope goes into this bottle for my first Bordeaux impression. And a wise man once said to me : “you never get a second chance to make a first impression”
So I wish the next bottle...
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Theme of the month - BORDEAUX - May 2012
Hi everybody,
it’s the first day of a new month, and a quick scroll through my winelist tells me this is the 17th theme I will blog for you! Pretty neat right?
After tasting 2 fantastic grape varieties (pinot noir & nebbiolo) that are such anchors in the history of wine, I am going to taste wines from the best known wineregion in the world : Bordeaux. I guess every young winelover...
April 2012
13 posts
7 tags
WINE OF THE WEEK #072
Hey, it’s me again. My blogging mojo has never been so high, so I guess I will just ride the wave and write another post about Nebbiolo.
With pain in my heart, I have to accept the fact that I have no more bottles left after this one. I have been indulged in elegance and authenticity the last 2 months (Pinot Noir & Nebbiolo) - but every great story must have an end. Let’s hope it...
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A field trip to ALSACE - pt.2
Hi everybody,
A while ago I went to Alsace in France to taste and select wines that would suit the Belgian market. After I got back, I wrote down some reflections and impressions about the issues Alsace has to deal with as a wineregion in France, and as a “brand” or export product in Belgium. (LINK to pt.1)
I believe today is the perfect timing to write the 2nd chapter of my Alsace...
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WINE OF THE WEEK #071
Oh yes,
I’m back with another Nebbiolo wine and my box isn’t empty yet.
Today we are tasting from the NINO NEGRI winery, their cuvee LE TENSE (d.o.c.g. Valtellina Superiore Sassella) - 2007
As I told you in my previous post (wine #068) , the Valtellina region is located in Lombardy in Italy and the conditions are a bit like Douro, but the the frozen version of that Portugese...
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WINE OF THE WEEK #070
Great,
yesterday I completed a project (I’m an architect) so I am free of deadline stress and can finally put my energy in tasting wine n°70!
Because my eyelids are still a bit heavy (sleep was not on my list last week), I wanted to go for a lighter wine so I picked this bottle out of my nebbiolo box:
It’s the Nebbiolo d’Alba d.o.c. 2009 from the BATTAGLINO winery.
I could...
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WINE OF THE WEEK #069
Hi Tumblrz, how are you all doing?
It’s been a small week since I’m back from my short trip to Turin in Italy. I really needed a break and I decided to go to the birthplace of Nebbiolo. I tried to taste as many Nebbiolo wines as possible, but mostly I ended up enjoying the sparkling wines from northern Italy, while Nebbiolo was more a struggle to enjoy. But, I must say, with the...
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WINE OF THE WEEK #068
Let’s kick off the Nebbiolo theme with the odd bottle.
I am going for a couple of days to Turin, Piedmont to indulge myself in the heritage of the Nebbiolo grape, so I only want to taste the “real” nebbiolo wines with my trip in the back of my head. Hence, this wine goes first.
UNIQATO (Damianitza winery) - Rubin 2007
I call this the odd bottle because of the grape :...
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Theme of the month - NEBBIOLO - April 2012
Hi winelovers,
I am a bit sad to say that my box of pinot noir wines is empty. It has been great to discover a fabulous grape and especially the ones from Burgundy. I somehow knew I loved pinot noir, but now I am sure I do!
My stomach, my little toe, my subconscience and my tastebuds are sending me the exact same signals for this new theme. I am overly excited to announce you that I have another...
March 2012
9 posts
9 tags
WINE OF THE WEEK #067
Hi everyone,
there is no better way to end this Pinot Noir theme with another Burgundy. Classics are there to be respected, and thus I kept the next bottle until the end:
Michel Sarrazin - Cuvée Champs Lalot - AOC Givry - 2009
It took me a while to figure out where the AOC of Givry was located. A friend of mine pointed me towards a website called Burgundy Report where you can find loads of...
Watchtheviinitv:
The episode where we try to convince you that we can read + we’re drinking some pinotage
Pinotage and WINE (book by Filip Verheyden-Tong magazine)
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WINE OF THE WEEK #066
Finally Tumblrz, we are back with a new post. The 4th pinot noir of the bunch, and I still have one to go!
Everything is loud and clear on the label : the grapes, the DOC. Everyone who is not familiar with Südtirol or Alto Adige : this is a region in Northern Italy, south of the Alps, and located more towards Venice than towards Turin.
The region is mostly known for their...
