This week I ‘ave been mostly drinking…

Dianne Barrie, Company Administrator 

Well, I was working in our shop again on Saturday, and as customary every Saturday we open a couple of bottles of wine for tasting between 12-4. This gives our customers an opportunity to try the various wines that we sell, and it allows us to get a feel for what our customers are looking for when they come in to our shop. This week, we opened a bottle of Chardonnay Viura and a bottle of Malbec from our Infinitus range from Spain. So, first to the Infinitus Chardonnay Viura – this is fresh and clean on the palate with a very soft almost creamy finish, and is a fantastic bottle of wine for the price of ONLY £7.79! The softness of the chardonnay really cuts through the crispness of the viura leaving a smooth and silky finish. This is a wine that would go particularly well with pasta, especially spaghetti carbonara, spinach and ricotta cannelloni or mushroom ravioli. Okay, enough with the food! Next to try was the Infinitus Malbec. Packing a punch, this red is full to the brim with black berry fruitiness, but again has a lovely softness on the finish. A great accompaniment to have with a hearty stew or simply to enjoy with some mature cheddar and oatcakes! So my advice would be to stock up, this is an amazing wine at £8.16 a bottle right now.

Russell Wallace, General Manager

This week I ave been mostly drinking Prosecco cocktails! Mmmm indeed, while visiting the family back home in Northern Ireland it is always a time when I get to enjoy the fruits of my mothers labours.  She has a wonderful big kitchen garden where they grow veggies to delight, but she is also great at foraging the hedgerows for berries and other things that nature provides us all free of charge.  For this particular drinking delight it was elder-flower. Now of course you can pop down to the local shop (independent deli’s preferred!) and pick up a bottle of ready made, but why? when you can enjoy a walk, collect some elder flowers on your way and make these into a simple but delicious cordial (recipes are instantly Google able).

 So this particular cocktail was a rather simple concoction of home-made elder-flower cordial dashed atop a nice but not overly expensive Prosecco.  I could give you a top tip for our favorites (if I did it would be La Farra’s Valdobbiaddene), but when it comes to cocktail making we are less fussed about high end wine and more concerned with a good base that is quite dry (the cordial adds quick enough sweetness).  That is it, simple but just to die for.  We did not on this occasion, but try adding a twist of lime or orange or maybe even a little diced apple to spruce this up to the next level.

Susan Ross, Logistics Manager

This week I ‘ave mostly been drinking Chakana Malbec2011 

What a fantastic wine... beautiful purple colour with a perfumey nose of violets and black berry fruit.... a pretty complex wine, loads of fruit, a bit of savoury and excellent depth and length... fantastic!  Even more fantastic is the price – you get exceptional value for this wine and it will drink well for another 3-4 years.  A great wine to share with friends over dinner.... or the last of our summer barbie’s?