I just tasted a range of ‘de-alcoholised’ wines, ie drinks that are made like wines and then have the alcohol removed before being sold in wine bottles to be drunk in place of actual wine.

Tasting notes for the whites range from ‘furry peaches and cream with hint of dead mouse’ (a Californian Chardonnay) to ‘gone-off buttermilk’ (a ‘Premium’ German beauty). The rosé was like ‘milk teeth on steroids’ (White Zinfandel) and the red a straight-up ‘gross’ (Californian Merlot).

Thankfully I had some left-over cold plain pasta on hand. And mouthwash. And actual wine. I can still kind of taste them but I’m happy knowing I will NEVER HAVE TO DO THAT AGAIN!

Apparently people buy this stuff and not just to serve it to people they have a pathological resentment against or something.

Remember Schloer? I do. And would much rather drink it than furry peaches and dead mouse cream. Weird that.

Once I got over the involuntary gagging reflexes, the one upside of tasting the above offenders was that they made the Torres Natureo Muscat (‘tangy Schloer with rose petals and peach’) and Torres Natureo Syrah (‘fruity and almost wine-like!’) taste amazingly well made in comparison. At least they kinda retained some of their original varietal flavours. And I didn’t have to leg it straight to the sink once I tasted them, just in case.

I’m not saying I’d drink these two Spaniards myself, cos personally I think life’s too short and wine is too tasty and I don’t mind drinking proper apple juice if I have to drive or something (or preferably my new favourite low-alcohol choice, Stonewell’s Tobairin, which is just 1.5% ABV and full of zingy craft cider attitude and goes great with curries, of which more anon).

But if you were on antibiotics maybe and really missing having the odd glass of wine with dinner, or if you were in early pregnancy and hoping no-one at the dinner party would notice the small print promising ‘less than 0.5% ABV’, or if you were obsessed with getting bikini-skinny and seduced by the promise of ‘fewer than half the calories of normal wine’, then I could see how you might actually not mind drinking those two ‘once-was-a-wine’ beverages.

So now you know.

Ah the charmed life of a wine writer. Tasting all the muck so you don’t have to.

You’re welcome.

Tobairín from Stonewell: all the cider tang with little of the alcohol zing and no threat of gagging reflexes

So, in no particular order, here follows my Fantasy Festive Food & Wine Wishlist (as it appeared in IMAGEdaily today, only with links, and some pix in case my words don’t cut it for you):

1.     A very generous voucher for Ireland’s Blue Book, which just celebrated its 40th anniversary with the addition of Thornton’s Restaurant (where the canapé bar is one of Dublin’s most underrated food-fun nights out); the remote Clare Island Lighthouse (a spectacularly located guesthouse overlooking Clew Bay); and Liss Ard Estate in Skibbereen (which has the coolest magical-mystery gardens, complete with an otherworldly Irish Sky Garden where humdrum clouds are elevated to works of art). Now when I say ‘a very generous Blue Book voucher’ I would of course graciously accept any kind of a Blue Book voucher. Especially if it came with the latest glovebox-friendly copy of Georgina Campbell’s Ireland Guide or the McKenna’s Irish Food Guide, so I could be sure to eat well en route too.

Some view, huh? That there’s Clew Bay.

2.     A full set of Riedel’s ‘varietal specific’ wine glasses so that I could have the perfect glass for every wine I drink, whatever the grapes or style. (I attended a Riedel tasting recently and their glasses really do make an incredible difference to different wines.) The only problem is that, with separate glasses for Cabernet or Pinot Noir, Riesling or Chardonnay, and so on, I’d really need a bigger kitchen to keep them all in. And logistically, that would involve moving out of my tiny apartment, which I’m really rather fond of. So to avoid all that hoo-ha, I’d settle for the Syrah set, the most versatile of the lot.

3.  A year’s supply of one of the following:

a)     Pata Negra Iberico ham, to be delivered to my door by a swarthy Spaniard. (Failing that, a voucher for Black Pig in Donnybrook might do it, and I could go collect my own whenever supplies run low, and pick up a bottle of something delicious while I’m at it.)

b)    M&L Szechuan’s chilli-fried green beans. (Or failing that, a new stainless-steel wok from the Asian market, a supply of dried bird’s eye chillies and the recipe for said green beans.)

c)     Green papaya salad, like what used to be on the menu at Diep Le Shaker restaurant and what I could have lived on in northern Thailand. (Or failing that, a mandolin slicer and a voucher for the Asian Market so I could get a fresh supply of unripe papaya, chillies, nam plaa fish sauce and limes to make my own.)

