I am in Genève, Switzerland for work, but of course there is wine to explore. Over the last couple of years I have been back and forth several times to Genève and each time I have tried to taste as many of the wines as possible. There are around 19,900 hectres of vineyards in Switzerland divided between thousands of full and part time growers. Production of wine is not huge in world terms and according to data from the Swiss Federal Office of Agriculture, production in 2009 was just over 1.1 million hectoliters, divided into 527,000 hl of white wine and 587,000 hl of red wine.
The Swiss tend to drink all their wine themselves with less than 2% being exported and that mainly goes to neighbouring Germany. The Swiss are the 6th highest per capita consumers of wine in the world at around 45 litres per person per year. Not surprising then given the Swiss’s love of wine and the sky high value of their Franc, that we do not see any Swiss wine on the shelves in Kenyan supermarkets or anywhere else for that matter.
You do not have to go far in Genève to find vineyards as there are dozens within 10 kilometres of the city centre. Crossing the Rhône River and heading west in the direction of the French border, there are lots of attractive villages such as Peissy, Satigny, Bourdigny, Choully and Russin. I am told that within the Genève canton there has been a significant revival of small family runs vineyards over the last ten years or so. This is surprising as the price of land is astronomical, which makes me wonder about the economic viability of these small, normally less than 4 hectres, vineyards. There are though very strict building regulations that prohibit the urban sprawl from swallowing the patchwork of vineyards, thank goodness.
Once a year about twenty-five vineyards in and around the village of Peissy open their doors to the public for a goûter (taste). The taste of Swiss wines is likened to the Alpine air fresh and clean. The famous grape varietal of Switzerland is Chasselas which produces a light, dry, spritzy, and delicate wine. Chasselas goes particularly well with fondue, a sort of gooey cheesy mixture that various bits of bread, fish, or meat are dipped into. Chasselas constitutes 40% of all vine plantings in Switzerland and like most grapes is known by different names in different places including Dorin in the Vaud region and Fendant in the Valais. Switzerland also has a long list of historic vine specialties such as Petite Arvine, Amigne, and Humagne Blanc for the whites. For reds, the Swiss love affair with Pinot Noir has seen a significant increase in plantings this vine often at the expense of Chasselas.
In general Genève winegrowers are in the process of downsizing Chasselas, formerly the most widely grown grape in the canton. The wines I found interesting and liked were made from the Gamaret grape. A red grape it is a cross between Gamay, (the famous grape of Beaujolais in France), and the white grape varietal Reichensteiner. Gamaret was developed for cultivation in French Switzerland, and is a sibling of Garanoir, which was intended for the German part of the country and was created by André Jaquinet at Station Fédérale de Recheres en Production Végétale de Changins in 1970. Total Swiss plantations of the variety in 2009 are small at 380 hectares (940 acres) and about 100 hectres are found in the Genève vineyards. Gamaret has good resistance to rot and ripens early. It gives dark purple wine with aromas of blackberries and spices and subtle tannin. In many ways the style is much more New World with up-front fruit, light tannins, and subtle (French) oaking that can be drunk a year or so after bottling.
Tuesday, September 28, 2010
Tuesday, September 14, 2010
Extreme Winemaking: Leleshwa Naivasha
Unsurprisingly I tend to love vineyards and over the years I have been fortunate to have visited a number of what could be called unusual vineyards. In the Karoo in South Africa it is not unusual to find a combination of a vineyard with Ostrich rearing. In the Douro Valley in Portugal the steepness of the vineyards, which rise almost vertically from the river, send anyone with a vertiginous sensitivity into apoplexy. This last weekend it was to another vineyard right here in Kenya that could be categorised as being at the extreme end of the winemaking scale.
The Great Rift Valley Winery is located in Naivasha about 90 kilometres west of Nairobi. The vineyard lies at about an altitude of 1,900 metres with about 35 to 40 hectres of vines and the farm is framed by hills all around that rise to over 2,500 metres. The brand of the vineyard is Leleshwa, which refers to the Masai name of trees with a distinctive white flower that are common to the area. The vineyard has been in existence since 1994 when the previous owner of the farm planted about 3 to 4 hectres of vines suitable for wine making.
