Category — New Zealand

To celebrate the upcoming Spring Bank Holiday the New Zealand House of Wine is offering an exclusive FREE bottle of Cloudy Bay Sparkling Vintage Pelorus 2002 with every ‘Pre-Mixed’ or ‘Mix Your Own Case’ 12-bottle selection purchased until 26th May 2008! (Offer applies to orders for UK delivery only.)
You can choose from PREMIXED CASES or MIX YOUR OWN 12 bottle selection.
Your free bottle of Cloudy Bay Sparkling Vintage Pelorus 2002 will automatically be included with any qualifying 12-bottle Mixed Case purchase, so no need to do anything except place your order at www.nzhouseofwine.com

The sparking wine from Cloudy Bay is described as “An ideal ripening season, long and cool, producing intensely vibrant flavours. The 2002 Pelorus Vintage has sumptuous aromas that invoke thoughts of a baker’s kitchen… warm brioche and almond flan with lashings of strawberries and cream. The palate is powerful yet elegant with buttery shortbread flavours, a delicate orange tang and the merest hint of white mushroom, leading seamlessly into a very fine finish.”

A novel approach to selecting and presenting wines comes from a new outfit called “Six Wines Eight”. based in London and online.

Six Wines Eight is about finding the right wine first time. The system we have developed is easy to use and even easier to remember.
There are six wines in eight styles. These are our featured wines. We have defined each style in three words and given it a colour. Within each style there are six wines graded by price. We do all the hard work (like taste hundreds of wines!)and then present the best in an easy to understand, easy to navigate system. All you need to do is choose your style and price. Easy!
In an effort to lighten the mood of wine buying we’ve tried to be a little less serious in our descriptions but we do have the usual stuff there as well.
Each quarter new wines will replace the current batch. The wines will match their predecessors in style and feel, though they may be from an entirely different grape from very different countries. That way you get to try wines that you might otherwise have ignored.

I like the classification of wine styles with 3 word descriptors e.g reds are light,simple,fresh;or juicy, round, easy; or spicy, peppery, warming; or intense, complex,elegant. That looks like the sort of vocabulary which both novices and old hands can use - and is a great way to help customers articulate what they are looking for.

Hence they offer 48 featured wines every quarter - although previous selections may be available from their warehouse. It certainly offers a way to help customers select the style of wine which they are seeking - and could be quite fun. The presentation is good, and the wines look to be well-selected from all corners of the globe.

Six Wines Eight
100-102 Tower Bridge road, London SE1 4TP

Tel: 020 7231 4477

Regular tastings and a blog complete a well-thought out approach to wine merchanting!

The Flying Corkscrew is holding two rather special tastings in June:-

Friday June 13th - Tindall Estate, Marlborough, New Zealand and Stanton & Killeen Rutherglen Muscats

The Sowmans, owners of Tindall Vineyards, will be showing the latest vintages of their Sauvignon Blanc, Chardonnay and Pinot Noir, and Peter Mulford will be taking us through the classic Muscats of Rutherglen, which are sublime on the rocks or over ice-cream, so not just for your Christmas pudding!

Friday June 27th - DEREK SMEDLEY MW - A Vertical Tasting of the Wines of Warden Abbey Vineyard, Bedfordshire.

Derek has been consultant to Warden Abbey for some years now and their wines have become amongst the best in England. He will be raiding their cellar for some older vintages as well as showing the latest vintage. Be prepared to have your view of English wine changed for ever!

For more info see

To book either reply to this e-mail with a contact number or call 01442 412311.

There is a rare opportuniy to attend a superb tasting in London on 14th May 2008 at Il Bottaccio, 9 Grosvenor Place, SW1.

The Moët Hennessy Estates & Wines “Discover the Flavours of the World” Tasting will feature iconic estates such as New Zealand’s Cloudy Bay (as well as Cape Mentelle, Cheval des Andes, Green Point, Newton and Terrazas de los Andes). The tasting will take a multi-sensory approach, to reflect each of the six estates: be it the altitude of Terrazas de los Andes, the maritime influence at Cape Mentelle, the science behind Green Point, the gardens of Newton or the visual impact of Cloudy Bay. Canapés – reflecting the local cuisines and emulating the wines – will be served. All the winemakers will be jetting in to the UK for the event.

