INSPIRATIONAL WINE KNOWLEDGE AND THE PEOPLE BEHIND THE DRINK June INTERNA TIONAL 2008 Quietly flows the Rhone SID 5 CONTENTS > 5 Quietly flows the Rhone Invigning hos Torres SID 26 14 Time to discover the Loire 18 Paul Dolan visit Copenhagen 19 Creative meeting between Winemakers and Journalists 22 The Diamant Process - revolution in the cork business 26 One man and his dreams 28 The trendiest in the Wineworld right now 31 A few questions upon the consumer role The Diamant process SID 22 32 Wine adventures in Argentina 33 Creating perfection 34 Grans Muralles Fine Wine winner 2008 35 Succes for the newly opened Wine Bar in Stockholm 37 With wery old Champagne you take your chances INTERNATIONAL NOTISER A WEAK VINTAGE IN BORDEAUX GIVES GREAT BOTRYTIS WINES VEGA SICILIA EXPERIMENTS WITH WHITE Spain’s absolutely most famous bodega the Vega Sicilia in Ribera del Duero, It’s been a tough year for Bordeaux will be launching a white wine in the future. If this happens and it looks producers. The vintage hasn’t been like it will, then the wine will create a sensation. Because this wine bodega one of the best - for the red wines. is famous for its high quality red wines. The mere thought of a white wine launch is enough for wine aficionados to roll their eyes in wonder. But down in Sauternes it’s all cele- brations. Already many wine experts It is more than 15 years ago that the 20 hectares of land was planted with around the world have hailed as one green grapes. Pablo Alvarez had declared earlier that he was very fond of of the very best vintages ever. Great wine both from the Rhône and the Bourgogne though you wouldn’t know balance between fruit and acidity, to- that by looking at his vines in the vineyard. nes of citrus honey, dried apricots and They are the Rhône grapes Roussanne, Marsanne Viognier, which play a do- lot of complexity is what is waiting for minating role with Chardonnay. us in the noble red in the future. Apart from that even the lowest levels ap- For those familiar history, this won’t come as a surprise. pear to higher than ever. So the wine White wines have already been made at the Vega Sicilia, that have gained experts are recommending us to buy international reputations and that can still be found at auctions around the the 2007 noble red Bordeaux. world. JFC JFC WELCOME TO A NEW NUMBER OF FINE WINE, YOUR WINE PERIODICAL ON THE NET DIN VINTIDNING PÅ NÄTET Summer is upon us and with that a new auction in Stockholm on the 10th June. Interest and turn over has increased steadily and is now the largest in the Northern countries. Interest in wine has reached the top. Slowly we are awakening for our winter sloth. The amount of time we spend outdoors in restaurants and bars is now on the increase, at least here in the north. Many hours spent in the beautiful light, with good food and drink and with the fantastic Midsummer celebrations as the season’s high point. In this edition we have several other high points. How about a trip to the Rhône, to meet the river Loire’s interesting wineproducers, find about new trends in New York and read Peter Thustrups commentary about the beverage auction and a whole lot more. Happy Summer - Until September Ove Canemyr Chief Editor It is perfectly allowed for you to send Fine Wine to friends and acquaintances who are over the age 20 and are interested in fine wines. Let us know about anything interesting in connection with Fine Wine [email protected] We cannot accept responsibility for unsolicited material. Please feel free to quote from us but always reveal your sources EDITORIAL: Ove Canemyr, chief editor, Fine Wine Trendsetter box 24013, 10450 Stockholm Layout Sophie L Slettengren by Design AB sophie@ bydesign.se English translations Roger Brett, Broadcasting Arts, [email protected] Coverphoto Per Karlsson BKWine 2 INTERNATIONAL NOTISER ALL THIS? WINE TOURISM GENERATES MILLIONS AND HEAVEN AS Wine tourism is the new fad. There has been a complete explosion in inte- WELL, is the name of rest for this kind of holiday, an industry that generates a lot of money and the new restaurant as such has become very important for the wine producing countries. on top of the old In- In California where they take a more relaxed attitude towards its industry, land Revenue buil- the number of visitors to the vineyards has shot up. Worst hit is of course ding in Stockholm. the Napa Valley. Last year the wine producers had more than 8 million Earlier this spring visitors, which in round figures generated more Tania Jourbert , wine- maker from KWV on than 300 million dollars. The statistics in Europe are not quite as impres- the western Cape in sive. France receives about 3 million visitors every year, which are spread South Africa and responsible for the Roo- over the whole