HORSESHIT AND BIODYNAMICS

A few weeks ago when the International Big Oil was in town a few media politeratti and cliteratti gathered for a bit of a catch up.

There was good wine to be had.  Lots of it - we were buying and sharing our favourites with  others . 

A well known media personality presented us with a new wine.  

It was cloudy and sorry boys - but it was the colour of a mucky period.. 

A diseased ruby color. 

We all sniffed inquisitively and as I cast my eyes around the table it was clear that this was not an ephiphanistic drop. 

We sipped but our palates were in obvious agreement - it was not a great wine. 

The purchaser of this bemusing wine was aghast - "Its bio dynamic! " he exclaimed 

Moments like these are always dangerous for us sheilas of advancing years and bladder valves worn by too many evenings on the hops as a young un. 

We were characteristically blunt. "Its crap." 

Others murmured in agreement . To be fair some thought it was okay  - drinkable at a pinch - " A quaffer " someone proffered.

Then the buyee of the bottle thundered  "Its $245.. "

About $10 bucks worth shot out the left side on my mouth. 

A mate lost control of her muscles and spilt a $20 bucks on the table as she jerked in reaction to the revelation. 

Then we proceeded to take the piss out of the plonk. It was universally declared ordinary. 

Bio dynamics is a wonderful marketing ploy by the organic lobby. Medieval mysticism gone moderne. 

Now I grow a few veges  and we have cows and sheep a horse and chooks and as everyone knows manure is good for you. I use it extensively  and the results are glorious. Use lots of manure and you get robust, lush fecund fauna. 

 However playing in shit filling up horns cos they are the seemingly magical   "fertile" bit of the bovine and burying them to mature the said crap  is just frikking daft. 

Doing it in time with the moon and sun indicates that the believers have been exposed to too many solar flares. 

Now in this video  up on the Seresin Wine Site (which I think has some of the finest wine in the world) is an example of  how this pseudo science is being peddled. 

<iframe width="560" height="315" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/forejgHXqD4" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen>iframe>

Some cute guy  playing with poo somehow seems romantic when the dreamy scenes are linked to lush vineyards. 

He looks like some agrarian Merlin piling the poop into horns for it to mature in the earth to wait a while for it to turn into plant superfood. 

The simple fact is - if you line up a biodynamic vineyard and one that uses natural fertilisers like manure broken down in the old fashioned way, the results would be the same. 

Its not the moon or the sun or the "fertile horn"  or even the steadfast belief of the cute guy that's creating good wine. Its a modern myth. 

Its simply that shit is the biz when it comes to making things grow. 

And its time that this weird wine wankery was unmasked for what it is  - bollocks. 

Some biodynamic wine will be good in spite of the all the jiggery pokery .  Because shit is good for the soil.  But all the biodynamic ritual adds no value

The shit is where its at. 

So to all you good wine makers out there - stop taking the piss - us good wine drinkers deserve more respect .

Their is truth in the vine - tell it. 

NZ PINOT NOIR GOLD - WYCROFT

We blogged the other day about getting a lovely bottle of 2009  Wycroft Pinot Noir in exchange for a lend of our meat mincer so our mate could make some venison sausages ( we got some sausages as well).
We are well familiar with the delightful depth and sophistication of Wycroft wines so we were well pleased to acquire a bottle.
However ,we have just discovered the latest accolade this small but excellent vineyard has won. Wycroft is only found in the best restaurants as is befitting a pinot of quality. We love its plummy, chocolaty  richness and the decadence that comes from a hint of tobacco. It is a supremely good wine that  glows from the loving touch of its passionate vintners.  It has always been in the best of NZ Wine company and the latest award sees it again recognised as one of this country's premium pinot noirs and indeed the world.  

Specialist Wairarapa pinot noir maker Wycroft has been awarded one of only 18 gold medals globally in the 28^th annual London International Wine Challenge (IWC). Six kiwi pinot noirs scored gold – three from Central Otago, two from Marlborough, and Wycroft, from Matahiwi Rd, Masterton for its 2009 Wycroft Pinot Noir. With more than 25,000 wines entered the IWC is the world’s largest wine competition. The local pinot noir gold medals were shared with Australia and the United Stateswith one each, and France with 10. This is the second international gold medal from two entries for the boutique Wycroft label, the other being a Decanter award for the Wycroft 2006 Pinot Noir. Wycroft was established in 1998 and produces purely pinot noir in small quantities for high-end restaurants and mailing list clients. Its annual production averages around 250 dozen. 

We wont be drinking this bottle until we can find  an auspicious occasion to do it justice and congratulations must also go  to  Roaring Meg 2009 (Mt Difficulty, Central Otago); Elephant Hill 2009 (Central Otago); Valli Pinot Noir 2008 (Central Otago); The Society’s Exhibition Pinot Noir 2009 (Craggy Range, Central Otago); Nautilus Estate 2009 (Marlborough); Villa Maria Cellar Selection 2009 (Marlborough) which were also gold medal winners. 

ICING ON A HOT NZ CAKE.

