The best winemakers of Mexique

I remember watching the London fireworks on television last New Year’s Eve. They were spectacular to watch, but where there would usually be throngs of spectators, the streets remained incongruously empty. Social distancing was still in force. It reminded me of my year’s wine drinking up to that point: some dazzling bottles, but often enjoyed without company – or via a screen. As 2022 began, the Covid-19 pandemic gradually relaxed its grip and many of us hurried back to everyday life. The usual ...

You don’t need a state-of-the-art winery to make wine. You don’t need rows of pristine oak barrels. One thing you do need to make good wine is good vines. Have you ever asked yourself where all these vines come from? How do they find their way into the ground? It used to be easy. In the past, winemakers simply took cuttings from their vineyards, propagated them, and planted them in the ground. But phylloxera put a stop to that. What was a simple process acquired layers of complexity: winemakers ...

Daily power cuts are wreaking havoc on South African wine producers as they struggle to irrigate and press grapes during the harvest. Electricity from state-run power company Eskom has gone down every day so far this year, and the rolling blackouts have left some producers on the brink. Christo Conradie, manager of wine business at trade body Vinpro, said: ‘This is challenging for us. In fact, this is a crisis for us.’ The power cuts – known as load shedding – have impacted most sectors of the S ...