The vineyard changed hands in the late 1990’s and now falls under the portfolio of the Kenya Nut Company owned by a prominent Kenyan businessman. For the last two-and-a-half years the viticulturalists, winemaker, and pretty well everything else, has been James Farquharson. James born in Kenya of Scottish ancestry spent time in the South Africa’s Cape first completing a BSc in Viticulture at Stellenbosch University before practicing his craft at a number of estates, including becoming the red winemaker at the prestigious Boschendal Estate not far from Franschhoek.
The biggest problem James has confronted is the low yields of the vines when he inherited the vineyard. Crop yields were as low as 1.5 tonnes per hectre, which makes commercial wine making economically unviable. For grapes such as Sauvignon Blanc for a commercial vineyard a minimum of 5 tonnes per hectre and hopefully more around the 8 to 9 tonnes per hectre is desirable. James is getting there in terms of increasing yields by applying techniques such as particular types of pruning. James has for example introduced a pruning system of 6 to 8 bud canes instead of the 2 bud spurs that was being used at the vineyard. This encourages fruit production although other problems include loss of grapes to birds and animals such as antelope and monkeys.
As mentioned in a previous blog, there are a number of challenges growing grapes and making wine bang on the equator. Vines perform best within a band of latitudes approximately between 30oN 50oN and the mirror image for the southern hemisphere, 30oS 50oS. Look at a map of the world and all the famous wine producing areas fall into these latitudes. The reason is partly climate as to produce grapes suitable for quality wine making it is generally agreed that vines require a period of dormancy. In the appropriate latitudes and the on-set of winter, cooler temperatures encourage the vine to shut down and the sap falls from the plant above ground to the roots. Vines perform best when they have long daylight periods particularly during the summer ripening period. In Europe the 14 to 18 hours of daylight in the summer enable the vine to produce quality fruit; the right balance between sugar and acid as well as other phenolics properties.
In Naivasha James cannot do much about the length of days as they are what they are about 12 hours a day all year around. To encourage dormancy James tries to starve the vines of water. Naivasha receives on average around 550mm of rainfall annually. This year rainfall patterns have been far from normal with to date over 750 mm. The other technique often used by grape growers in the tropics is to waken the vine from an induced dormancy period by applying hydrogen cyamide (Prussic acid) the commercial brand name in Kenya is Dormex. An advantage of this application is that as well as wakening the vine it also encourages the uniform setting of fruit.
Despite the challenges of growing vines on the equator James has in a very short period of time achieved considerable success. The Leleshwa brand currently produces a very good Sauvignon Blanc with bright fruit and a definite varietal character. A rosé wine is also produced and the next venture is to add a Shiraz to the brand line. Marketing wine is a major industry in itself and in Kenya there are additional challenges. James hopes that the country’s tourist industry will want to serve Leleshwa highlighting the fact that it is a unique Kenyan product and all things considered it should be a winner. James is philosophical when it comes to accepting that the specific challenges of Naivasha mean that his wines are not necessarily going to be challenging Burgundy Gran Cru’s or Bordeaux First Growths and that is in any case certainly not the objective. Good quality, technically sound wine at an affordable price (Leleshwa Sauvignon Blanc retails at about KSH550 (about $6.80) a bottle in Nairobi) and a unique Kenyan product makes more than enough sense.
The Great Rift Valley Winery is located in Naivasha about 90 kilometres west of Nairobi. The vineyard lies at about an altitude of 1,900 metres with about 35 to 40 hectres of vines and the farm is framed by hills all around that rise to over 2,500 metres. The brand of the vineyard is Leleshwa, which refers to the Masai name of trees with a distinctive white flower that are common to the area. The vineyard has been in existence since 1994 when the previous owner of the farm planted about 3 to 4 hectres of vines suitable for wine making.
The vineyard changed hands in the late 1990’s and now falls under the portfolio of the Kenya Nut Company owned by a prominent Kenyan businessman. For the last two-and-a-half years the viticulturalists, winemaker, and pretty well everything else, has been James Farquharson. James born in Kenya of Scottish ancestry spent time in the South Africa’s Cape first completing a BSc in Viticulture at Stellenbosch University before practicing his craft at a number of estates, including becoming the red winemaker at the prestigious Boschendal Estate not far from Franschhoek.