The tasting costs £60 including canapes, and given the quality of the wines and the opportunity to meet some top winemakers it should be well worth it! There are a limited number of free tickets if you purchase a special case of 6 wines - for more info contact Rosalyn.LANE@mhuk.co.uk.

It cannot be often that you would find a New Zealand Cloudy Bay and a red wine from Wales on the same list ! But at ND John you can discover the Sugarloaf Vineyards Deri Coch, and even on their website they state “They must be mad with our weather - but somehow they pull it off, and in some style!” - Deri Coch is a blend of Triomphe D’Alsace, Regent and Rondo varieties and has brambly autumn fruit flavours with a delicious sour cherry finish” (£8.50)

ND John Wine Merchants Ltd are an established wine merchants in the South Wales area supplying fine restaurants, hotels, gastro-pubs and clubs.

In 2003, we moved to new premises and opened a large ‘wine warehouse’ bringing our extensive range of wines direct to the public.

The success of this business led to us expanding our retail operation onto the internet to enable people throughout the UK to experience our portfolio of wines from the bargain new world offerings to the more prestigious old world favourites.

In between they offer a decent selection of wines from France, Italy, Spain, USA, Australia. New Zealand and Lebanon amongst others.

ND John, 90 Walter Road, Swansea SA1 4QF
Phone: 01792 644 688 Fax: 01792 646 600 Email: mail@ndjohn.co.uk

The Channel 4 sponsored Taste festival comes to Edinburgh (The Meadows) from 29 May - 1 June 2008, offering visitors a great opportunity to taste fine foods and wines available in the region.

Imagine a picnic in a park. Now multiply it by thousands of people. Invite all the best restaurants in the area to contribute the food, and discerning vintners to bring the bottles. Make sure some of the guests are famous chefs happy to help out with cooking hints, and organise live music to eat and drink by. This is a Taste Festival.

Amongst the wine-related exhibits will be the Edinburgh School of Food and Wine, Portobello’s Fine Wine Co, New Zealand’s Jackson Estate Winery, Champagne merchants Lovely Bubbly, highly-rated Scottish Merchant Valvona & Crolla,Bordeaux Wines, Wines of Chile, Faustino Rioja

Being in Scotland there is also a Food & Whisky School!

For more info and tickets see www.channel4.com

A refreshingly different approach is evident as soon as you enter Cadman Fine Wines website. Its crisp design and great graphics tempt you with some good special offers, yet also provides easy navigation of the site to find what you want.

The tagline “Quality is merely a starting point…” is more than merely words - they do seem to have a real commitment to sourcing their wines:-

Cadman Fine Wines stands for quality, exclusivity and selection

We bring you the world’s finest wines from the world’s finest producers: classic labels from famous names and regions that sit at the pinnacle of their craft; rare gems that have never been seen in the UK, plus exciting, cutting-edge wines from newly emerging stars of the fine wine world.

Our wines are intelligently and skillfully sourced by an international team of experts based in Italy, France, Spain and the UK. Through desk research, field trips and tastings, our experts seek and source hand-crafted wines from producers and winemakers who reaclly care about the contents of the bottle. To achieve a Cadman Fine Wines listing, a wine must score at least 88 points on our quality rating system or from the world’s most authoritative wine critics.

The wine list is extensive covering a wide range from New and Old World, some classic fine Bordeaux and Burgundies together with an eclectic mix of lesser-known wines such as Spanish Jumilla DO, French Cour-Cheverny AC and Otago wines from South Island, New Zealand.

Yet for each and every wine there are thoughtful tasting notes and good background information - very impressive. What’s more each delivery comes with “full tasting notes and background information for each wine, including grape varieties, when to drink the wine and reviews from our own experts and the world’s leading critics where applicable. This leaves you free to argue/ discuss the merits of wines with your friends and family. Their inclusion also makes each order an ideal gift.”

