The flavor of perfume in wine of Southeastern Anatolia

We all have different motives in choosing wine. There are those hoping for a journey into unexplored regions of sublime sensation, and those with earthier desires, happy when the first glass has them seeing double. There are wines to accommodate them both: a prickly little Mosel on the one hand and a 15% Barolo on the other. Doesn’t the ideal wine, though, combine the two – inspiration with stimulus, perfume with punch? The three little letters ‘abv’ (alcohol by volume) only tell half the story, ...

Described by Courvoisier as ‘daring’, ‘visionary’ and ‘a first-of-its-kind collaboration’, Courvoisier Mizunara was created by the house’s recently-retired maître de chai, Patrice Pinet, and Shinji Fukuyo, chief blender of Japanese whisky maker Suntory. The project dates back to 2015, when the president of Suntory visited Courvoisier at Jarnac shortly after Suntory took over Beam Global, the Cognac house’s then owner, in a deal worth US$16bn. Pinet expressed an interest in experimenting with miz ...

Whisky is emphatically a product of place. The flavours in the glass conjure images of the spirit’s origin, from an Islay malt’s distinctive peat smoke to the exotic perfume of a Japanese blend. Traditionally, however, that local accent is lost when spirit is filled into cask. The vast majority of Scotch malts and blends, for example, are matured in oak sourced from thousands of miles away, and previously used to age bourbon or Sherry. Some whiskies might venture into more exotic territory. Thin ...