Of all things wine I love old red Burgundy, young red burgundy, and everything in between. I also love Jancis Robinson's web site which I often find to be one of the more entertaining and insightful professional wine sites on the 'net. So when I visited her site this week to see what was new, I nearly fell off my seat when I read about the record breaking auction that took place in NYC last week. Ahhhh, mature buurgundy....mmmmmmm This is making me thirsty. Read it and weep.

Plonkapalooza. Finally, wine professionals are getting serious about cheap wines. My hometown newspaper reported recently that a group of wine professionals got together to rate the best under $10 wines (in the local market). Read for yourself:

The Boston Globe

Two wines I really liked, recently purchased from the Kempische Wijnhuis, came from the recommended Domaine de la Guicharde. The Cuvee Ninon is an oak aged cuvee made of 60% syrah 40% grenache, and comes from the hot '03 vintage The wine displays very attractive and complex nose of rspberries, lavender, iron, and mushrooms. Chocolaty (torrefaction) in the mouth but a beautiful sweetness that is still light and precise. Delicious and low in alcohol for an '03, it went great with arroz con pollo and then with a vacherin to finish the meal.

Tried on a different night, the Le vin rouge d'Isabelle, also '03, is pure grenache and aged in stainles steel. The wine is more brooding with leather, raspberries, and what smells like blood from a stone. It's grainy and assertive, and finishes very figgy. In fact, a couple of hours later the fig aroma was dominating. 14.5% alcohol (but not surprising for the varietal and vintage).

I really enjoyed both of these wines but I LOVED the cuvee Ninon. This recent focus on S. french and Rhone blends has confirmed my suspicion that as good as these southern French grenache blends are, it's the delicacy of the N. Rhone and predominantly Syrah blends that really turn me on.

Check out the web site of this domaine and while your at it, take a look at the site of the idependant vignerons of France. It's an informative site that provides links to similarly minded producers in France as well as dates and locales for upcoming wine tastings. For me, I'm thinking about going to the Paris Salon on the weekend of Nov 25 and 26th. If you'd like to try and meet up while I'm there, post a comment and we'll see if our schedules work.

Be sure to take my new poll in the right column!

I'm just glad he doesn't make red Burgundy....

Michel Rolland

Yes he has been an agent for improved quality in wine making around the world, BUT his influence has become so large that the result is a massve shift in the way wines taste today; away from distictiveness and towards homogeneity. One can argue that his legions of customers are no longermaking their own wine, they are instead making Michel Rolland wines.

I agree with the sentiment expressed in Mondovino , this man can be likened to the Pied Piper, and winemakers are following the tune of high RMP points. Only thing the winemakers forget, is what happened to the mice.