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The Morning Claret

Simon J Woolf + friends on wild and wonderful wines

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  • Father Gerasim pours the 2010 vintage (Nov 2012)

    The fleeting joy of an Alaverdi Monastery Kisi

    Simon J Woolf   

    Simon reminisces about a special visit to Alaverdi Monastery, and how he finally proved just how well Alaverdi Monastery Kisi 2010 can age.

  • Skerlj Vitovska

    Matej Skerlj shows the elegance of Vitovska

    Simon J Woolf   

    The wonderful skin macerated Vitovska from Skerlj isn’t just a great wine, it’s also a demonstration of how different this region is from its Friuli-Venezia-Giulia neighbours.

  • Bina 37 at night

    Is Bina 37 Georgia’s most bizarre winery?

    Simon J Woolf   

    “Sorry, but this is absolutely nuts!”, says one member of our group during a visit to restaurant/apartment/winery Bina 37, and he’s merely stating what everyone else is thinking. We’re talking with Zura Natroshvili, a medical doctor turned traditional winemaker. Well, almost traditional. Most winemakers don’t install their cellars on the 8th floor of a city residential block.

  • Iago Bitarisvili, Kartli, May 2017 (Photo (C) Simon Woolf)

    Iago Bitarishvili – The Chinuri Master

    Simon J Woolf   

    Chinuri is one of the more important white grape varieties indigenous to Kartli, and Iago BItarishvili is without doubt its best exponent. His focus on the grape is absolute, inviting comparison to the Vodopivec brothers in Friuli who focus solely on their native Vitovska. Iago makes two Chinuri wines, one with and one without skin contact.

  • Martin Lichtenburger and Adrianna Gonzalez in their cellar, March 2017

    Muscat Ottonel, a love story

    Simon J Woolf   

    Sometimes the path of true love really does alter everything. When Austrian Martin Lichtenberger and Spaniard Adrianna Gonzalez met in 2007, during their winemaking studies in California, they might not have predicted that they’d soon be making wine together on another continent. Not to mention a skin contact Muscat Ottonel (an orange wine).

  • Simon holding Portuguese grape varieties

    Making orange wine in the Douro Valley – Part 1

    Simon J Woolf   

    It started with a seemingly innocent question from Oscar Quevedo: “Simon, do you know how to make an orange wine?”. Oscar isn’t stupid of course, he knew damn well I’d have something to say on the subject. We were sat in the tasting room at Quevedo, a port and still wine producer in the Cima Corgo

  • intellego-elementis-2014

    Balance is everything – Intellego Elementis

    Simon J Woolf   

    Elementis 2014, like its predecessors, is 100% Chenin Blanc, fermented on the skins for 3 weeks and then matured in used French oak for 9-10 months. Jurgen gets incredible freshness and concentration from his dry farmed fruit. That’s given this wine a lightness of touch and purity that is quite startling.

  • Radikon Cellar 2014

    Year zero at Radikon – Ribolla Gialla 1995

    Simon J Woolf   

    “The really big change was when I tasted the wine. It was something completely new, totally different and exciting. It made me crazy, just tasting it.”

    This is how Stanko Radikon describes the life changing moment in 1995 which prompted him to change the family’s entire wine production to what we now know and love as “orange wines”.

  • Štekar - Re Piko 2007

    Well macerated Riesling: Štekar – Re Piko 2009

    Simon J Woolf   

    Almost 18 months after discovering Štekar’s serious, spicy and brooding Rebula at Rawfair in 2013, The Morning Claret made it out to their beautiful corner of Brda (Western Slovenia), to discover an outstanding skin macerated RIesling.

  • Tauss vinyeards in Southern Styria

    A fiery Roter Traminer from Tauss

    Simon J Woolf   

    I’ve featured wines from several of the Schmecke das Leben producers in this series, but not Tauss until now. Roland and Alice Tauss are perhaps the least well known winery in the group, partly due to their very small size – there’s a mere 6 hectares of vines at their bucolic estate in Southern Styria.

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