Three Cheers for English Wine

Three Cheers for English Wine

It was International Wine Awards time again this week, another year where accolades of medals are handed out to the wines that tickled the judges fancy. Most years a plethora of medals are awarded to wines bottled under multiple labels (Sainsbury’s Taste The Difference etc), as well as the usual plethora of French and Australian wines. Seeing as they enter the most wines for judging it is no surprise. One does wonder if the wines being entered by these giants are in fact what is finally or has been put in the bottle, or am I just being cynical.

Anyway, hurray!! A fantastic year for awards to English wines. A reflection of the strides forward the industry has made in a short period of time. Proving that we have the capability, the right climate, soil and desire. No longer are we a laughed at being a backwater wine producing country, as each year passes our wines grow in respect. Indeed possibly too much as much of the land in the south and south east seems to be falling into Johnny Foreigner’s hands. As a cynic it may be the case that the land and vineyards that are bought by French interest might be a sign that Champagne may not be all it’s hyped up to be?

So the English awards tally was great – 24 medals, 1 Gold (Camel Valley Bacchus), 4 Silver, 7 Bronze and 12 Commended. Out of that 4 were for red wines, this is very interesting. Whilst the awards were for Rondo, Dornfelder and Pinot Noir, I would expect Pinot Noir to continue to develop here and in the not so distant future we will be challenging New Zealand’s Pinot achievements. 13 awards for sparkling wines, they don’t get better anywhere in the world!

A big big well done to Camel Valley, Chapel Down, Whickam Vineyards, Astley Estate, Sharpham Vineyards, Ridgeview Vineyards, Carr Taylor Vineyards, Balfour Estate and anyone else that I may have forgotten.

We all need to be drinking more English wine, it’s clean, fruit driven, made locally and you know where it’s come from, cheers!