We reckon that this is the time we really need to sell our place- New Zealand. While Tourism New Zealand does a pretty good job - its time for the rest of New Zealand to start selling our story.

Early this morning we saw a tweet from the Wine Diva, a well known Canuck wine writer and tweeter.

Daenna van Mulligen has been tweeting for the last few weeks as she travelled around NZ chronicling her experiences . If we were writing about Wine full time - she would set the benchmark for use of social media and telling the story of wine in a fun way.

And she is a shining example of how we can get the "story" of New Zealand out through the "new media," online media, social media - what ever you want to call it.

Today we retweeted her wonderful take on NZ. She was glowing in her praise for New Zealand wine and Air New Zealand but she found pineapple lumps hard to swallow...

We have about 630 solid followers on Twitter and have got to the stage where twits with large audiences are following us. We loved what Thewinediva wrote about New Zealand. So we retweeted it. Then we checked on an online tool called Tweetreach later in the morning to see just how many people saw the story. Its a quick and dirty measure of how far your tweet goes. That single tweet went close to reaching 30,000 people in the space of a couple of hours.

We know that it only measures reach and not action and yes we have less than a thousand followers but handled right a tweet like that can suddenly be "heard" by a huge international audience. We know from the #hashtag #nzwine on twitter that it has been retweeted by thousands more people. So the reach of a positive article, if you have the right followers, is exponential.

For anyone who is a bit cynical about twitters ability to spread the word this is an example of how it works. Its like icing on a hot cake.

Thanks theWineDiva- you have showed us a small part of the future.

So New Zealand - get on board - lets sell ourselves to the world- it only takes 140 letters.

HEART OF THE GLASS

We had at lovely day today touring around Cromwell, Bannockburn and Earnscleugh with mum

while dad was off playing golf, very good golf actually - he had a net 67. Not bad for a creaky 75 year old.

We decided to call in to the Wooing Tree vineyard on the boundary of the Cromwell township.

We won a bottle of its extremely fine Pinot Noir in an online Air New Zealand Wine awards competition recently, so we wanted to see what else they had.

We now have a new best wine friend - Blondie - its the liquid version of BustedBlonde. A blanc de Noir. It's zippy, luscious, a little bit fruity and surprising good and the more you get to know her the better you will like her.

Way better than Sauvignon Blanc, in our uneducated opinion.

For that reason it has to be a superb wine match with crustaceans and we think almost perfect with New Zealand Rock Lobster.

Funny how things just happen though - a mate of a mate of mine rang out of the blue yesterday. He lives in Wanaka and he was heading over to Fiordland with some blokes and had heard of a method to cook crayfish using kelp that he thought we might know about. As we were in the car with the our father, the answer was almost immediate.

"Yup" dad said.

"Cut two bits of kelp and hollow them both out like a bag. One has to be able to fit inside the other so you end up with two bags. Then put the whole crayfish inside one and then opened end first - put it in the the other kelp bag - then fold the ends in like an envelope. Then put them on hot coals and when the first bag has burned off the crayfish is ready to eat."

The minerals and salts of the kelp will flavour the steamed crayfish.

Muttonbirders, like Bustedblonde, used to use kelp bags to store muttonbirds, so you can get an idea of how it works from the great old photo above.

We seem to remember using the kelp purse method of cooking fish on a beach many moons ago.

We also remember being with some bloke and doing a bit of sandy snogging - but can't remember just who that bloke was so he cant have been much good - but we do remember the crayfish and it was very memorable.

So how good is it that today we found the wine that we think would be a perfect match with that ancient recipe!

Wooing Trees " Blondie" is a complex and extremely interesting wine - unlike anything we have had for quite some time.

Its slight champagne blush comes from a smidgen of contact with the pinot noir skins. Its really is a stunner. It lingers on the tongue and has lovely peachy notes.

Sadly we have some crayfish but not the kelp to cook it in this weekend. But for the those who like adventure with elegance and if you are heading to a kelp strewn coast to catch crayfish, then make sure you get a bottle of "Blondie" as a perfect accompaniment with your kelp parcelled crayfish.

You will be delighted by how much she will enhance your lobster eating experience. Of course if you want a sublime experience take BustedBlonde with you as well

BEST WINE OF FESTIVE SEASON

We have sampled a few wines in the Xmas New Year. But today we are sitting savouring what has to be the best wine we have had in the last few weeks and its the best Rose we have had in quite a while. Rose's can often be light fluffy quaffers, little depth and bugger all style. More often than not they can be best described as the "barbie doll" of wines. A tad superficial.

Todays bottle changed our view of what a Rose can be.

It is lovingly crafted by Karl Johner under the Paulownia Estate label - a 2009 Rose . The vineyard is owned by Christine and Vaughan Paul.

We have been a fan of the complex and deeply satisfying wines created by Karl Johner for some time . This Rose is no exception. Its golden pink hue sees it glow in the bottle. Its has the longest finish of any rose I have ever had. It simply dances on the tongue and thoughts of strawberry and caramel linger long.

And if all that is not good enough - its also at a price point that is likely to win many fans. $14.50 from the Greytown Wine Centre.