Plageoles’ Vin d’Autan 2005

Tarn in Gaillac from Didier Descouens — Travail personnel, CC BY-SA 4.0, Link

Gaillac is located in the center of the southwestern French wine-growing region of the same name, from which the sweet wine tasted this time comes. The wine-growing region north-west of Toulouse, on the Tarn – with 9,000 hectares of vineyards and around a third of which are appellations – is characterized above all by its often regionally autochthonous grape varieties and the range of wine styles.

Read more …

Santo(rin)i’s Christmas wine – Vinsanto

© lyager Pixabay

The wines of Santorini differ in one essential point from almost all other Greek wines. The grapes come from real-root vines, means they are not grafted, as the phylloxera cannot survive in the barren, sandy soil of the island, which consists of volcanic ash and pumice. The vine training system is done in a rarely used way: the vine shoots are “braided” into a wreath,

Read more …

Liatiko – Crete’s red sweet wine


Liatiko - Crete's red sweet wine

Southwest of Heraklion lies the Psiloritis massif, also known as the Ida Mountains, on the north-eastern slopes of which the vineyards of the Dafnes wine-growing region are located at heights between 300 and 500 m. There, mainly local traditional vines, such as the white varieties Vidiano, Vilana or Thrapsathiri as well as the red varieties Kotsifali, Mandilaria and Liatiko, thrive on lighter, sandy, often gravelly, mostly poorly fertile soils.

Read more …

West Styrian Mistella from Schilcher


© ÖWM / Robert Herbst

Schilcher is the name given to the rosé-colored shimmering wine of western Styria, which is made from the red grape variety Blauer Wildbacher. From this variety mainly still wine is produced, only about 3% of the Blauer Wildbacher grapes harvested from more than 360 hectares are made into sparkling wine and even much less into red wine.

Read more …

Prošek – Sweet wine of Dalmatia


© barbaragnelson Pixabay

The sweet wine Prošek, pronounced Proschek, is rare in Germany under this name, because Croatia has forgotten to protect this product name with its joining of the EU. Although not to be confused with Prosecco, the name Prošek can only be used in Croatia because of its similarity to Prosecco.

Read more …

Recioto di Soave from volcanic soil

Viticulture near Verona © Pixabay

Recioto is a typical term in the northern Italian Veneto, used for a wine produced from rosinated grapes – in the remaining areas of Italy, such a wine is called Passito. The name Recioto goes back to the local dialect which names the external grapes of the vine as Recie, which at least in earlier times, exclusively were used to produce this kind of sweet wine.

Read more …

Santorini’s red sweetness

Santorini is not only known for its white-blue postcard idylls, but also for the Vinsanto, a sweet wine from the white grapes Assyrtiko, Aidani and Athiri. Less known, however, is a red sweet wine of Santorini, made purely from the variety Mandilaria. A wine of this type, the Apiliotis from the Domaine Sigalas, Alex had brought as a gift from his original home, when he was our guest for dinner together with his wife and children.

Both wines are made similarly. This starts with the Koulora training system where the wine shoots are “braided” into a wreath, within which the grapes grow and are thus protected from … Read more ...

Vin de Paille from Côtes du Jura

On the western foothills of the Massif de Jura, along the road N 83, there is, in an altitude of about 200 to 400 meters, the approximately 650 hectares large wine-growing area Côtes du Jura. In a semi-continental, rather cool and with about 1100 mm annual precipitation also rather wet climate, there are produced about 25,000 hectoliters of wine per year, mainly (~ 2/3) white wine, the rest red wine, Vin Jaune and also about 550 hectoliters of Vin de Paille, as straw wine is called in France.

Two white varieties Chardonnay and Savagnin and also two red varieties Poulsard and Trousseau may be used to produce Vin Read more ...

Swiss straw wine from the Rhine

From Ticino to Aargau our Swiss wine tour led us this year in June. We also got to know the Räuschling, an indigenous Swiss grape variety, of which only 25 hectares are cultivated worldwide, 18 hectares of which at Lake Zurich. The parents of the grape variety are the grape varieties White Heunisch, also known as Gouais Blanc or Gwäss as well as the vine named in the Jura Savagnin Blanc and in Switzerland Heida. Gouais Blanc, which is also a direct ancestor of Riesling, seems to provide for the very strong acid and therefore predestined this grape variety as very good for sweet … Read more ...