The biggest problem James has confronted is the low yields of the vines when he inherited the vineyard. Crop yields were as low as 1.5 tonnes per hectre, which makes commercial wine making economically unviable. For grapes such as Sauvignon Blanc for a commercial vineyard a minimum of 5 tonnes per hectre and hopefully more around the 8 to 9 tonnes per hectre is desirable. James is getting there in terms of increasing yields by applying techniques such as particular types of pruning. James has for example introduced a pruning system of 6 to 8 bud canes instead of the 2 bud spurs that was being used at the vineyard. This encourages fruit production although other problems include loss of grapes to birds and animals such as antelope and monkeys.
As mentioned in a previous blog, there are a number of challenges growing grapes and making wine bang on the equator. Vines perform best within a band of latitudes approximately between 30oN 50oN and the mirror image for the southern hemisphere, 30oS 50oS. Look at a map of the world and all the famous wine producing areas fall into these latitudes. The reason is partly climate as to produce grapes suitable for quality wine making it is generally agreed that vines require a period of dormancy. In the appropriate latitudes and the on-set of winter, cooler temperatures encourage the vine to shut down and the sap falls from the plant above ground to the roots. Vines perform best when they have long daylight periods particularly during the summer ripening period. In Europe the 14 to 18 hours of daylight in the summer enable the vine to produce quality fruit; the right balance between sugar and acid as well as other phenolics properties.
In Naivasha James cannot do much about the length of days as they are what they are about 12 hours a day all year around. To encourage dormancy James tries to starve the vines of water. Naivasha receives on average around 550mm of rainfall annually. This year rainfall patterns have been far from normal with to date over 750 mm. The other technique often used by grape growers in the tropics is to waken the vine from an induced dormancy period by applying hydrogen cyamide (Prussic acid) the commercial brand name in Kenya is Dormex. An advantage of this application is that as well as wakening the vine it also encourages the uniform setting of fruit.
Despite the challenges of growing vines on the equator James has in a very short period of time achieved considerable success. The Leleshwa brand currently produces a very good Sauvignon Blanc with bright fruit and a definite varietal character. A rosé wine is also produced and the next venture is to add a Shiraz to the brand line. Marketing wine is a major industry in itself and in Kenya there are additional challenges. James hopes that the country’s tourist industry will want to serve Leleshwa highlighting the fact that it is a unique Kenyan product and all things considered it should be a winner. James is philosophical when it comes to accepting that the specific challenges of Naivasha mean that his wines are not necessarily going to be challenging Burgundy Gran Cru’s or Bordeaux First Growths and that is in any case certainly not the objective. Good quality, technically sound wine at an affordable price (Leleshwa Sauvignon Blanc retails at about KSH550 (about $6.80) a bottle in Nairobi) and a unique Kenyan product makes more than enough sense.
Sunday, September 12, 2010
The Chocolate Block
Selling wine is a tough business. Annual consumption of fermented grape juice rises every year, but the picture is distorted by the Chinese and Indian markets, which along with other so called emerging economies, accounts for most the increased sales. In the traditional retail wine markets of Europe and North America the picture is very different. Here consumption of wine is at best stagnant and the supermarket shelves, where approximately nine out of every ten bottles are sold, groan with an ever expanding array of wines. In the traditional wine producing and consuming countries of Europe such as France, Italy, and Spain, the young increasingly drink beer or Alcopops and often view wine as distinctly un-hip, old fashioned and, heaven forbid, something their parents drink.
As mentioned in previous blogs, wine consumption in Kenya albeit at a low base level is increasing dramatically. For the lower price band of wine between $5 and $10 a bottle, promotion is largely confined to the handful of importing companies trumpeting their respective commercially successful brands, usually from South Africa or increasingly Chile. A typical promotion for these wines normally consists of a display in a local supermarket where (usually) young sales representatives try to tempt the shopper to sample and hopefully buy this week’s bargain.
The bargain more often than not is a commercial white, red and sometimes rosé, usually a single varietal, Sauvignon Blanc or Cabernet Sauvignon for example, that in wine speaking parlance is described as easy drinking; fruity with low tannins and at the higher end of dry, or, increasingly off-dry. These promotional campaigns, mostly through the supermarkets, are much the same as anywhere in the world, although we do not as yet have the three-for-two or the 10% discount offer if you buy a case.
For the mid price level for wine above $15, but below $30 a bottle, the choice is reasonably good in that quality examples can be found from the Old World, Italy, France, and Spain, and the New World, mostly South Africa and Chile. Much like anywhere in the world, consumers often bulk at paying a premium for these mid priced wines largely because they are not really sure what extra quality for their money they are getting. In addition for the consumer it is not helped by the absence of the promotion of these wines; the distributors perhaps believing that sales are relatively so small that there is little merit in investing in promotion.
