Press "Enter" to skip to content

Month: February 2021

Wine of the Week

Weird berries, stylish wine

Adelaide Hills is a quite cool region northeast of Adelaide in South Australia. It’s varied in terms of soils and expositions, and many of the best vineyards are scattered over large distances.

Ochota is the young couple Amber and Taras Ochota, who started their natural wine project in 2008.

Surf trippers on the Mexican coast, where the idea was born (credit: Ochota Barrels)

They have a long list of wineries around the globe where they have worked and learned; the Hitching Post winery from the movie Sideways not least. By now they have half a hectare of vineyards of their own, high altitude on quartz and ferrous soil. They also tend an old grenache vineyard in lower McLaren Vale.

The wines are made according to natural methods, some whites with extended skin-contact. This one is more “normal” in that respect, a varietal gewürztraminer bottled with low sulfur values.

Weird Berries in the Woods Gewürztraminer 2019 (Ochota Barrels)

Light brilliant yellow with green tones. Aroma of white flowers, hay and herbs. Quite full but dry, good acidity with a trace of yellow tomatoes and also some stoney minerality. A stylish wine that strays from the often boring cliché of the grape.

Price: Medium

Food: Fish (both white and red, grilled and cooked), shellfish (crab, prawns), squid, salads, cheese (both creamy and hard, like parmesan), pizzas (especially good with white sauce (two of them pictured, in the making…)

Leave a Comment

Wine of the Week

Both alter and native

Clemens Busch and his wife Rita makes exciting wines mainly from the Pündericher Marienburg vineyard in Mosel. Everything is organic, and natural practices in the vineyards and cellar give a feeling of expressiveness between tradition and forward-thinking.

In the Marienburg vineyard, with vines placed on soils based on gray slate.This dry riesling is made with old style artisanal methods, including biodynamic practises. Alcoholic fermentation started with indigenous yeasts. The pressing was light, the maceration went on with stalks for 48 hours, before ageing15 months in large oak barrels in contact with the lees. It was bottled without any filtration and clocks in at 11,5% alc.

(alter) native riesling 2016 (Clemens Busch)

Golden, slightly turbid. Aroma of white flowers, yeast, lime peel, and a touch of honey. A bit fizzy, with rounded acidity and a dry finish. Refreshing and very quaffable.

Price: Medium

Food: A great variety, like fish (both white, red, smoked too), hams, pasta, cheese (hard, aged), and also quite unusual stuff like omelettes and pies

Leave a Comment

Wine of the Week

Donkeys deliver

The Asinoi “we are donkeys” wine is maybe easy to forget. But it’s rather remarkable that the Carussin family manages to keep the quality up and the price down. The 2019 has an acidity as splendid as ever before. I have given some background here, when talking about a wine two years older.

Some keywords: Biodynamic farming, hand-picked grapes, spontaneous fermentation, low sulphur and no oak.

And, as producer Bruna Ferro says to Wine Chords: Asinoi is a simple yet complex wine – just like the character of the animal donkey.

Asinoi Barbera d’Asti 2019 (Carussin-Bruna Ferro)

Ruby red. Aroma of red berries (cherries, raspberries), herbs and a trace of almond. Fresh, luscious, low tannin, and a wonderful acidity that keeps on going from start to finish.

Price: Low

Food: Pasta, pizza, light meat, white fish, vegetables, and a variety of (mostly hard) cheeses

Leave a Comment

Wine of the Week

A light orange Baden weißburgunder

Sven Enderle and Florian Moll founded their winery in 2007 in Münchweier, Baden, close to the border to Alsace. They have now some 2 hectares of vineyards, mostly pinot noir, pinot gris and müller-thurgau.

This one is from pinot blanc, or weißburgunder in local nomenclature. The peak of their three level hierarchy are the single-site wines Muschelkalk, Buntsandstein and the Buntsandstein single location Ida.

The grapes are organically grown on shell limestone soils (Muschelkalk). Unfined and unfiltered. Very low SO2. It’s from Baden, but declassified by purpose to Deutsche Wein.

Weißburgunder Muschelkalk 2018 (Enderle & Moll)

The colour is somewhat between yellow and pinkish orange. Slightly reductive at first, some chalkiness, giving way to a more open aroma with yellow fruits and a white pepper/ ginger character. Careful skin-contact, some spice, a lively acidity, also with a hint of bitter almond. Shows some development too.

Price: Medium

Food: Light meat, tasty fish, salads, root vegetables, try with several Asian…

Leave a Comment