4.     Speaking of mandolins, I’d also love a new Microplane grater, which happens to be the best grater in the world. I left mine at a party (don’t ask) and I really miss it for everything from grating Parmesan to finely grating garlic (beats crushing it by a mile). Okay, if you have to know, it was my own party but in a rented place and we were cooking and I thought I couldn’t cook without my Microplane. That’s how much I love it.

That’s what I mean by Microplane

5.     A case of Highbank Medieval Cider, because I know that it’ll probably be sold out by Christmas if it isn’t already. If you haven’t tried it, look out for it next year: it’s an amazing new honeyed cider that is sweet at first and then dry thanks to the tannic apples. Or failing that a mixed case of Irish craft beers and ciders. (A year’s supply is harder to define, right?)

6.     A wine course. If I hadn’t already done the WSET course run by Cooks Academy (‘Dublin’s School of Food & Wine’) and tutored by the brilliant Liam Campbell, I’d do that all over again. It was such a treat to go in every week, taste different wines and learn about different styles from all over the world. (WSET stands for Wine & Spirits Education Trust, a global professional wine educator, but they offer courses at all levels from introductory to Masters of Wine.) But seeing as how I’ve done the WSET thing, I’d go for a voucher for Ely Wine Bar’s weekly Thursday night wine tastings, which are only €15 a pop and give you a chance to taste some gorgeous wines you mightn’t otherwise try.

7.     A pair of stockings from Avoca (have you seen them? Cute or what!) stuffed full of hot and salted Pulparindo candy bars and fizzy cola bottles and Wham bars. (There’s a reason that tangy green papaya salad is my favourite dish ever.) What are Pulparindo bars? They are the penny sweets of gods, courtesy of some Mexican genius who thought to turn tangy tamarind into a sweet candy, and to flavour it with salt and chilli. Bam!

chilli-hot, salted and tangy tamarind – that’s what I’m talking about, right there

8.     A stainless steel stove-top moka pot for home-brewed coffee, possibly from Coffee Angel on South Anne Street, who seem to sell every kind of coffee accessory you could possibly want, not to mention every kind of coffee. (My current favourite is their Kebel Demersa from Ethiopia which tastes like Turkish delight, in a good way.) Oh and they’re also selling really sweet little stocking filler snowflakes made out of Finnish birch for €6, 100% of which goes to Barnardos. Sweet.

9.     A voucher for Inis Meain Restaurant & Suites so I could go back and recreate one of the best short breaks I’ve ever had. And maybe I could go towards the end of their season and they’d let me stay on and write that novel I always thought I’d get around to. It’d be the perfect stop for it, and the food is pretty darn spot on too. (I could do island lobster and fresh spuds on a daily basis. No problem!)

The Inis Meain Breakfast Box, delivered to your door early morning to be eaten whenever. That’s my kind of breakfast.

10.    An essential cookbook. Maybe Darina Allen’s 30 Years of Ballymaloe, which just won Best Irish Cookbook at the Bord Gais Energy Book of the Year awards. Or From Lynda’s Table by Lynda Booth of Dublin Cookery School, where I did the life-affirming one-month cookery course a few years back. Or Ross Lewis’s startling Chapter One: An Irish Food Story. Or whatever cookbook looked fun and interesting and solidly written. I wouldn’t mind which one.

Whichever.

I’m really very easy to please.

Honest.

The Chapter One cookbook, a soulful thing with very beautiful photography by Barry McCall

On Wednesday evening in Ely CHQ (that’s the one in the IFSC, Dublin 1), The Corkscrew wine merchants are hosting a very special wine dinner with visiting wine-maker Paolo de Marchi from Isole e Olena winery, one of Chianti Classico’s leading lights. A fourth-generation wine-maker and exceptionally charming man, Paolo was one of several wine-makers who helped to put Tuscany back on the map in the 1970s and ’80s by producing wine according to their own rules rather than according to the rules laid down by the local Chianti appellation regulations.

The wine at the picture-pretty estate of Isole e Olena

Following the lead of the makers of ground-breaking Super-Tuscan wines such as Sassicaia and Tignanello (both of which made the bold step of introducing Bordeaux grapes to their blends), Paolo made an international name for himself and his Tuscan estate. But unlike those two genre-defining wines, which looked beyond Tuscany for inspiration, Paolo’s most esteemed wine, Cepparello, is a celebration of the local Sangiovese grape (100%) as well as the soil and climate of the local terroir. He doesn’t restrict himself to local grapes however, with Syrah, Cabernet Sauvignon and Chardonnay coming centre-stage in other Isole e Olena wines. 