Above the $30 a bottle price the wine market in Kenya is at best miniscule. In the wider world despite economic recession, the demand for so called fine wines seems to increase exponentially. Bordeaux first growths, Burgundy Gran Crus, and some flagship New World estates such as Screaming Eagle in California, can charge, and do, just about what they want. The need to promote these iconic wines is non existent as buyers already know that they are unique products and that the price is more a function of demand and supply rather than anything to do with the taste. Indeed, part of the attraction is that they are collectable, endowed with a caché that above all makes them a sound investment.
Against the promotional tide, there are occasionally in Nairobi promotions of wines that in some respects do not, from an economic perspective, seem to make sense. One example was an evening a week or so ago of an event promoting The Chocolate Block. The wine emanates from the Boekenhoutsklof Winery in Franschhoek, South Africa. A Shiraz led blend, (the 2008 vintage is a blend of 69% Shiraz, Grenache, Cabernet Sauvignon and a dash of Cinsaut and Viognier[1]), the wine mimics to an extent a Rhône Valley wine from France; a quintessential so called “Rhône Ranger”, and the label has been a huge commercial hit in South Africa (current annual sales are around 180,000 cases). Also, the wine sales well in European markets in particular the UK. Boekenhoutsklof understands and exploit the fact that a wine with a discernibly taste, in this case chocolate, is both understandable and desirable for wine consumers who seek at the very least consistency. In other words, the label delivers what it says, chocolate.
The Market for The Chocolate Block is in Kenya at best is limited, not least because at a price tag of around KSH4,000 (about $50) a bottle it is not exactly going to fly off the shelves. Yet Boekenhoutsklof and Kafra[2], (the distributor here in Kenya), went to the expense of sending the marketing manager from South Africa to Nairobi (as well as Uganda, Nigeria coupled with a trip to the UK and Germany) to promote the wine, and I for one are more than grateful. Boekenhoutsklof as part of the larger Vinimark Company[3], (South Africa’s largest independent specialist wine wholesaling company), have the resources to warrant such “loss-leader” adventures into new markets. It underlines the fact that selling wine is a tough business and that it requires strong nerves to push the investment boat out, so to speak. As the saying goes the best way to make a small fortune in the wine industry is to start with a large one.
[1] The following are notes from Boekenhoutsklof. “The Syrah fruit comes from Malmesbury with its unique growing conditions and dryland farmed vineyards to ensure it deep-rooted vines and therefore optimal concentration of colour, flavour and tannin structure. The Grenache noir (from some of the oldest in the country) is sourced from Citrusdal with its very sandy soils and perfect terroir for ripening this grape varietal. This batch was matured in 600L barrels to retain the unmistakable fruit and freshness on the cultivar. The Cabernet Sauvignon and Viognier come from the organically farmed vineyards of Boekenhoutsklof and the Cinsault is from old bush vines on decomposed granite soils on Welbedacht in Wellington. The wine matures in 2nd and 3rd filled French oak barrels for 15 months before it gets a light egg-white fining.
The wine shows typical Malmesbury Syrah flavours on the nose with intense spicy notes which is supported by ripe plum, black fruit and violet aromas. The wine has a grippy acidity and well integrated tannins with a well textured and rounded mouth feel. The long, elegant and succulent finish with superb structure from the Cabernet Sauvignon leads us to believe that this wine has at least 8 years of aging potential”.
[2] The Chocolate Box is aavailable from Kafra Wines Kenya Limited, Kafrawines@nbi.ispkenya.com
[3] The labels under the Vinimark Company include Avondale, Fish Hoeh, Glen Carlou, Longridge, and South Africa’s only bio-dynamically certified estate Reyneke Wines.
As mentioned in previous blogs, wine consumption in Kenya albeit at a low base level is increasing dramatically. For the lower price band of wine between $5 and $10 a bottle, promotion is largely confined to the handful of importing companies trumpeting their respective commercially successful brands, usually from South Africa or increasingly Chile. A typical promotion for these wines normally consists of a display in a local supermarket where (usually) young sales representatives try to tempt the shopper to sample and hopefully buy this week’s bargain.
