News from the vine!
Hot off the press – I’m holding a wine tasting at Supermercado Mendoza, Albir on Friday 7th December, 12:00 – 15:00 hrs and again 17:00 – 19:00 hrs; as well as Saturday 8th December 12:00 – 15:00 hrs.
We are tasting wines from Australia and New Zealand supplied by the leading New World Wine distributors in Spain!
It’s very informal, there’s no need to reserve – just come along, taste some wines and have a chat!
You can do your shopping whilst there too!
Hope to see you soon!
Akira would like to say a massive thank you to Colin who helped us make our wine tasting charity event a huge success.
The event was held at the Restaurant Salamanca in Jalon and Colin organised a selection of five brilliant wines from Bodegas Castaño, DO Yecla and Bodegas Sierra Salinas, DO Alicante, as well as making a generous donation of several wines to the charity raffle.
The wines were accompanied by five different cheeses too, and Colin shared his knowledge of both the wine and cheese, talking everyone through the tasting sessions. Many commented on his professionalism and enjoyed the evening, and by the time they left, knew a little more about wine. An excellent evening and you helped our charity raise 635 euros – so thank you!
Akira is an animal protection charity for Teulada, Moraira and Benissa and for information on our work visit www.akira-animals.com
Although I love the wines of my adoptive country, Spain, I’m certainly not averse to tasting wines from other countries! Indeed, whilst the variety of Spanish wines is vast with lots to please all palates, it’s good to try wines from elsewhere – given the chance!
And that’s the point – it’s not easy to find wines from other European countries, let alone examples from the Southern Hemisphere. So, as you can imagine, I was delighted to be asked to present one wine from Chile and two from South Africa recently for an informal tasting in Albir’s famous Supermercado Mendoza.
GIRABEBE, is a large distributor of New World wines throughout Spain supplying Hypermarkets like Carrefour as well as smaller independant supermarkets along the costas and islands. If you’ve bought a wine here but made in Australia, New Zealand, California, Chile and/or RSA it’s likely to have been supplied by GIRABEBE.
And, of course it was their Commercial Director, Juan Carlos, who asked me to be involved with the Mendoza tasting (incidentally, the Mondoza valley is a major wine producing area of Chile – but there’s no connection!).
A crisp and refreshing Sauvignon Blanc, from the Gran Tierra winery, which is nestled in the hills beneath the Andes, displays some of the varietal characteristics of this enduringly popular variety. Light (so is the bottle, made deliberately lighter in weight to help the environment), easy and most pleasant drinking!
The Western Cape of South Africa is home to several large producers, Kumala being one of the more famous. Their Rosé wine, made from Cabernet, Merlot, Shiraz and the indigenous Pinotage has just a touch of residual sugar making is very slightly sweeter than bone dry. Lovely with Paella!
My favourite of the three was the Kumala 50/50 blend of Cabernet Sauvignon and Shiraz 2011. Remarkably approachable so young in it’s life, this fruit driven red will also be super chilled down a little for top Summer drinking!
There may well be further tastings of New World wines – please watch this space!
Short notice, I know, but I only found out about this yesterday!
I’m presenting a range of wines from South Africa and Chile – white, rosado and red at Supermercado Mendoza, Albir, of Friday 2nd and Saturday 3rd November, 12:00 hrs to 15:00 hrs.
There’s no need to reserve, you can pop in at any time during the session and all the wines will be available to taste – plus, it’s FREE!
If you can make it – I’ll see you there!