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WINE OF THE WEEK #065
Hi there,
After a more critical post about the problems Alsace wines are facing today, I’m back again with what I do best, and that is tasting wine. Today we are having the 3th Pinot Noir, and yes my friends, you can even make sparkling wine from Pinot Noir!
This is a “sekt” from Leth, and it’s their Methode Traditionelle Brut 2007, from the Wagram region in Austria.
...
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A field trip to ALSACE - pt.1
Hi everyone,
on the first weekend of March I joined a group of flemish winepro’s for a trip to the Alsace region. Our goal : discover why wines from Alsace are so unpopular in Flanders. We had 2 great dinners with the head of marketing for CIVA (Conseil Interprofessionel des Vins d’Alsace) and tasted a flight of 120 samples of various wines from the region.
As soon as we sat...
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WINE OF THE WEEK #064
What’s up!?
Are you ready for some Wine? Are you ready for some Pinot Noir? Are you ready for some Burgundy?
Let’s go!
This is a wine from Philippe Gavignet , cuvée Clos des Dames Huguettes from Burgundy (AOC Hautes-côtes de Nuits)
This AOC is actually a vast area of small plots located on the hills and valleys around the village of Nuits-Saint-Georges. You can see on the image...
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WINE OF THE WEEK #063
Allright,
as you have read in my previous post, I’ve got 5 Pinot Noirs to taste instead of 4, so I am giving myself the pleasure this weekend to taste the first wine straight away.
One of those five wines has been staring at me for weeks, almost begging me to uncork it. So I am not going to push my luck, and obey the winegods.
I start with the LETH - Pinot noir reserve 2009 from the...
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Theme of the month - PINOT NOIR - March 2012
Hi everyone,
I have been travelling around the world with my last couple of themes : Portugal, Belgium, South-Africa, Hungary, France. Those themes helped me a lot to discover cool regions and learn more about the wineworld in general, but I always got the feeling that this kind of research stays a bit superficial and simplistic. I feel it’s time to focus again. So I got the idea to...
February 2012
6 posts
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WINE OF THE WEEK #062
Hi everyone,
I’m back with an exciting post! We are going to taste a Pinotage today, from the Altydgedacht winery from Durbanville in South Africa.
First of all, I have to tell you the story behind the grape : PINOTAGE.
Pinotage is a cross between Pinot Noir & Cinsaut, made in 1925 by Abraham Izak Perold, a viticulture professor at the Stellenbosch University at the time....
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WINE OF THE WEEK #061
Hi guys & girls,
today we are tasting the wine that surprised me the most in the selection that the South-African wineshop “Paradisi” made for me. We are going to taste some SA riesling! In the glass we have the SUTHERLAND, Rhine Riesling 2008 from THELEMA vineyards.
If you’ve been following my blog since somewhere in June last year, you know I’m a riesling-head and...
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WINE OF THE WEEK #060
Hi friends,
I finally found the time to taste my second South-African wine. Today we are going to discover Viognier, a grape that seems to be very well known, but a grape that never filled up my glass. Tonight, that’s about to change with this wine from La Petite Ferme in Franschhoek, S-A.
It will not surprise you that the origin of the grape is France! More specifically from the Rhône...
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WINETWUNCH 3 : Bigger & better!
Hi Everyone!
It’s Saturday morning right now, and last thursday is still a very vivid memory. For the third time I attended a winetwunch, an idea that started on twitter 8 months ago. The concept is genious: You bring a bottle, you have a seat, and you eat & taste all night long. Having 20 people around the table means you’ll taste 20 different wines.
And this is what we’ve...
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WINE OF THE WEEK #059
Hey, it’s me again!
I couldn’t wait to get started and I was already preparing to start this new theme with the viognier ‘La petite ferme’, but by the end of this week, a giant cold wave hit Belgium. It’s been 4 days that temperatures do not go above -3°C, and as I am tasting this wine right now it’s -13°C outside!
So the white wine back in the fridge, and...
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Theme of the month - SOUTH-AFRICA - January 2012
Yes! It’s time for a new theme! I actually had the idea to taste wines from South-Africa (S-A from now on) in October last year after having a conversation with a friend of mine on twitter who was in Kenia and wanted to enjoy a good glass. She asked me for advice, because S-A wines where the only ones available in Kenia.
And so I gave here the names of cool wineries I knew like Lammershoek,...
January 2012
8 posts
7 tags
January - The final post !
