James Bercovici - The Big Red Wine Company

Dinner last night with a couple of neighbours who had been impressed to find us written up in Oz Clarke's guide. It seemed only fair to give them a taste of his recommendations. First, though, a sample sent by Miguel Angel Muro of his 2004 Reserva, the inaugural vintage of this wine. Very smooth: as always, Miguel Angel's wines are about texture first. The fruit is soft, slightly overwhelmed by the sweet oak just now but earlier incarnations (the 2001 Seleccionada Vendemmia, for example) suggest this will be a very good Rioja in a couple of years. Another debut followed, this time it is Xavier Vignon's red vin de table which was called "Debut" until Virgin Wines trademarked the name (so I am told). This could not fail to impress the neighbours. There is so much going on in the wine it is actually very difficult to know where to start (so I won't!). Xavier has just come under the radar of Robert Parker although it is unlikely he will get this wine reviewed as I...

Vintage 2009 - 70 days to go! The vines outside the Auberge have berries already - now we are waiting for the veraison, the stage where the skin of the berries starts to change colour from green to red. As anyone who has been on a wine course knows, all grapes have a clear juice and its the colour of the skin and how long the juice is in contact with it in the winery, that will determine if the final wine will be white, rosé or red. The date of the harvest is always tricky to predict - the amount of sun and rain we have in the next 70 days will impact, but assuming we continue with this 37C heat through summer, the harvest should be from the 10th September to the end of September. Tour de France 2009-1 day to go! All those sports mad people out there will already know Le Tour starts on Saturday, but did you know the penultimate stage will be right past us, to the top of Mont Ventoux? Watch out for us on Saturday July 25th as we wave on Brit Mark Cavendish up the gru...