Cadman Fine Wines
Freepost NAT21632, Northampton NN3 6BR
Tel: 0845 121 4011
sales@cadmanfinewines.co.uk

Region Wine is a new Chester-based online merchant with a retail shop in the heart of historic Chester. The website is attractive and offers a wide range from around the world, including Greece, Oregon USA and Hungary in addition to the usual New and Old World sources. In addition to offering selections by region, grape variety and price there is also the opportunity to choose from a selection by “experience” - i.e. Aromatic white, exotic white, fruity white, quaffable red, red with herby notes, red with spicy notes, red, big and dark, refreshing rose, refreshing white, smooth red etc

Our company started out as a quality online wine merchant in 2006 by Ian Wildboar, fulfilling a twenty year ambition to turn his love of food and drink into a business. His aim is to help maintain diversity in wine choice throughout the UK at excellent prices and value for money.

Details of the New Zealand wine fair have been released.

At the end of the annual trade tasting the New Zealand wine fair opens to the general public. Tickets cost £25 per person which includes all wine samples - and there will be plenty available.

Join us for New Zealand’s largest ever wine tasting held outside New Zealand with more than 600 stunning Kiwi wines form over 120 award winning prdocuers. Winemakers will be flying over especially for the tasting and visitors will have the chance to hear the latest news and to learn first hand about the latest vintage releases

The Fair is to be held at the Nursery Pavillon, Lord’s Cricket Ground, St John’s Wood, London from 6pm - 9pm on Tuesday 15th January. You can order tickets from NewZealandWineEvents.co.uk.

Cooden Cellars is an independent wine merchant established by Colin Barnes and Ian Jarman in 1997. In May 2001 we opened our retail shop in the Grand Hotel Buildings, Compton Street, Eastbourne. They were awarded Independent Merchant of the Year 2007 as well as Regional Wine Merchant of the Year in the IWC Awards for the last three years, in 2003 and 2004 as runner-up and in 2005 outright.

For those not lucky enough to live within the bounds of Eastbourne they maintain a very functional and informative website. Registered users can login and leave their own tasting notes. The only thing that is lacking are images of the wine bottles (perhaps they should engage this budding photographer?)

The range is excellent across the board - lots of interesting wines from Argentina and Australia, New Zealand and Portugal are particularly interesting with several wines we are yet to discover. Regular offers, a regularly updated blog section and a decent range of spirits plus a regular payment wine club complete the picture. Perhaps the perfect wine merchant?

Zelas is the on-line arm of North London merchant Wine of Course.

The range is not huge - just one wine form the Languedoc for example, 7 from Australia, 4 from South Africa etc. But the quality is top notch. Prices generally are in the £12+ bracket and include such delights as Sequillo Eben Sadie (South Africa) £17.99, Daniel Schuster Pinot Noir “Twin Vineyards” (New Zealand) £16.99 and Bolgheri Tenuta Guado al Tasso Il Bruciato (Italy) £17.99. Prices for unmixed cases are generally £1 or so cheaper.

The site is nice to use, each wine having a picture and brief tasting notes. You can add your own notes too on the site if you feel inclined; although I didn’t spot any during my forage. Delivery is free for purchases of 6 or more bottles and £8.50 for anything less.

Wine courses are held on the last Thursday of the month. These cost £25/£35 each, cheaper for 2 or more people, and are held in the store. Their Wines for Christmas tasting session is described as

If you have ever wondered which wines to serve with your Christmas meal, consume over your Boxing Day leftovers, or have just wanted to learn more about wine in general, then this is the tasting event for you. We will taste our way through a range of ten fantastic wines, featuring examples both traditional and modern, for pairing with the rich and varied foods of the season. The tasting will include a champagne, a sweet wine, and a port as well as a spread of festive nibbles.

Wine of Course / Zelas
216 Archway Road,
London N6 5AX

Operational since 1988 Surf4Wine was one of the pioneers of the internet-based mail order wine merchant scene in the UK.

It’s a dynamic little operation and while they admit that the website has lacked in the update department recently a chat with Andrew Chapman indicates that things are about to improve. Not only is an expansion of the Oxfordshire warehouse and offices about to begin a new ‘backend’ of the website is soon to be launched. Coupled with a new staff and a range of new wines things are going from strength to strength for Surf4Wine.

The wine range is world encompassing with a slight slant of favouritism to the new world. There are many gems on the list ranging from Brokenwood, Bremerton and Qupe through to Kim Crawford and Vergelegen. Plenty of gift packs - such as a seasonal six pack rosé case (£36) and gift packs for Father’s Day, a smattering of spirits and some unusual beers completes the range.