Paola di Marche and his son Luca who now works with him at the Tuscan estate in the heart of Chianti Classico

On Wednesday evening, you’ll have to eat and drink your way through five courses to get to the climactic tasting of the Cepparello, which will be paired with Italian and Irish cheeses. But that won’t be any great hardship, with pairings such as baked bone marrow, herb crust and salsa verde served with with Isole e Olena’s award-winning Chianti Classico 2010; or haunch of venison with braised chicory, celeriac remoulade and chocolate, served with their Collezione de Marchi Syrah 2006. 

The dinner kicks off at 8pm and costs €95 per head, which is more than your average mid-week meal for sure. But considering that, in a wine shop, you would pay on average about half of that for a bottle of any one of the six wines being served, it’s a pretty good deal. Click here to go The Corkscrew’s website and grab one of the last few tickets going.

So, today I’m giving you not one but TWO chances to sip and savour wine FOR FREE!

First up, there’s the O’Brien Winemakers Experience taking place in Dublin’s Mansion House tonight and tomorrow (Fri 8th & Sat 9th). More details are to be found in my last post (click here) but if you want to win a pair of tickets, you’ll have to go to my Holy Mackerel facebook page (click here). Then all you have to do is to ‘like’ the page (please and thank you), tell me what your favourite tipple is at this time of year, and make sure you leave your name and some form of contact details, whether that’s your twitter handle, email or whatever. I’ll announce the winner by tea-time and your name will be left on the door with a pair of tickets valid for any one of the three sessions this weekend.

You’re welcome!

But wait! Don’t be running off yet. There’s more opportunities for free wine swilling, I mean tasting.

Besides my weekly wine column in the Irish Mail on Sunday, I look after a monthly wine feature in FOOD&WINE Magazine, called The Guinea Pig tasting. The idea is that as well as the regular round-up of 20 wines every month conducted by wine editor Raymond Blake along with some hand-picked industry experts, the magazine also offers a different bunch of readers a chance to give their take on a half-dozen wines. The wines are chosen by my good self, tasted blind by that month’s Guinea Pigs, and then we write up their comments alongside my own take on the wines.

We’re always looking for volunteers, so if you think you can round up four more thirsty people who you maybe work with, or read books with, or play footie with, or anything that makes you a collective of some sort, then we’d love to hear from you. We’ve had builders and nurses (both maternity and psychiatric) and panto casts and comedians and boutique owners and Electric Picnickers and ICA women and GAA coaches and all sorts of other kinds of walks of life. You don’t need any particular wine knowledge or experience, just to enjoy drinking it and to be prepared to tell us what you think of the wines we taste. If you’re interested, please leave a note on my Facebook page saying so, again with some way to contact you, and I’ll be in touch. (Or you could contact me on carrigy AT gmail.com if you’re not on Facebook.) I’ve a couple of dates coming up later this month, so would love to have you and your crew along.

Cheers!

St Stephen’s Green looking pretty

The leaves are finally turning, Halloween has got us back in the party spirit and the December diary is starting to fill up with get-togethers of old pals who don’t see enough of eachother and reunions with loved ones returning to these shores. Any week now and we’ll be saddling up and heading across the festive frontier, so it’s a great time to give some thought to what supplies you might want to bring there with you.

With this in mind, I thought it timely to remind you of two excellent wine fairs happening this weekend, both in aid of great charities (not to mention in aid of the betterment of your festivities).

On Sunday (10th November), one of my favourite Dublin wine-merchants will up sticks from their Clarendon Street base and set up shop around the corner in The Westbury hotel for their annual Corkscrew Winter Wine Fair. Expect to pay €25 on the door, for which you can come and go as you please between 12.30pm–5.30pm and taste “over 100 of the best wines available in Ireland today” (their words, but I would concur – they’ve a really excellent selection of wines, some available exclusively, others from some of Ireland’s top wine importers, some of whom will be there on Sunday). The lovely Corkscrew lads also add: “We advise some restraint, but don’t necessarily expect it – three laps of the room should cover the most of what’s on offer from white, red, sparkling and fortified wines that come from all corners of the earth.” See www.thecorkscrew.ie for more details.

