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Review: The Bottle Store Restaurant at Squerryes Winery

Review: The Bottle Store Restaurant at Squerryes Winery

In the summer, on one of the hottest days of the year, I sat by the stream at the Squerryes Winery’s Kent estate and feasted on a picnic, looking out onto the lush vines. It was a pleasure to be invited to return at the weekend, on a misty afternoon, to visit the new Bottle Store restaurant.

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Non-Eurocentric food and wine pairings: Want to know what wine pairs well with curry, jerk chicken and jollof rice? Read this!
Food Pairings, Wine Recommendations Sophia Longhi Food Pairings, Wine Recommendations Sophia Longhi

Non-Eurocentric food and wine pairings: Want to know what wine pairs well with curry, jerk chicken and jollof rice? Read this!

As a wine communicator, I need to move beyond Eurocentric food and wine pairings and be much more inclusive in every area when I talk about wine. I spoke to six wine professionals about their favourite food and wine pairings - and there isn’t a tomato-based pasta dish in sight.

If you love to eat food with spice, seasoning and exotic flavours - I’m talking curries, patties, fritters, marinaded meats and anything with a banging home-made rub - and want to know about the best wine pairings for it, keep reading and prepare to make your mouth water!

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Drink wine and save the planet: The rise of eco-conscious wine

Drink wine and save the planet: The rise of eco-conscious wine

What if you could help to save our planet with your wine choices? Most of us have dabbled (some unknowingly, some enthusiastically) - and many of us are converted - to drinking wines that are kinder to the earth. ‘Natural’, ‘organic’, ‘biodynamic’ are words that have flooded the industry over the past few years and they are no longer on the wacky fringes of the sector. Although there are some staunch traditionalists, it is widely accepted that gentler practices in the vineyard result in healthier, longer-lasting vines, which produce tastier, more character-driven fruit. Grapes on steroids are no longer en vogue.

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All you need to know about Greek wine: Start exploring a land of exceptional terroir, indigenous grape varieties and cutting-edge winemaking
Greece, Wine Recommendations, Greek Wine Sophia Longhi Greece, Wine Recommendations, Greek Wine Sophia Longhi

All you need to know about Greek wine: Start exploring a land of exceptional terroir, indigenous grape varieties and cutting-edge winemaking

What do you know about Greek wine? It seems to be an area that even the most committed of wine lovers often overlook. Is it because the Greek roads are ones less travelled or because we simply have trouble pronouncing the names of the grape varieties (have a go at Agiorgitiko) and therefore will choose something that appears more familiar?

Although Greece is one of the oldest wine regions in the world, with wine production dating back to the Ancient Greek times, today it doesn’t rank in the top ten wine producing countries globally and, in the UK, we’re more likely to go for wines from Italy, France, New Zealand, Australia and Spain before we think about Greece.

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An Introduction to Canned Wine: Should you be embracing wine in a can?

An Introduction to Canned Wine: Should you be embracing wine in a can?

Canned wine has only started hitting the UK supermarket shelves in earnest this year, though America has been on this trend since 2016 (Trader Joe’s were even selling wine in cans back in 2009). South Africa, Australia and New Zealand are also embracing the can, so the question is: Is canned wine any good and should you be drinking it?

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Sparkling Wine From Italy and Around the World: Your Ultimate Guide (Including Recommendations from 6 Masters of Wine)

Sparkling Wine From Italy and Around the World: Your Ultimate Guide (Including Recommendations from 6 Masters of Wine)

Whether it’s sparkling wine from Italy, France, USA, South Africa, it’s official: we love our bubbly. Sparkling wine sales now account for some 10% of all wine sales globally, meaning we are consuming approximately 2.5 billion litres of fizz every year. This figure is only set to increase, as more and more consumers become interested in premium wines. If there are bubbles to pop, we are popping them!

This is your ultimate guide for sparkling wine from Italy and beyond. Strap in - it’s going to be a bubbly ride.

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How To Create The Perfect French Picnic
France, Dining, Wine Recommendations Sophia Longhi France, Dining, Wine Recommendations Sophia Longhi

How To Create The Perfect French Picnic

I don’t know about you, but I love eating and drinking outside in the summertime. The French are undoubtedly the masters of this, with their fresh baguettes, delicious charcuterie and, of course, their mouthwatering wines. Originally, a pique-nique referred to a group of people in a restaurant who brought their own wine, but then it developed to mean a dining setting where everyone brought a little something to nibble on and share.

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Weingut Lutz: German wines for the global palate
Germany, Wine Recommendations Sophia Longhi Germany, Wine Recommendations Sophia Longhi

Weingut Lutz: German wines for the global palate

Rhinehessen (or Rhine-Hesse as we often call it in England), located on the left bank of the Rhine river between Worms and Bingen, is Germany’s largest wine region. It is here, we find winemaker Stefan Lütz and his estate, Weingut Lütz. Stefan focuses on making vegan wines for every day pleasure, that will pair with all kinds of food or just good conversation and laughter. 

His Grundstock range is born from one of the best terroirs in Rhinehessen. In case you need to polish up your German, Grundstock is the word for ‘basis; foundation; root; core; basic stock’. I guess, in this context, it means ‘upon which everything else is built’, which can refer to winemaking, community, friendships and all sorts of other great things.

