Time Travel with Wine.

Time Travel with Wine.

While scrolling through twitter the other day I came across one from a wine buff describing the best wine he drank in 2022 as being a 1983 Chateau Vannieres from a small region called Bandol. Flying back in time to a tasting room in South Kensington in 1986, this was the very first wine I tried on my first day working at a proper wine merchant. I can remember exactly how it tasted as if it was yesterday which, is in stark contrast to the fact that I find it increasingly hard to remember what I actually did yesterday. 

At the time I had already worked in various restaurants and wine shops but this was the famous La Reserve, which sadly is no longer with us. This was a business where many trade luminaries had started out and I knew what a privilege it was to be working there. My nerves were partially calmed by the fact that there was another Smith employed there. That was until I found out that his grandfather had run a newsagents and whose initials were WH.

Back to 1983 Vannieres – a wine made almost forty years ago but still alive and thriving. So much has changed in the world but this has kept constant. One of the reasons why it stood out for me was that I had yet to learn a working wine vocabulary which is something essential for note taking and making comparisons. But this wine tasted of something distinct, it tasted of raspberry fruit gums. To be specific, Rowntrees. Little did I know this wine was to become quite famous for its quality so much so that a French critic described as the best wine made in all of France that year. Should you wish to purchase a bottle, it would set you back £170. Would I Pay that much for it? 

Possibly. At the very least, I’d love to taste it just one more time.