I was glad to help our local group of the National Trust (Honiton and Ottery St Mary) with a fund-raising wine tasting at West Hill Village Hall on Friday 23rd March.  We do not ‘host’ many events of this type as most of us CPW’ers have families and our Friday evenings are far too precious.  However, the indefatigable Richard Coley was very kind to my mother when arranging her wonderful NT trip to Northern Italy last year so I was glad to return the favour.   If anybody wants to organise a great wine tasting, make sure to take my Mum on holiday first!

Approximately 70 people attended with a 32 seater charabanc being organised from Honiton, which took care of any problems with finding a designated driver.  The Village Hall was an agricultural barn many decades ago but has now quite converted to deluxe standards, as you might expect for West Hill, with an excellent kitchen.

We tasted nine wines, kicking off with a glass of sparkling Aldridge Brut NV from Australia and then moving through four whites (Castillo White, Spain – Gros Manseng ‘Cassagnoles’, France – Frog Haven Pinot Gris, New Zealand – Bourgogne Blanc, France) and then four reds (Roc du Gouveneur, France - Rio Alto Carmenere, Chile – Barbera Piedmonte, Italy – Zweigelt, Austria).  I tried to throw in some unusual grape varieties as there’s no point in going to a wine tasting and then drinking what you normally glug back at home!

The questions flew in thick and fast so we wrapped up much later than planned, for which I apologise.  One of the benefits of doing wine tastings for groups such as the NT is that the members tend to either be widely travelled or have a enquiring nature…and often both.  This means lots of ’feedback’, which enables me to ditch the boring stuff and and instead answer the points raised from the floor, so to speak!  The topics ranged through semi-permeable membranes in screwcaps, the pro’s and con’s of plastic bottles for wine, residual sugar levels for diabetics, ‘hang time’ for phenolic ripening in grapes and how Champagne gets ‘tweaked’ for different parts of there world, amongst many.  It’s amazing how a relatively simple question about, say, Chilean reds can end up at organic manures, via drip irrigation techniques!  Nobody fell asleep, as far as I could tell, so it couldn’t have been too boring.

I was also amazed at the alacrity at which the venue was tidied up afterwards.  Several of the NT members may be mumble mumble years old but they set too when it came to making it all ’ship shape and Bristol fashion’.  I wish I could get my children to be that motivated!

My thanks to Richard Coley for organising the event, the ’volunteers’ who helped pour the wines and all who helped tidy up afterwards.  The concensus on the night was that a good time was had by all.

We’re popping corks and cracking screwtops to hold a tasting at our shop in Ottery St Mary on Friday 18th March, 2-5pm with a £2 donation per head going towards Comic Relief. We might even venture out to get some nibbles ! We have a great selection of bottles to try and also have chosen a range of wines where 10% from the sale of each bottle goes to Comic Relief.

Our website offers two mixed cases  under the title of ‘Wine Relief’ which was originally set up by Jancis Robinson and her husband to swell the coffers of Comic Relief by offering specially selected wines in aid of Comic Relief.

So come in, taste some wines, meet the very friendly CPW team and even if you don’t want to come into the shop you can admire the bottles in the window and our highly polished new awards for Best Buying Team and Best Digital Strategy (ie. Fab Website).

Walking up to The Innovation Centre on the Exeter University Campus I was struck by the great design of the building.  Our ‘tasting room’ was a bright, airy, colourful room with glass windows to the floor. On the dot of 5.30 our tasters arrived, all clutching their tickets and eagerly perusing the 80 or so bottles on display ranging from crisp, dry whites, to dense dark reds, sparkling, port and many others. On my table it was the Australian Second Innings Malbec that caused a great deal of interest, especially in comparison with it’s Argentinian namesake from Finca Sophenia. The time went exceedingly quickly and it was truly a fun evening. The group from Mamhead were particularly great participants, and we hope everyone got home safely.

With all proceeds to Devon Air Ambulance we raised in excess of £1000 which in my opinion was a fantastic effort by all.

An on-time flight from Bristol got us fifteen mustard-keen cyclists in to Bordeaux’s Merignac airport right on time. Sensibly, some of the team decided to take a taxi to the terribly ‘un-posh’ Novotel in Bordeaux’s faceless Mériadeck district. However, others followed my lead and took the bus in to town. Wrong decision! I managed to get us on to the commuter bus instead of the airport shutlle and after an hour’s worth of meandering around the houses, we got to the Novotel. Our bikes were delivered over night and on Friday morning, we negotiated our way out of the Bordeaux traffic and powered our way up the minor roads along the Garonne. This was a great gang of lads who really did want to cycle but also wanted to learn a little about this very demanding region. By lunchtime, we had found a really friendly café in Macau (le Petit Verdot) and freshened up with a few beers and some charcurterie and then pressed on up to Paulliac where we had a visit planned at Grand-Puy-Lacoste. François Borie was his usual charming self and didn’t seem at all phased by a group of rather sweaty chaps from East Devon. We tasted a beautifully structured and pervasive 2006 GPL and the remarkable 2009 that is now showing its real potential – a really grand master. The team were hugely impressed by the triage work (not really needed!) going on in the salle de réception but equally so by the sheer class of the wines and the welcome of Monsieur Borie. We nighted at the France et Angleterre on the front in Pauillac and tumbled in to bed really quite tired and happy!

Saturday was a big day with a run up to Mouton and then down through the vineyards via Gruaud-Larose, Talbot and (unexpectedly) Lanessan! We had chosen an off-road route for this part of the ride and ended up on private roads through Château Lanessan, ending up narrowly been chased by a very fierce Alsatian guard-dog but managing to set off a state-of-the-art burglar alarm system surrounding the (uninhabited) château. “Every man for himself” was the shout that went up and we scattered like rabbits in the headlights. No sign of the local gendarmerie – phew! Mark Seward, our host for this event (who was celebrating his 50th birthday) had managed to find an étape for lunch on his I-pod (Michelin app) and our ever-dapper van driver, Daryll, persauded Le Lion d’Or at Arsac to take us for lunch. Madame was really quite surprised when we all turned up and the tone was set by Richard E. who was attired in a startling Tour de France  one-piece cycling suite that really didn’t do him justice. When we ordered 15 menus at 13 euros, she became even frosty but we turned things around by managing to order wine worth three times the value of the food element of the bill! Onwards to Château Paloumey near Pian-Médoc, albeit rather late as we experienced some navagational problems, adding a further 10km. to an already very long route. Martine Cazeneuve, the delightful owner, gave us a fascinating tour and proved that some delicious, affordable wine is also available at the Cru Bourgeois level. We had been cycling in late-20 degree Centigrade temperatures and we were more than relieved to get to our hotel at Le Pian-Médoc and throw ourselves in to the pool!

It was a fantastic trip…covering over 100 miles on our cycles…without any injuries or too many hangovers. By the way, Dick, you did very well…

Whilst we have had tasting events throughout the year we have had many requests for an ‘open tasting’ where our customers can come and taste a wide range of our wines. Having sat down and discussed this we have decided to hold a Charity Wine Tasting in aid of Devon Air Ambulance (by popular vote) at The Innovation Centre in Exeter. This will be held on Thursday, 25^th November from 5.30 – 8pm. Tickets £10 to be bought in advance.

Please do give us a ring on 01404 814139 or email us on sales@christopherpiperwines.co.uk

This will be a great opportunity to taste our wines, (everything from Massaya Classic Red from Lebanon, to our delicious Gremillet Champagne) and meet some of the CPW team.