The bargain more often than not is a commercial white, red and sometimes rosé, usually a single varietal, Sauvignon Blanc or Cabernet Sauvignon for example, that in wine speaking parlance is described as easy drinking; fruity with low tannins and at the higher end of dry, or, increasingly off-dry. These promotional campaigns, mostly through the supermarkets, are much the same as anywhere in the world, although we do not as yet have the three-for-two or the 10% discount offer if you buy a case.
For the mid price level for wine above $15, but below $30 a bottle, the choice is reasonably good in that quality examples can be found from the Old World, Italy, France, and Spain, and the New World, mostly South Africa and Chile. Much like anywhere in the world, consumers often bulk at paying a premium for these mid priced wines largely because they are not really sure what extra quality for their money they are getting. In addition for the consumer it is not helped by the absence of the promotion of these wines; the distributors perhaps believing that sales are relatively so small that there is little merit in investing in promotion.
Above the $30 a bottle price the wine market in Kenya is at best miniscule. In the wider world despite economic recession, the demand for so called fine wines seems to increase exponentially. Bordeaux first growths, Burgundy Gran Crus, and some flagship New World estates such as Screaming Eagle in California, can charge, and do, just about what they want. The need to promote these iconic wines is non existent as buyers already know that they are unique products and that the price is more a function of demand and supply rather than anything to do with the taste. Indeed, part of the attraction is that they are collectable, endowed with a caché that above all makes them a sound investment.
Against the promotional tide, there are occasionally in Nairobi promotions of wines that in some respects do not, from an economic perspective, seem to make sense. One example was an evening a week or so ago of an event promoting The Chocolate Block. The wine emanates from the Boekenhoutsklof Winery in Franschhoek, South Africa. A Shiraz led blend, (the 2008 vintage is a blend of 69% Shiraz, Grenache, Cabernet Sauvignon and a dash of Cinsaut and Viognier[1]), the wine mimics to an extent a Rhône Valley wine from France; a quintessential so called “Rhône Ranger”, and the label has been a huge commercial hit in South Africa (current annual sales are around 180,000 cases). Also, the wine sales well in European markets in particular the UK. Boekenhoutsklof understands and exploit the fact that a wine with a discernibly taste, in this case chocolate, is both understandable and desirable for wine consumers who seek at the very least consistency. In other words, the label delivers what it says, chocolate.
The Market for The Chocolate Block is in Kenya at best is limited, not least because at a price tag of around KSH4,000 (about $50) a bottle it is not exactly going to fly off the shelves. Yet Boekenhoutsklof and Kafra[2], (the distributor here in Kenya), went to the expense of sending the marketing manager from South Africa to Nairobi (as well as Uganda, Nigeria coupled with a trip to the UK and Germany) to promote the wine, and I for one are more than grateful. Boekenhoutsklof as part of the larger Vinimark Company[3], (South Africa’s largest independent specialist wine wholesaling company), have the resources to warrant such “loss-leader” adventures into new markets. It underlines the fact that selling wine is a tough business and that it requires strong nerves to push the investment boat out, so to speak. As the saying goes the best way to make a small fortune in the wine industry is to start with a large one.
[1] The following are notes from Boekenhoutsklof. “The Syrah fruit comes from Malmesbury with its unique growing conditions and dryland farmed vineyards to ensure it deep-rooted vines and therefore optimal concentration of colour, flavour and tannin structure. The Grenache noir (from some of the oldest in the country) is sourced from Citrusdal with its very sandy soils and perfect terroir for ripening this grape varietal. This batch was matured in 600L barrels to retain the unmistakable fruit and freshness on the cultivar. The Cabernet Sauvignon and Viognier come from the organically farmed vineyards of Boekenhoutsklof and the Cinsault is from old bush vines on decomposed granite soils on Welbedacht in Wellington. The wine matures in 2nd and 3rd filled French oak barrels for 15 months before it gets a light egg-white fining.
The wine shows typical Malmesbury Syrah flavours on the nose with intense spicy notes which is supported by ripe plum, black fruit and violet aromas. The wine has a grippy acidity and well integrated tannins with a well textured and rounded mouth feel. The long, elegant and succulent finish with superb structure from the Cabernet Sauvignon leads us to believe that this wine has at least 8 years of aging potential”.
[2] The Chocolate Box is aavailable from Kafra Wines Kenya Limited, Kafrawines@nbi.ispkenya.com
[3] The labels under the Vinimark Company include Avondale, Fish Hoeh, Glen Carlou, Longridge, and South Africa’s only bio-dynamically certified estate Reyneke Wines.
