http://bbrblog.com The closest link between the people that make wine and the people that drink it Fri, 12 Mar 2010 12:05:20 +0000 http://backend.userland.com/rss092 en Last week Olivier Humbrecht MW of Domaine Zind Humbrecht come over to Berrys to give us a preview of his 2008 range, which is already showing real elegance with delicious acidity: http://bbrblog.com/2010/03/12/olivier-humbrecht-shows-us-his-2008s/ At the end of the month Signor Claudio Rosso bows out after three years as the (Honorary) President of the Langhe and Roero Consorzio, representing most - but not all - of the hundreds of (Nebbiolo, Barbera, Dolcetto, Arneis, Moscato) producers in the region. Last week I caught up with him ... http://bbrblog.com/2010/03/08/interview-with-claudio-rosso-president-of-the-langhe-and-roero-consorzio/ Right, before I start recounting the details of an epic 10 vintage Pontet-Canet Dinner last night, I thought it best to update you on my progress; as I’ve now been here for over a month and would consider myself a local (in fact I have my first visitor next week!), ... http://bbrblog.com/2010/03/04/on-becoming-a-%e2%80%98local%e2%80%99/ Rhône 2008 is just about to hit the market so while we were out there recently we had lunch with Mark Perrin from Ch. de Beaucastel and talked about the characteristics of the vintage. In this video he tells us about the climatic conditions, which at times proved challenging, as ... http://bbrblog.com/2010/03/03/rhone-2008/ Last week we had the opportunity to sample a range of 1990s in Berrys' Long Room (left), which confirmed the reputation of the vintage. Enhanced it even! The evening was mostly about Burgundy, albeit sandwiched between some white Bordeaux wines, Domaine de Chevalier and Laville Haut-Brion at the front and ... http://bbrblog.com/2010/03/01/burgundy-the-1990-vintage/ It had in many ways been a decade in the making: the culmination of years of monitoring the Italian fine wine scene; of passing on the increasingly good news (and fine wines) to customers; during which period our sales of Italian wine had risen nearly fourfold while the number of ... http://bbrblog.com/2010/02/23/anteprima-2006-tasting/ It all goes back to a tasting sometime last year here in the Langhe of course, when I sniffed, slurped and spat my way through three score (and ten?) Barbareschi born of the promising 2006 vintage. I recall being held up by a flight of chewy ‘wonders’ (oh yes let’s ... http://bbrblog.com/2010/02/16/cascina-delle-rose/ We were lucky enough to have a visit from Tim Heath, wine maker at Cloudy Bay recently, who let us taste a wonderful selection of Cloudy Bay's latest releases, including the ever-popular (and rightly so) delicious 2009 Cloudy Bay Sauvignon Blanc.  In this video he gives us a quick run-down ... http://bbrblog.com/2010/02/15/cloudy-bays-latest-offerings/ Last week Jean-Guillaume Prats of Ch. Cos d’Estournel (pictured left with myself and my colleague, Jenny Wee) paid us a flying visit to host a private dinner at the fantastic new restaurant in Wan Chai, Amuse Bouche . I was pretty excited for most of the day, as I am rather ... http://bbrblog.com/2010/02/12/be-cos-be-cos-be-cos/ Having just returned from a break-neck few days in Bordeaux with our buyer, Max Lalondrelle, our early thoughts on the vintage are… .that we really can’t say for sure! Dull, I know, but we only tried a handful of finished wines and only twice that amount in barrel samples – ... http://bbrblog.com/2010/02/10/bordeaux-2009-our-thoughts-so-far/