Decanter March 2023

You may notice that we’ve gone classically retro on the cover this month, in a slightly tongue-in-cheek homage to the heritage and heft of Bordeaux. And while the château pictured doesn’t actually exist, except in the mind of our illustrator, we will definitely be building it. Just as soon as that elusive lottery win turns up. Because isn’t that everybody ’s dream – a52-roomed, picture-perfect palace with manicured lawns, topiaried shrubbery and river view? The lifestyle seems even more atttactive when you meet the representatives of Bordeaux’s great estates; they ’re elegantly dressed, beautifully mannered and all have terrific hair. However, don’t be fooled by the inch-thick veneer of luxurious splendour. Wine here, like everywhere, is a business. And an agricultural business at that. Which means dealing with the unforgiving…

AMANDA BARNES is a writer and presenter specialising in South American wine and travel. A DWWA judge, she is author of the award-winning The South America Wine Guide (£35 southamerica wineguide.com) ELAINE CHUKAN BROWN is a widely published and internationally awarded wine writer, speaker and educator. Originally from Alaska, they now live in Sonoma, and specialise in climate action and social justice in wine JONATHAN CRISTALDI is a widely published writer on wine, spirits and beer. Based in California, he is editor-at-large for both The Somm Journal and The Tasting Panel magazine, contributing to various other titles including Food & Wine GEORGINA HINDLE is Decanter’s Bordeaux correspondent, tasting and writing about the wines of the region where she lives, as well as editor of Decanter Premium, overseeing global fine wine…

French government steps in to help crisis-hit producers F rance’sgovernment has said up to €160m (£142m) could be made available to help crisis-hit producers drain surplus wine this year. The funding would aid winemakers wishing to distil excess wine into industrial alcohol – amethod also used previously to cut overproduction. This could ease a short-term ‘wine sector crisis’, France’s Ministry of Agriculture said, explaining that inflation linked to the war in Ukraine has exacerbated preexisting structural challenges faced by some French vineyard regions. A distillation scheme could begin this summer, using €40m of state funds and €40m from the European Agricultural Guarantee Fund, as allowed by EU rules, the Ministry said. This funding could be repeated to launch a second distillation scheme in October, it added, stating that it plans…

■ Hardcore Burgundy fans queued outside Norway’s state alcohol retailer Vinmonopolet in Oslo more than two weeks before its February release of top cuvées, including Domaine de la Romanée-Conti wines. Six people were queuing by 26 January, said Arnt Egil Nordlien, Vinmonopolet senior product manager fine wine and auctions. ‘ There are facilities available close by (toilets, showers, food) and they all know who is number one to six in the queue.’ ■ Liquid Icons, a company founded by the late Gerard Basset OBE MW MS and his friend Lewis Chester, has launched the 2023 Taylor’s Port Golden Vines Diversity Scholarships in Wine, which it said are designed to help ‘aspiring black and ethnic minority students (BAME/BIPOC) wishing to undertake the Master of Wine and Master Sommelier programmes’. A scholarship…

Uzuntawas the last hamlet. Then it was up through the snows of the Khikhata pass: still wet in early winter, but the fat, swirling flakes brightened the cinder-grey forest. That ridge divides Georgia’s Imereti region from its northern neighbour, Racha, whose often steeply sloping vineyards line the river Rioni. I’d visited Kakheti, Kartli and Imereti before – Georgia’s dominant central wine-producing zones; but never the wild exterior. From the ice-crisped cemetery grass of the 11th-century church of St George, dominating the mountaintop village of Mravaldzali, we looked north across the mountains of the Greater Caucasus, Europe’s highest. The silence, and the vista, was daunting. Hundreds of dry, drab valleys lost themselves in as many snowy peaks. Russia lay beyond. There was, apparently, a way over: the Mamisoni pass. But you’d…

Foundationalto the notion of terroir is the story of Burgundy. It is a relationship between Pinot Noir and the monks’ investment in defining place, identifying growing conditions in a complex tapestry of climat and cru that has inspired winemakers worldwide. Countless vintners have sought to replicate its magic elsewhere, planting Pinot around the globe. With it has developed an assertion almost unquestioned – Pinot Noir is the grape most expressive of terroir. But in wines grown outside the Côte d’Or, we rarely find the magic of eastern France. If we can learn a lesson from Burgundy, it’s that the world’s great wines cannot be replicated by relocating their vines. The newer region must build its own defining relationship between the grapes best suited to its conditions and those who invest…