Monferrato Chiaretto Funtanin by Bricco dei Guazzi

The sun comes up over the vineyards, set among the Monferrato Hills, illuminating each undulation in subtle pinks against the Western Alps soaring skywards.

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Chiaretto Di Bardolino - Arresting rosé from the shores of Lake Garda

There’s a cool breeze blowing in across Lake Garda and, despite the record breaking drought of Italy’s ’22 summer, the horizon line between the lake and sky is a silky, silvery grey, with the lower ranges of mountains fading in and out of vision; rain threatens. 

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Hérosé 2021 - Cellier des Princes

A real beauty of a modern rosé from the Cellier des Princes, a cooperative of 150 winegrowers in Chateauneif-du-Pape. 

Strawberry pink colour - in a bottle with elegant floral design and an attractive 12.5% in alcohol making it very drinkable.

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What do Rosé and Bourgogne have in common?

Brendan Barrett tastes two rosés with varied responses. But the big question he is asking is whether rosé might actually grow up into something much more revered?

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An injection of pink into a monochrome world

More evidence that rosé wines pair fabulously well with food and are at the ready to add colour into the wintry months. Scottie Gregory explores three fine pinks from Provence with some mouth-watering dishes.

Three more Provence Rosés well worth trying are Le Grand Cros L’Espirit de Provence; Chateau St-Maur Cru Classé and last, but not least, La Sangliere Speciale.

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Last week a picture was posted on Twitter of vines in Shabo, a large estate that lies to the west of Odesa on southern Ukraine’s Black Sea coastline. The image seemed benign at face value but the reality, of course, is that the city of Odesa has been bracing itself for attack by Russian forces. 

 

As COVID-19 conspires with the grimmest of winds and rain to force a societal retreat behind our own front doors, the word ennui springs to mind. The muddle of displeasure is pierced when Natalia hands me a large bulbous glass of a liquid I do not recognise.

 

 

Britain’s lamentable exit

On the eve of Britain’s official departure from the EU, my partner and I decided to explore a small town on the Italian Riviera where thewintry cold doesn’t feel so much like cold war bite.

I had warned my significant other that I would be having an inverse departure party, a release of the sanity valve if you like!

 

Sitting inside the ancient castle walls inside the town of Soave, a short drive from Verona in northern Italy, the unique slightly almond aroma of the indigenous grape, Garganega, rises gently from my glass. The castle sprawls up the side of an extinct volcano that gives the region its variant soil structures that mark out the better quality of Soave wines.

 

Tanisha Townsend decided to move to Paris 4 years ago after regularly passing through the city en route to the world’s most famous vineyards. In fact, it was about 2 years ago at the Printemps de Champagne Bouzy Rouge tasting in Reims that I saw (who we shall now refer to as) GirlMeetsGlass chirpily speaking to her web followers on Snapchat.

 

The cathedral in Santiago de Compostela, the final resting place of Saint James, rises out of the landscape, infested with antiquity. The rambling steep streets give way to shafts of dramatic light, emblazoned chapels, and tightly packed tapas bars, dusty, as old novels pressed together in antiquarian bookshops.

 

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