country. Even though there is still expansion potential. deberg Restaurant put in guest appearan- But then the vineyard owners will pull themselves together ce. She brought with her something new. Namely a white Roodeberg, which was And make the visitors really welcome. grown in 2005 and has finally reached the In Spain they are lagging quite far behind with only 1.8 million visitors shelves of the SystemBolaget last year, which actually is an all time high. (Swedish state owned off-license). Fresh However within the foreseeable future they hope to be able to catch up and fruity with a long taste is a good way with France. Information material is available in English, and the Bodegas of describing it. WE drink up to 46% of are slowly waking up. One of the most visited Bodegas, not surprisingly is their Roodeberg export every year. Quite the Torres in Catalonia which alone had 130 000 visitors in 2007. More is an impressive sum and even more proof of expected, because the industry is in its infancy at least in the old world. the fact that interest in better wines is on the increase in Sweden. JFC ALSACE COMES TO STOCKHOLM THE INTELLIGENT WINE In April it was Alsace’s turn for a guest BOttLE HAS ARRIVED appearance in Stockholm. Or more To guarantee the quality and the authenti- to the point it was Benedicte Claudel city of the new fine wines from Bordeaux, from the Chateau de Riquewihr, who a new system based upon RFID tags (radio came and told us about their long and frequency identification) has been imple- venerable history. mented with within the bottle itself. It is Everything started around the 6th called eProvenance. century when a rich French landow- ner called Richo founded a large vine- To deliver this unique information about yard every bottle’s journey from the produ- at a place called Roquewihr. The name cer, through the chain of delivery to the stems from Richovilla which means customer, every bottles is fitted with a tag Richo`s area. Thanks to its good wine containing a unique code in the bottom reputation the area flourished during the middle ages of the bottle and the cap. Neither of these And Roquewihr`s wines were sold all over Northern Europe. A lot of this can be manipulated. Apart from that there was thanks to the river Rhine which was essential for transport during are also tags in the crates during transpor- those times. Today they export 35% of their 2 million bottles yearly. tation. Most of it Goes to Scandinavia, after that, Canada and USA: Even Russia has ac- In this way it is possible to tell whether the quired a palate for Doff & Irion and high quality Alsace wines. It was wines have been exposed to low or high the family Dopff and Irion that took over the property and castle in the temperatures simply by taking a reading. fifteen hundreds. It used to belong to the Prince of Wurtemburg, who This will mean the end of fake fine wines reigned as mayor at that time. Today the castle contains both Dopff and in the future. Good news at last for all of Irion and a museum well worth visiting for any body who is passing by us wine lovers. during the summer.. 3 INTERNATIONAL NOTISER STARLINGS DISTURB THE PEACE IN AUSTRIAN VINEYARDS In the spring Austria is invaded by millions of starlings who spend the summer nibbling away at lovely grapes. They are tired of eating any old insects, scraps and other animal’s fodder. They are pleased to change over to a rather more delicate menu of ripe grapes. In Austrian a starling is called a star. That’s why they have christened the solution to get rid of them the “starfighter” project. They are light aircraft that don’t spray them or poison them but rather swoop over the vineyards and frighten the life out of the gigantic number of starlings that have settled in the vineyards and shoo them all away. Naturally they all drift back after a while, but then it’s time to swoop over them again. This continues throughout the summer to protect the harvest from these thirsty birds. But there are other tricks that work as well. Alarms, fireworks, flood lights, banging things. If you are looking for some fes- tive fun in Austria during the summer months, then make your way out to the vineyards and join in. Everything to protect the harvest of course. THE NEW CHAMPAGNE DISTRICT VINORDIC HAR BLIVIT The communes named in the Marne are: Baslieux-les-Fismes, Blacy, Bo- EN NORDEUROPEISK issy-le-Repos, Bouvancourt, Breuil-sur-Vesle, MÖTESPLATS Bussy-le-Repos, Champfleury, Courlandon, Courcy, Courdemanges, Fismes, Huiron, La- När Vinordic 2008 slog upp dörrarna på Ville-sous-Orbais, Le-Thoult-Trosnay, Loivre, Stockholmsmässan i slutet av april hade Montmirail, Mont-sur-Courville, Peas, Ro- pressmötet inte mindre än journalister main, Saint-Loup, Soulanges, Ventelay.