Hi there,
it’s time to unravel the mistery, to unwrap the bottles and to tell you what I’ve been tasting. So far, I have no clue and after the last bottle, more questions came up and less answers were given to me.
So let’s start with the beginning:
WINE N°1 My prediction was a German chardonnay from 2007 for a price of €16. I remember I really liked the acidity on the wine,...
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WINE OF THE WEEK #058
Hi everyone,
after a busy week it’s time to do the final blind tasting and to discover the theme that my girlfriend prepared for me. So far she picked wines for me that scored two gold medals and a silver one, so a very good start. Let’s hope the last one is not the least one, and maybe I can finally tell you guys what I have been tasting.
Let’s begin!
Appearance Again a very...
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WINE OF THE WEEK #057
Hi Tumblrz,
after 2 blind white wines (I guessed Chardonnay and Riesling, both cold climate), it’s time to dive into the red wines and see what my blind tasting skills are worth now. And maybe I will find the first clue for the theme I am trying to unravel here…
Appearance A very interesting colour. It appears completely “normal” ruby red, but 3 aspects are slightly...
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WINE OF THE WEEK #056
Hi tumblrz,
time to get back to business. My senses are focused, I am focused and the next blind bottle is open. Here we go!!
Appearance It’s a high bottle, that’s one, so maybe that influences what I’m about to sniff. The colour of the juice is a deep deep yellow, I would call it even peach yellow, because there are hints of orange/red when I swirl it around. Clear, bright,...
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IN DE WULF - Dining with nature
This weekend I had an amazing experience.
My girlfriend and I had some reasons to celebrate and we decided to have dinner at a great restaurant. We like what nature has to offer, pure and simple, and we like our food elegant and well balanced. And so we ended up at “In de Wulf”, the restaurant of chef Kobe Desramaults.
A lot of my friends asked me to take pictures of the food...
The "Saturn Wine Glasses".
American art student Christopher Yamane of fragile studios adapts traditional glassblowing techniques towards the creation of an unspillable drinking glass : ‘Saturn Wine Glasses’… by folding a bubble of glass, trapping air within it, he creates the ‘Saturn ring’ that circumferences the bowl.
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WINE OF THE WEEK #055
Hi guys,
I’m so thrilled to start sniffing, sipping and spitting my way into this mistery. I really don’t know what to expect and I hope I’ve learned enough over the past year and 54 wines to make an educated guess on what’s in my glass right now. Let’s kick off and make some predictions when we’re done.
Appearance It’s a white wine! Score :) The colour...
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Theme of the month - ??? - January 2012
Hi everyone,
it’s 2012 and I’m back with a new theme!
A while back I was thinking how I could spice up my blog a bit and me & my girlfriend came up with the following theme. I gave her €50 to spend on 4 bottles of wine. This month, I will try to unravel the mistery theme she has put together.
This is the selection, and all I know is that n°1 and 2 are white wines, n°3 and 4...
December 2011
7 posts
10 tags
WINE OF THE WEEK #054
Hi everyone,
I have been having a blast since I started this wineblog. I’ve learned so much about wine in general : the regions, the grapes, terroir, climate, techniques, natural wines, sparkling wines, fortified wines, … the list is endless. But most of all, I’ve met a lot of people and made some really good friends. And maybe that’s what I like the most about wine,...
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WINE OF THE WEEK #053
What’s up Tumblrz?!
I am so excited that christmas is just around the corner. Hibernating around the christmas tree with the family is just all you need when it’s cold & dark outside.
But before we taste the last bottle of this year during my hibernation, we are going to taste a red wine from the Loire valley, again :
it’s CHINON time! CHARLES JOGUET - AOC Chinon -...
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WINE OF THE WEEK #052
Hi girls & guys,
after a disappointing wine last week, it’s time to change direction and head south for a bit of fun, for some ‘plaisir’. And there is another reason to celebrate! That’s right, it’s blog number 52, I’ve done it! Can’t believe I’ve been doing this every week since december last year.
I am putting all my hopes and celebrations...
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WINE OF THE WEEK #051
Hi Tumblrs,
I’ve had a busy week and am finally able to write a new review and to enjoy (hopefully) a nice bottle of wine over the weekend. For this second red wine from France I’ve picked out the Burgundy. It’s pinot time!
BERNARD LAGARRIGUE - AOC Monthelie - 2007
And again, it’s amazing when you break down the AOC. We are in France (duh), Burgundy (less duh) , Beaune...