Delivery is £7.50 per order regardless of size (up to a case) which is pretty much standard (and at cost). Personal service is vital to the success of the company shown through Chapman’s professional staff and attention to detail. Buy with confidence.

Surf4Wine/Andrew Chapman Fine Wines
Unit T2-27 & 28,
Milton Park,
Near Abingdon,
Oxfordshire OX14 4TA
United Kingdom

Previoulsy known for their excellent coverage of Austria, Switzerland, and Beaujolais, specialist Nick Dobson wines has announced the introduction of a small range of wines from New Zealand.

“Whilst our strength is undoubtedly rooted in our ranges of wine from the old world countries of central Europe, we’ve also decided on a small foray into the new world, with wines from small family estates in New Zealand. We will be offering wines mainly from the North Island, from the Mystery Creek Vineyard in Waikato, The Cottier Estate in Wairarapa, and a premium range from Amor-BendallPreviously Wines in Gisborne. We’ve just taken delivery of the Amor-Bendall wines, and these are now available from stock. The other suppliers will be added soon, and their arrival will be announced in a future mailshot. The Amor-Bendall wines are truly stunning, and are well worth trying. We start with 7 different wines plus a mixed case.”

The Armor-Bendall range includes a Gisborne Sauvignon Blanc (£14.95), an unoaked Chardonnay (£12.95) and a Pinot Girs (£13.95) while the mixed case comes in at £159.40 for 12 bottles.

The store just opposite the railway station has a wine bar above. This is Five Reasons Wine, a mighty fine looking shop offering 400 or so wines. All are listed on the website but sadly there is no online ordering.

Owner/manager Irene writes

Our approach is to operate a one in one out policy at our optimum number of 400 wines This means that we aim to ensure that our range is continuously improving over time rather than expanding willy nilly, and our customers aren’t met by a bewildering wall of wine, creating the illusion of choice, but actually risking alienating all except the most dogged wine enthusiasts.

This discipline ensures we can keep in touch with how our wines are tasting, and give knowledgeable advice - following a high quality service rather than largely product-driven/cult-wine-chasing model of an independent wine merchant.

Tastings are at the heart of what we do. We’d like to think we are getting a pretty good local reputation for our fortnightly tasting events.

This rolling wine range has resulted in some choice pickings from New Zealand, Alsace (Zind Humbrecht, Clos Wintzenheim, Gewurztraminer for example), Australia (Coriole Shiraz amongst many choice bottles), the Americas, Spain, Italy and across the regions of France. On the bubbly front the Billecart Salmon and Jacquesson bottles would be my recommendations.

Prices are generally in the £10plus range with many in the super-fine league of £30+ a bottle. Delivery is free locally in Tunbridge Wells while overnight delivery elsewhere in the UK is £10.80.

FIVE REASONS WINE
7 Vale Road
Tunbridge Wells
TN1 1BS

Easy Wine/Wine Of Course probably have the largest range of Bulgarian wine in the UK. A total of 18 different wines at the last count, ranging in price from £4.99 up to one at £14.99!

But there is a lot more available from the company than just Bulgarian wines. The nicely designed website holds vinous treasures from across the globe.

Strengths are in Australia (look out for Vasse Felix, Innocent Bystander and a Sangiovese from Uleybury), California (expensive but Ceago, Hirsch and Shafer are listed), Italy, New Zealand (Dog Point, Akarua and Isobel), The Rhone and Spain. Chile is a little light at just four and there are no listings for Austria or Germany.

We’re an independent wine specialists with shops in leafy north London and beautiful Ongar, Essex. Our goal is to source top quality wines from around the world from producers who are individualistic, small (but perfectly formed), and who represent the best that their respective regions have to offer. We deliver across the mainland UK at no additional delivery charge* and offer monthly wine courses and additional events to suit the casual enthusiast to the hardened connoisseur.

Free delivery across the UK.

Wine of Course (London)
216 Archway Rd
London N6 5AX
T: + 44 (0) 20 8347 9006

Wine of Course (Essex)
135 High Street
Ongar, Essex CM5 9JD
T: + 44 (0) 1277 365116