Wine
WINE TO DINE – OCTOBER 2018 – WILD MUSHROOMS
Drinks writer Peter Ranscombe selects five wines to go with wild mushrooms. FEW ingredients are as versatile as mushrooms, offering plenty of pairing opportunities, from crisp whites that cut through sauces and creamy chardonnay that accentuates buttery accompaniments all the way through to fresh and fruity reds for meatier dishes. Check out the wild mushroom…
Read MoreWINE TO DINE – SEPTEMBER 2018 – GROUSE
Drinks writer Peter Ranscombe picks five wines to go with grouse. TO MARK the start of the shooting season on 12 August, grouse is the star ingredient in the September 2018 issue of Scottish Field magazine. Here are a brace-and-a-half of wines that will help grouse dishes take flight, with a combination of red and…
Read MorePommery adds some sparkle to the Fringe
Peter Ranscombe toasts the return of Champagne Pommery to the Fringe with a laser show at The Signet Library. I HAVE very fond memories of lasers – they were a big part of my course as a physics student at St Andrews – but I’d never associated them with drinking wine… until last night. The…
Read MoreThere’s more to New Zealand than sauvignon blanc
Few countries have as close ties with a single variety as New Zealand does with sauvignon blanc, but Peter Ranscombe has been discovering that Scotland’s antipodean twin is much more than a one-trick pony. THINK New Zealand, think Marlborough sauvignon blanc – it may have only been planted for the first time as recently as…
Read MoreSparkling wine special part three: Bobby’s bubbles
In the final article in his special sparkling wine trio, Peter Ranscombe follows in the footsteps of Robert Louis Stevenson by tasting wines from Schramsberg in California. AUTHOR Robert Louis Stevenson is famous throughout the world for his novels, including classics such as Kidnapped and Treasure Island. Yet few of his readers know about the…
Read MoreSparkling wine special part two: Pretty in pink
In the second of three articles focusing on fizzy wine, Peter Ranscombe discovers that beauty is in the eye of the beholder – or, when it comes to Ruinart, in the eye of the partridge. CHAMPAGNE is full of weird and wonderful stories – from Benedictine monk Dom Pérignon using thicker glass to stop bottles…
Read MoreSparkling wine special part one: ‘It’s not Champagne’
In the first of three articles focusing on fizzy wine, Peter Ranscombe meets a French winemaker who’s creating sensational sparklers in England. “I AM French, but I’m here to express the terroir of England,” declared Exton Park winemaker Corinne Seely as she introduced her latest wine to the press in London this morning. “It’s not…
Read MoreRamon Bilbao goes back to the future in Rioja
Peter Ranscombe straps himself into his DeLorean to watch Spain’s flagship wine region take a step back in time. WITH its massive turbine hall and colossal central chimney, there’s no forgetting that the Tate Modern art gallery was once the Bankside power station, burning through piles of coal to provide electricity for London’s homes and…
Read MoreWine to Dine – August 2018 – Venison
Drinks writer Peter Ranscombe picks five wines to pair with venison. FEW meats scream “Scotland” in the same way as venison; whether it’s the wild red deer roaming the mountainsides on either side of the A9 while driving home to the Highlands, or the farmed animals in Fife and beyond, our nation is blessed with…
Read MoreWhat have the Romans ever done for us?
Peter Ranscombe learns more about Croatian wines from Igor Kroljic of Pine Nut Path and Diana Thompson of Wine Events Scotland. “WHAT have the Romans ever done for us?” comes the cry from Monty Python’s Life of Brian. Ask that question in Croatia and the answer may include winemaking. Although Croatia in its current form…
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