Personalities Behind Pages

CAPTURED DURING my day at the London International Wine Fair last week...

I almost literally bumped into Robert McIntosh (pictured), wine culture commentator and cohesive blogger (Wine Conversation). He was representing the wines of Dinastia Vivanco whose varietal Graciano was warm, supple, with rustling autumnal leaves on the palate and a sweet, determined finish. Other bloggers encountered included Peter May of the Pinotage Club who made me blush with his positive words about my prose, and Spittoon's Andrew Barrow. We tasted some intense, pitch black Marselans together. It is always interesting to meet the personalities behing their pages.

I did not love the smell hanging over the wine faults workshop, first thing in the morning. I felt spoilt as glass after glass of astringent, reduced and over-sulphured elixir was put in front of me by French scientist Dr. Pascal Chatonnet. During the same event, George Taber, author of To Cork or Not to Cork (which he was unofficially launching) took us through a history of closures. An interesting fact emerged: TCA cork taint was identified as late as 1981. To cut a very long story mercifully short, his (frustrating) conclusion: the perfect closure is yet to be found. I guess that means we're (cork) screwed...

Tim Aikens MW chaired a seminar in a husky voice (he had a sore throat) entitled Why Argentina Matters. Needless to say it does and will be the focus of my next article in the Southwark News.