Relaxed, friendly and unfazed, Adolfo Hurtado is equanimity made flesh. There may be moments when he loses his rag mid-harvest — berating a hapless cellar hand or smashing his knuckles...
Read MoreLaithwaites on the up
Laithwaites, the UK’s biggest home-delivery wine business, has always reminded me of Dan Brown: loved by the general public, but dismissed as a bit of a joke by us critics....
Read MoreA toast to Grenache
TS Eliot got it wrong in my view: October, not April, is the cruellest month. Once the clocks go back you know you’re in for a winter of sniffles, short...
Read MoreGo wild with The Bunch
Attending a tasting run by The Bunch, a group of Britain’s leading independent wine merchants, is like watching The Magnificent Seven. Every time the posse reassembles, it seems to have...
Read MoreKeith Floyd and the art of product placement
RIP Keith Floyd. For all the headlines about boozing, bankruptcy and failed marriages, Floyd was a talented chef and a brilliant TV presenter. It’s easy to forget that, before Floyd,...
Read MoreSparkling form
Help! I fear I’m turning into a Prosecco snob. You might think this is slightly silly – like favouring one daytime soap over another – but I’m serious. There are...
Read MoreWilliam Golding and wine competitions
When William Golding sent the manuscript of “Lord of the Flies” to the publisher, Faber & Faber, it landed on the desk of a reader called Polly Perkins. Her verdict...
Read MoreMajestic’s six bottle switch
Economic necessity or swift-footed tactical shimmy? Majestic’s decision to reduce its minimum in-store purchase from 12 to six bottles – as predicted here on 2 August – is arguably both...
Read MoreA Fruity Number
I know we’ve just come through the silly season, when tales of killer chipmunks and dolphin sign language deputise for what’s normally classed as news in the British media, but...
Read MoreReview of La Tour d’Argent’s Wine List
When La Tour d’Argent lost its second Michelin star a few years ago, continuing its slide down the ranking of top French restaurants, television crews were camped outside for days....
Read MoreAussie wines and The Ashes
How good was that? For an Englishman who’s passionate about sport, nothing compares with beating the Aussies at cricket, not even a win on penalties against the Germans or a...
Read MoreWolf Blass and his wines
There are so many stories about Wolf Blass that it’s hard to know when fact shades into fiction. Did he really page himself at airports so that other people would...
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