But before that particular extravaganza, O’Brien’s Wines will be hosting their own annual wine fair, the O’Brien’s Winemaker Experience, over two days at Dublin’s Mansion House. Tickets cost €15 each, or €20 for a pair, with all proceeds going to Our Lady’s Hospice & Care Services. You can opt for one of three sessions: Fri 8th 6-9pm, Sat 1-4pm, Sat 5-8pm (…unless you win a pair of tickets that get you into all three sessions, that is: keep an eye out here tomorrow morning for details on how to win). There will be up to 45 wine producers in attendance, showcasing 250 wines. See www.obrienswine.ie for more details, including some of the highlighted wineries being represented. I’ll be popping along a little early on Friday for a preview tasting, and will pop up a few recommendations here for you to seek out if you make it along.

So, lots of fine sipping (and maybe just a little spitting) to look forward to. Like I said, I love this time of year, don’t you?

Superquinn Sausages, the stuff of Irish legends

So, it’s a good time to say ‘thanks a million Superquinn’. Apparently, a million is how many Superquinn sausages we Irish eat every fortnight. To celebrate, Superquinn are launching a sausage sale today, with 33% off all bangers until July 9th, including their new limited edition Superquinn BBQ sausage.

And because the sun is shining today, against all odds, you might like to pick up a steak to throw on the barbie while you’re at it. The recent Superquinn Steak & Wine Sale might be over but those dry-aged rib-eye steaks are always worth grabbing, as are their T-Bones and New York-style Striploin. (If you don’t want to take my word for it, Beef Magazine in Germany named the rib-eye best steak in the world two years ago, and myself & my colleagues at the Irish Food Writers’ Guild awarded it one of our annual Irish Food Awards in 2008).

Striploin, New York-stylin'

They won’t tell us what’s in their secret sausage recipe that makes their sausages so special, but the fact that they are made daily in-house may have something to do with it. As for the dry-aged rib-eye, Finbarr McDonald of Anglo Irish Beef Producers did divulge at a recent dinner that they use a patented five-step dry-aging process exclusive to Superquinn within Ireland, key to which are the steps of using the weight of hanging to stretch the meats fibres; something called sympathetic chilling, which allows the fibres to relax rather than shocking them with fast chilling; and allowing them to hang for up to seven days in the carcass itself. All very technical, but the proof is in the eating, and they taste as good as ever.

Superquinn wine-buyer Richard Moriarty was at the dinner too, and he got all technical with us about the intricacies of pairing food and wine. Well, not too technical, because he’s not that kind of guy as anyone who has attended a wine-tasting with Richard will know. (He presented a masterclass with me at a FOOD&WINE Magazine Christmas Show a couple of years ago, and is a great man for cutting through some of the nonsense that often accompanies any serious chat about wine.)

Richard Moriarty, who selflessly tastes and buys wines on your behalf

In the name of research, Richard had recently shut himself up in a room with a frying pan, a bottle opener, a selection of cuts of Superquinn steaks and a geansaí-load of wine. The aim was to explore not just what wine went best with what cuts of beef but also what kinds of effect cooking the beef to various temperatures had.

The results were fascinating, and are explored in greater detail by Irish Times wine writer John Wilson who was also at the table: have a read here if you have the time. If you don’t have the time, the gist of it was that:

• Powerful flavours need powerful wines, and more delicate flavours fare better with more delicate wines (as with most pairing of food and wines).
• Flavour comes from the cut as much as the cooking style, with fattier cuts such as rib-eye offering more flavour than leaner fillets; and the carmelising effect of char-grilling on a roasting hot barbecue producing more robust results than pan-frying on a domestic stovetop.
• How you cook the beef makes a difference too: the more a rib-eye was cooked, the sweeter a wine it demanded (Richard suggested a fruity Argentinian Malbec); while the rarer it was the better it fared with wines combining both acidity and tannin (such as an elegant Pinot Noir for rare fillet, or a more fulsome Bordeaux for a rare sirloin).
• At the end of the day, what’s important is that you enjoy what’s in the glass and on the plate – so if you want to drink Gavi with your steak and bearnaise sauce, that’s exactly what you should do.

T-Bone for tea, with wine

If you’d like some more wine and food pairing recommendations from Superquinn’s Richard Moriarty, look no further than their website which gives a trio of price-tiered wines for all sorts of foods, from beef, fish and game to vegetarian, Oriental and Indian. They’re pretty broad categories admittedly, but it’s a nice start to what’s really just a bit of fun (pairing food and wine, that is) and a good excuse to buy something you mightn’t have tried before.

I can’t quite decide what I’d pair with Superquinn Sausages. Made from 100% pure Irish pork, they’d come under the pork category, with which Richard suggests an SQ Fiano, Soave Classico Suavia or Llicorella Blanc.

They sound great. But with breakfast? Call me old-fashioned… but I might stick with a cuppa tea for that one.