Don’t be afraid of residual sugar in wine, was the lesson I learned. I began exposing myself to wine back in 2015, for a reason unknown to me till this day. Out of curiosity perhaps, or maybe I had the desire to step into unknown, to inject new forms and shapes into my life, new textures and pleasures. It was now late 2016 and I had found what I considered to be meaning and beauty in wine. I thought I had discovered truth – not capital T objective truth, but my truth, one of many plural truths out there. I had explored both Old and New Worlds, fallen in love with Pinot Noir and Syrah, realised I preferred Cabernet Franc over Cabernet Sauvignon, declared Chardonnay from Burgundy my number one, had succumbed to the subtle charm Nebbiolo is capable of treating us to, had been in awe of wines that smelled like floral cologne and sweet powdery lipstick and meat and soy sauce and salty sea and mud and truffles and multi-layered fruit and spice and smoke. I was a kid again in a toy store, having fun, once again spending summers in nature, or so it seemed, tending to my grandmother’s garden, bringing my nose close to the tuberose she planted, getting lost in a dense pine tree forest, jumping into fresh lake, lowering myself into a deep well to claim my reward – a bucket of liquid purity. But my grandmother had long left her body and taken her garden with her. I hadn’t seen an actual tuberose in years, and I heard rumours my once beloved well had been contaminated. Childhood was over, I was now 31, waiting for a friend to come over, for some food and wine. The bottle I chose was Noyer de Cent Vouvray Moelleux Vincent Careme 2002 – my first Chenin Blanc. And I was scared of it, for this bottle contained residual sugar. I didn’t know how much exactly. I knew it wasn’t a lot. And still I wasn’t sure: to open today or to give it away? My only bottle in the stash though and I need one for today’s lunch. Up until this point I only had some Sauternes some time ago, and disliked them all immensely. I like sugar in Napoleon torte, not in wine, became my mantra. My friend turned up, I took the bottle out of the fridge, pulled the cork, poured the wine. As it was landing in a wine glass, the wine appeared chunky and thick, as if containing gelatine, and this was new to me. An element of surprise, I like it. I smelled it. Back to my childhood again, my favourite fruit, the small yellow Mirabelle plums we used to pick off the freshly cut grass. The row of Mirabelle trees friends and I used to shake and let the plums fall on our heads and grass and pick them and eat them on an empty stomach and then shake some more some of those trees. And so this was what the wine smelled like: fresh Mirabelle plum puree and nature. I tasted the wine. Crisp and lifted and very convincing plum fruit. It took a second or two for a razor sharp and precise acidity to cut through all that sweetness. Wine coated my mouth, it extended deep and long. Hardly a sip, a wall more likely. Another surprise: no heaviness. Wine felt weightless. Not a trace of alcohol. So pure and fine and delicate and focused and yet so concentrated and powerful and persistent, almost too much of a good thing. How did the winemaker achieve this? This was the first time that wine was bending my mind. And I only paid £17 for a bottle? Another reminder, price isn’t everything, good value high quality wines exist, go out and find them. My friend, in the meantime, wandered off into another room, having left the note for me to read on the table. She’ll return once I start speaking again.