Sunday, September 5, 2010
“Ho Brion that hath a good and most particular taste I never met with”
Here in Nairobi the Diploma course of the Cape Wine Academy has started. I am teaching the course, which consists of four units lasting approximately six months each with assignments and an exam for each unit. Once the exams for each unit have all been passed, students can then embark upon the tasting exam. All-in-all quite an undertaking and a total of six students are signed up, primed, and ready to go.
Each lecture within each unit culminates in a wine tasting the wines reflecting the subject of the lecture. For example, lectures on the theme of organic, bio-dynamic, and environmentally sustainable wine making we taste wines that best reflect these principles and techniques. For lectures more country and region focussed, such as Bordeaux or Burgundy in France, or, Mosel in Germany, then the wines selected reflect the styles and diversity from these different regions.
Finding wines in Nairobi to match the themes and subjects covered in the lectures for the Diploma course is quite a challenge. The supermarkets and most wine suppliers in Nairobi, as I have mentioned in previous blogs, tend to mainly stock the generic and brand wines from South Africa, Chile, and some European countries. Wines that are more interesting, endowed with a sense of character, are generally not available. For example, the wines available from Bordeaux are at best the generic regional Appellations d'origine contrôlées such as Bordeaux Supérieur, rather than the famous individual appellations such as Médoc and Graves. Obtaining interesting wines requires lots of lateral thinking, begging, borrowing, although not yet stealing. As a group we are dependent on ourselves and soliciting the assistance of many and any a friend to bring back from travels the necessary precious bottles.
Bordeaux apart from the Diploma classes is also on my mind at present because the recently released en premeur offerings for the 2009 vintage are causing a bit of stir in the press of the fine wine world. The international wine critics have let the superlatives rip by describing the 2009 vintage as the best in a generation and some have gone as far as writing the best ever. The quality of the 2009 vintage is somewhat academic as most mere mortals will never get to taste the wines. Even with a deep interest in fine Claret the chances of also having deep pockets to buy an even moderate example of the 2009 vintage are unlikely.
To buy a case of any of the famous 2009 first growths, as they are called, such as Chateaux Lafite, Latour, Margaux, Mouton-Rothschild, and Haut-Brion, (the famous Ho Brion of the title of this blog), will cost between Euro 5,000 to 10,000 a case, about Euro 400 to 800 a bottle. This is the en premeur price meaning that when you eventually take receipt of wines some two years hence you will have to add tax and shipping on top of the price, about another 25% to 100% depending where you live in the world. These are wines that have not even been bottled yet. They have been assessed by wine critics from samples straight from the barrel and yet such is the almost hysteria that has been created for the 2009 vintage, at least in some parts of the world and in particular China, allocations of the best wines are already sold.
At one level the price of a bottle of any given wine should be fairly straight forward. Like any other commodity the price of a bottle of wine reflects the costs of production. Surprisingly then the production costs of a bottle of wine from a vast agri-business enterprise somewhere in the world are not that different from that of the world’s most expensive wines. Now I am not being precise here, but say the production costs of a bottle of imaginary el-cheapo are roughly $3 to $5 a bottle. The production costs of a fine and even an iconic great wine may only be very roughly twice that of my el-cheapo bottle of wine.
The owners of first growth chateaux in Bordeaux would most likely disagree with this estimation of additional production costs. They are more likely to argue that their costs are much, much higher than those of my imaginary el-cheapo producer. They would point to the stratospheric costs of land, higher labour costs due to for example hand picking of grapes, the low yields of grapes per hectre necessary for really great wine production, and the use of the finest and therefore most expensive oak barrels. Let me be generous therefore and revise my estimation of the increased costs of a first growth bottle of wine by say 5 times. Yet the fine wines of Bordeaux first growths for example can sell for a 100 times or more a bottle than the price of my el-cheapo bottle.
If the high price of a bottle of first growth Bordeaux in comparison to el-cheapo is not entirely a function of production costs, then perhaps it is because it tastes better, even a 100 times better? If you read the tasting notes of the more prosaic wine tasters you may actually believe this to be true. In reality the price of a bottle of wine is established by a whole cornucopia of factors, perhaps the most important one being what any given individual will pay. The spectacular rise of the economies of the Far East, in particular China, coupled with a rapidly rising demand for the very best wines is a major factor in why the prices of Bordeaux wines has been rising almost exponentially over the last decade. For the Diploma students in Nairobi we will taste really interesting wines. Unfortunately it is unlikely they will be first growth Bordeaux unless someone out there would like to donate a few bottles of say 1990 Pétrus?
