The flavor of 5-spice powder in wine of Colombia

Think of Colombia, think of balmy evenings dancing to salsa, fuelled by shots of aguardiente and arepas. But there’s plenty more than the anise-based spirit and cornmeal cakes to sample in the South American country. Chefs have stepped up their game to put gastronomy on the map, with sommeliers and bartenders following suit. Not just appreciating local ingredients and distilling spirits, they also seek out wines from around the world to accompany fine-dining experiences. Their endeavours have pa ...

Most of the Italian masterpieces of the Renaissance in the 15th and 16th centuries were carved out of marble. Since the 1980s, Italian viticulture has had its Renaissance in the form of wine, but not much was often thought about combining the two. ‘Man needs to realise his dreams,’ said Yannick Alléno, presenting Fuori Marmo 2019, a unique marble-aged Cabernet Sauvignon from the Costa Toscana IGT at his three-star Michelin restaurant, Pavillon Ledoyen, in Paris last week. The idea was born in 20 ...

How’s the weather been this year? Awful. ‘La nature m’écoeure’, one of my wine-growing friends posted on Facebook on 8 April, having been out to look at the frost-crippled shoots on his vines that morning: ‘Nature disgusts me’. It takes a lot to make a wine-grower feel that. He wasn’t alone. Jeremiads echo around the northern hemisphere as 2021 closes. It’s been the year of all the miseries. None suffered more horribly than the growers of Germany’s Ahr valley, where floodwaters caused by the fou ...