While Nick was in Boston speaking to a group of leading hoteliers, our son suggested we console ourselves at Terroirs, a brand new very wine-minded establishment just opposite Charing Cross, on a...

A few months ago I was introduced to the new wine label, Evening Land Vineyards (see tasting notes and more background here ), which produces some particularly impressive wines from Oregon and...

The pleasure of being back in Ballymaloe House, 30 miles south-east of Cork in southern Ireland, after 27 years was accentuated when Darina Allen pointed to my place at the dinner table and said,...

I can still remember where, when and why I walked into my first tapas bar. It was one early Sunday evening in the spring of 1978 in the old town of Bilbao in northern Spain to which I had...

See below for Linda Murphy's contribution. David Lett, the man who led Oregon into ambitious vine growing in general and the cuttings of Pinot Noir he planted in the 1960s (see...

As we left Agapé, which opened earlier this year in Paris’s chic 17th arrondissement, I congratulated Laurent Lapaire, its maitre d’ and co-owner, on what had been an excellent dinner. As I...

A British captain of industry and his wife find themselves with a decided superfluity of 2000 red bordeaux and are selling off more than 40,000 bottles (well over 3,000 cases) of it at...

The best known running joke in California wine country is of course: How do you make a small fortune in the wine business? Start with a large one. This continues to tell the hard truth of...

In a nutshell: Mostly bordeaux-like, plus some Basque influence. Main grapes: Cabernets Sauvignon and Franc, Merlot, Malbec, Tannat, Negrette, Fer (red); Sauvignon,...

In a nutshell: Dry, sometimes beefy red wines designed for ageing. Grapes: Syrah (red); Marsanne, Roussanne, Viognier (white). It's not difficult to see why vine-growing is...

In a nutshell : Sparkling and in demand. Grapes : Chardonnay, Pinot Noir, Pinot Meunier. Little by little the rest of the world is coming round to the French point of view, that...

In a nutshell : Huge quantity of mainly long-lived, medium-bodied, ultra-digestible reds (called claret by the British) with some sweet whites and extremely varied dry whites. Main...

As we left Agapé, which opened earlier this year in Paris’s chic 17 th arrondissement, I congratulated Laurent Lapaire, its maitre d’ and co-owner, on what had been an...

I’m not a huge enthusiast for the sexual stereotyping of wines but even I can see that Cabernet Franc might be described as the feminine side of Cabernet Sauvignon. It is subtly fragrant and...

Malbec was originally a grape associated with south west France but today is much more glorious in South America. Better known then as Cot, it was the most commonly planted vine throughout...