The week in pictures

the drinks business hosted the second Wine Show Chelsea at Chelsea Old Town Hall last weekend, with thousands attending the three-day show to sample hundreds of wines showcased by dozens of exhibitors, take part in masterclasses and learn more about the world of wine.

Throughout the weekend a number of packed-out masterclasses took place, with db’s Patrick Schmitt MW leading guests through sessions exploring Pinot Noir, sparkling wines and Sherry.

In the Global Masters Hall, the drinks business showcased dozens of award-winning wines that won a medal in one of this year’s Global Masters competitions….

….while a tombola raised money for drinks charity The Benevolent, offering guests the chance to take home an array of wines and spirits.

New to this year’s event, the drinks business also hosted a stand showcasing a selection of beers awarded a medal in its inaugural Global Beer Masters, held earlier this year.

Dom Pérignon’s chef de cave Richard Geoffroy was in town this week to launch the 1996 vintage of P2 rosé, which comes with more than 16 years maturing on its lees, and then a further three years resting off them.

Geoffroy described the Champagne as  “the softest 1996 rosé of them all,” noting that with a dosage of 6 g/l, it must also be “the lowest dosage in all of 1996”.

Among the attendees at the hot ticket event were Serena Sutcliffe MW of Sotheby’s

the drinks business was in Marylebone today, judging the 2016 Fortified Masters at Hardy’s Brasserie.

Royal Tokaji launched the 2008 vintage of its Essencia, the sixth vintage produced since the Hungarian producer was founded in 1990, with a dinner at the private residence of Damon de Laszlo, shareholder and company director of Royal Tokaji, in London this week.

Of all of the Tokaji wine produced in Hungary’s Tokaj region, in the foothills of the Carpathian mountains, Essencia is its most rare. Made from the very best Aszu grapes that have been raisined by botrytis, the result is a highly concentrated, intensely sweet ‘wine’ with an ABV that rarely tips above 2%, with a minimum sugar content required for a Tokaji Essencia wine 450g/litre.

Royal Tokaji’s 2008 is only the fifth vintage of Essencia to be released by the winery, which was founded by Hugh Johnson in 1990, with the five intervening vintages being 1993, 1999, 2000, 2003 and 2008. The super sweet wine is traditionally served from spoons made with Hungarian crystal. 

Jeff Arnett, master distiller at Jack Daniels, was in Scotland last week at the The Glasgow Sessions to help launch Tennessee Calling – an initiative set up by Jack Daniel’s to inspire the next generation of bartenders. As part of the initiative, Scottish bartenders will be tasked with creating a cocktail using what they learnt at The Glasgow Sessions and Jack Daniel’s Old No. 7, with Jack Daniel’s then selecting 10 finalists who will the receive a visit from a major player in the drinks industry. Three finalists will be flown to the US to visit the Jack Daniel’s Distillery.

Eric Lorincz, head bartender at the American Bar at The Savoy, is just one key figure that will serve as a mentor to one of the 10 finalists. Bartenders have until 1 November to enter.

Jenkyn Place Vineyard in Hampshire started its Pinot Noir harvest last weekend, with winemaker Dermot Sugrue describing the 2016 vintage as “very, very good”. “We have luckily had no mildew damage and only a few vines have suffered from frost damage and so we are really excited for a very special vintage.”

db‘s Darren Smith was on the volcanic wine trail in Tenerife this week, visiting Suertes del Marques in La Orotava in the north of the Canary island. The family winery, managed by winemaker Jonatan Garcia Lima, has only been making wine since 2006 but has already built up a strong reputation for producing distinctive, high-quality volcanic wines from the region’s native Listan Negro and Listan Blanco grapes.

Here Darren is helping Jonatan with the pumping over of the recently picked Listan Negro grapes from various sites, including the Solana and El Ciruelo vineyards which go into the single-vineyard bottlings of the same names. Suertes del Marques produces its wines by hand using indigenous yeasts and with a minimum of intervention during the vinification process. This year Jonatan has been keen to experiment with whole bunch fermentation and maceration of his best Listan Negro grapes with the aim of producing wines of greater elegance and structure.

The vineyards of Suertes del Marques are distinctive for their use of trenzado vine training – a method unique to the Orotava Valley in which vines are plaited and extend as long as 10m from the trunk. What appear to be rows of vines in the picture above are actually single vines extending several metres up and down the hillside.      

Some of the trenzado vines on the Suertes del Marques estate are thought to be up to 200 years old and are still yielding commercially viable quantities of fruit. These particular vines were under threat of being grubbed up before the Lima family stepped in to rescue them.

And finally… no week in the drinks business would be complete without gin, so this week we headed down to Anna Hansen’s The Modern Pantry in Finsbury Square for a Sri Lankan full moon feast and Colombo No. 7 gin cocktails by maestro mixologist Ryan Chetiyawardana of Dandelyan and White Lyan.

Our favourite was a tumeric and yuzu gin and tonic, which worked well with the cinnamon bark, curry leaves, liquorice and ginger root in the gin and paired perfectly with a divine dish of soft shell crab. Colombo gin is formed of seven botanicals and is inspired by ingredients found in Colombo’s cinnamon gardens.