Wine whine

I’LL NOW return to my own foibles and eccentricities and have a moan.

Recently I’ve been feeling distraught and worse. I’m becoming ill-tempered and exasperated each time I open a bottle of wine these days. Sitting at the dining table, reviewing the remains of a Galician steak whilst lingering over the last drops from a goblet of Glorioso, I should be at peace with the world but I’m not.

Apart from celebratory occasions I am no longer able to savour the ruby Rioja nectar to which I have been addicted for many years. The high mucky-mucks of the Spanish wine industry have seen to that. They have gone bananas; nutty as fruit cake.

Wine has gone to their heads. Their lack of foresight is incredible; unbelievable. Just because – around the advent of the new millennium – wine harvests were poor for a couple of years, they hiked up the prices more than somewhat. At a time when the product was barely up to scratch this made their decisions even harder to swallow.

The bodegas were chucking away both their credibility and their grip on the local market. En route they were giving me indigestion and ruining the feeling of bonhomie I usually achieve at the end of a good lunch. I did not come to Spain to either give or get belly ache!

I love wine to distraction but I could never be a wine snob. Give or take a few, I’ve seen the dimple in the bottom of over 300 bottles of tinto every year since I’ve been here and that is quite a lot of red wine. Nevertheless, despite an ability to distinguish infinitely quaffable wine from plonk, there’s no snobbery in my make-up unless it’s the inverted kind.

Good wines, particularly the reds from northern Spain are my favourite tipple. My enjoyment comes from taste and not superior knowledge. I’m no expert on ‘the bouquet’ or ‘roundness’ of the wine – whatever those terms mean – and I’ve never got around to sniffing a cork! Pour me a glass of Ribera de Duero, Rioja, Toro or even Hoya de Cadenas and I’m as happy as a pig in muck. If it’s accompanied by a pierna de cordero or a rare Galician chuleton (T bone steak), all the better. A smidgen of manchego or cabrales Spanish cheese for afters goes down well too, if the bottle bottom is still out of sight.

Wine isn’t just a drink, it’s a sensual pleasure best enjoyed with a good meal. When I’m communing with wine, I eschew the ‘reservas’. I don’t need them any more than the ‘gasolina’ plonk sold by supermarkets in cardboard bricks. Middle of the road crianzas and cosechas are my bag; they suit me fine. I’ve never had a bad Añares or Glorioso but now prices have become prohibitive forcing me to shop around a bit more. Which brings me back to my opening gripe. I have voluntarily helped to finance the Spanish wine industry for nigh on thirty years; even longer were I to count the amount I consumed in England before moving out here. I don’t object to being a paying supporter – it’s something of a pleasure really – but I don’t take kindly to being ripped off.

I sympathise with the viticulturists who have had harvest debacles but I’m not into heavy personal subsidisation. Temporary vendimia setbacks aside, I am aware that a lot of changes have occurred in the industry.

Different production methods have been adopted and new vine stock introduced, all of which are costly but as such this should have been anticipated. I shouldn’t have to pay for it all! However, areas which were only noted for plonk are coming up with better, more palatable libations. I’m told that even the cardboard carton ‘gasolina’ is no longer quite so lethal.

Labels are now listing grape varieties like Sauvignon, Tempranillo, Shiraz and Merlot. Vintages are denoted more clearly and in some cases, secondary labels on the backs of bottles, describe the methods of production, the characteristics of the wine and even how to drink the bloody stuff ! Price rises are nothing new but in the case of some of my ‘long-time’ favourites they have become excessive. My original Rioja crianza preferences have doubled in price. I’m not really whining about wine, I love it! What I’m complaining about is the cost of buying it and the fact that in recent years it has escalated at an alarming rate. If all imported wine was rough plonk, there would be nothing for local producers to worry about but this is not the case.

Argentinian, Australian, Bulgarian, Californian, Chilean, New Zealand and even South African wines have become common on the supermarket shelves and are competing vigorously in both quality and price. I still have no interest in Eastern European wines and before the millennium I would never have given table space to New World Wines but the Spanish ‘euro inflicted’ wine price explosion has changed all that.

I have now taken to sampling Chilean and Argentine reds and although I’m not euphoric about them they do present an acceptable and affordable alternative. I have always had a taste for South African Pinotage – I spent some time in the Stellenbosch area and really enjoyed it but it seems a shame to buy it in a country where wine is king.

There are obviously still some low-priced Spanish wines but they’re not for me. Jim Tully disagreed with me on this subject, his attitude was ‘the cheaper the better’. Author of a best-selling ‘Jack The Ripper’ exposé, Jim liked nothing better than to sit on his Altea sea front terrace banging away at his antiquated Olivetti portable with a constantly filled glass of warm white Condestable at his elbow.

My addiction to the wines of northern Spain is chronic but it seems I shall have to dry out unless prices are stabilised. I have no intention of signing the pledge though. I intend to continue to enjoy the rich ruby juices of the grape, even if I have to economise by diversifying. Whether this might impair my taste buds is academic but so far, having discovered ‘Fire & Ice’ Tamaron, Ribera del Duero, several full-blooded Toros and some delectable Somontana and Gandia wines at affordable prices, I think this is unlikely to happen.

However, several wellknown Rioja bodegas have lost my age old patronage. Now I have begun to shop around more for my booze, I am happy in the knowledge that I can continue my romance with the grape indefinitely.

I shall still achieve that delightful afterglow which emanates from full fruity red Spanish wine even if I have moved on from Campillo and Glorioso to Hoya de Cadenas and Tamaron… unless someone else is in the chair. Any offers?