Each lecture within each unit culminates in a wine tasting the wines reflecting the subject of the lecture. For example, lectures on the theme of organic, bio-dynamic, and environmentally sustainable wine making we taste wines that best reflect these principles and techniques. For lectures more country and region focussed, such as Bordeaux or Burgundy in France, or, Mosel in Germany, then the wines selected reflect the styles and diversity from these different regions.
Finding wines in Nairobi to match the themes and subjects covered in the lectures for the Diploma course is quite a challenge. The supermarkets and most wine suppliers in Nairobi, as I have mentioned in previous blogs, tend to mainly stock the generic and brand wines from South Africa, Chile, and some European countries. Wines that are more interesting, endowed with a sense of character, are generally not available. For example, the wines available from Bordeaux are at best the generic regional Appellations d'origine contrôlées such as Bordeaux Supérieur, rather than the famous individual appellations such as Médoc and Graves. Obtaining interesting wines requires lots of lateral thinking, begging, borrowing, although not yet stealing. As a group we are dependent on ourselves and soliciting the assistance of many and any a friend to bring back from travels the necessary precious bottles.
Bordeaux apart from the Diploma classes is also on my mind at present because the recently released en premeur offerings for the 2009 vintage are causing a bit of stir in the press of the fine wine world. The international wine critics have let the superlatives rip by describing the 2009 vintage as the best in a generation and some have gone as far as writing the best ever. The quality of the 2009 vintage is somewhat academic as most mere mortals will never get to taste the wines. Even with a deep interest in fine Claret the chances of also having deep pockets to buy an even moderate example of the 2009 vintage are unlikely.
To buy a case of any of the famous 2009 first growths, as they are called, such as Chateaux Lafite, Latour, Margaux, Mouton-Rothschild, and Haut-Brion, (the famous Ho Brion of the title of this blog), will cost between Euro 5,000 to 10,000 a case, about Euro 400 to 800 a bottle. This is the en premeur price meaning that when you eventually take receipt of wines some two years hence you will have to add tax and shipping on top of the price, about another 25% to 100% depending where you live in the world. These are wines that have not even been bottled yet. They have been assessed by wine critics from samples straight from the barrel and yet such is the almost hysteria that has been created for the 2009 vintage, at least in some parts of the world and in particular China, allocations of the best wines are already sold.
At one level the price of a bottle of any given wine should be fairly straight forward. Like any other commodity the price of a bottle of wine reflects the costs of production. Surprisingly then the production costs of a bottle of wine from a vast agri-business enterprise somewhere in the world are not that different from that of the world’s most expensive wines. Now I am not being precise here, but say the production costs of a bottle of imaginary el-cheapo are roughly $3 to $5 a bottle. The production costs of a fine and even an iconic great wine may only be very roughly twice that of my el-cheapo bottle of wine.
The owners of first growth chateaux in Bordeaux would most likely disagree with this estimation of additional production costs. They are more likely to argue that their costs are much, much higher than those of my imaginary el-cheapo producer. They would point to the stratospheric costs of land, higher labour costs due to for example hand picking of grapes, the low yields of grapes per hectre necessary for really great wine production, and the use of the finest and therefore most expensive oak barrels. Let me be generous therefore and revise my estimation of the increased costs of a first growth bottle of wine by say 5 times. Yet the fine wines of Bordeaux first growths for example can sell for a 100 times or more a bottle than the price of my el-cheapo bottle.
If the high price of a bottle of first growth Bordeaux in comparison to el-cheapo is not entirely a function of production costs, then perhaps it is because it tastes better, even a 100 times better? If you read the tasting notes of the more prosaic wine tasters you may actually believe this to be true. In reality the price of a bottle of wine is established by a whole cornucopia of factors, perhaps the most important one being what any given individual will pay. The spectacular rise of the economies of the Far East, in particular China, coupled with a rapidly rising demand for the very best wines is a major factor in why the prices of Bordeaux wines has been rising almost exponentially over the last decade. For the Diploma students in Nairobi we will taste really interesting wines. Unfortunately it is unlikely they will be first growth Bordeaux unless someone out there would like to donate a few bottles of say 1990 Pétrus?
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