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Winning Wines from Hambledon Vineyard for English Wine Week
UK, Vineyards, Wine Recommendations Sophia Longhi UK, Vineyards, Wine Recommendations Sophia Longhi

Winning Wines from Hambledon Vineyard for English Wine Week

In a blind tasting organised by Noble Rot magazine in 2015, one English vineyard came ahead of Pol Roger, Taittinger and Veuve Clicquot, bagging the highest score of all the wines tasted. Located on Hampshire’s South Downs, on the Newhaven Chalk formation, Hambledon Vineyard possesses the same terroir that can be found in the very best sites of the Côte des Blancs in Champagne - could this be the reason it produces such winning wines?

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'What is Provence to you?', asks Château Gassier with their new Esprit Gassier 2019 vintage
France, Wine Recommendations Sophia Longhi France, Wine Recommendations Sophia Longhi

'What is Provence to you?', asks Château Gassier with their new Esprit Gassier 2019 vintage

Provence rosé is undoubtedly a style, but within that style, you have a sea of different expressions. This is no one-dimensional wine. You have the fun, flirty, pink-frilly-knickers kind; you have the fresh, racy, sea winds whipping-your-hair-back-and-forth kind; you have the classy, exquisitely-mannered kind, with hidden mineral depths. Esprit Gassier 2019 can be all things to all, but to me, it is the latter.

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Could adopting a vine with Cuvée Privée be the transparency wine consumers are looking for?

Could adopting a vine with Cuvée Privée be the transparency wine consumers are looking for?

There has become a common theme in the wine industry in recent years, from the labelling of wine to asking to know exactly how the wine was made: transparency. Consumers want to know what has gone into their bottle - whether or not the grapes were grown organically; how exactly was the wine filtered, using which fining agents; who picks the grapes and are they paid fairly; what chemical processes were used in the vineyard and in the winery (- and I am allergic to them?) ...on and on. As well as what is in our wine and what we are putting into our bodies, marketeers know, more than ever, that ‘story’ is vital. Millennials, more than any other age group before, are most likely to become loyal to a product or brand, because of the story behind it - and it had better be honest. In a world where we often feel we are losing personal connection, young consumers (in particular) want to relate to the brands they support - they want to connect. With a level of choice out there growing year on year, we want to choose things in our lives that speak to us authentically and represent us on a personal level.

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Wine Recommendations Sophia Longhi Wine Recommendations Sophia Longhi

Take a trip with your sip: It’s off to California with Talbott Vineyards

In the pine, fir and redwood covered Santa Lucia Mountains in Monterey County, you’ll find the prestigious Santa Lucia Highlands AVA, where over 930 hectares of vineyards are planted, some as high as 1,200 feet above sea level. The mornings there are chilly, with fog and breezes coming over from Monterey Bay, but the sun shines warmly in the afternoons onto swathes of berries, ripening them steadily and slowly to lock-in complex layers of flavours and aromas. This incredible micro-climate ensures the ideal conditions for excellent cool-climate Pinot Noir and Chardonnay, and the Sleepy Hollow Vineyard is one of the most renowned places for it. Owned by Talbott Vineyards, Sleepy Hollow Vineyard was once named by Wine Enthusiast Magazine as a California Grand Cru because of the exceptionally high quality of the grapes.

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Wine to the rescue! Berkmann Wine Cellars to save restaurants and bars with Help4Hospitality 

Wine to the rescue! Berkmann Wine Cellars to save restaurants and bars with Help4Hospitality 

The hospitality industry is one of the sectors that has undoubtedly been hit the hardest during the Coronavirus pandemic and the future is still uncertain for many of our beloved restaurants, hotels, pubs and bars. But, pulling together and creating initiatives, like Help4Hospitality, that are designed to support each other in the industry - chefs, bartenders, suppliers, wineries, venues - is keeping the hope alive that hospitality could be the phoenix that gloriously rises from the ashes. I know I for one will need giant drink after these and I’ll need somewhere to drink it!

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Battle of the Rosés - My Pick: Alois Lageder Lagrein Rosé
Italy, Wine Recommendations Sophia Longhi Italy, Wine Recommendations Sophia Longhi

Battle of the Rosés - My Pick: Alois Lageder Lagrein Rosé

Earlier this month, Hannah aka The British Bouchon approached a bunch of wine people and myself with the idea of going into battle armed with our rosé recommendations for the Bank Holiday weekend. As it’s set to be a scorcher, there is no doubt that it is bound to be awash with varying shades of pink. We do love a bit of rosé with our t-shirt tans, don’t we?

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Berrilicious Bordeaux Rosé
Wine Recommendations, France Sophia Longhi Wine Recommendations, France Sophia Longhi

Berrilicious Bordeaux Rosé

As the springtime sunshine continues to stick around, we continue to think and drink pink. Scrolling through Instagram, you’d be forgiven for thinking that there was some unwritten law somewhere that tells us that sunny days are rosé days. And if you take a look at my Instagram feed, you’ll see that I am most definitely a law-abiding citizen.

Like the rest of the world, I love Provence rosé. I love the dryness, the lightweight texture, the white peaches and the watermelon. But I’m making an effort to look beyond the South of France to see what the rest of the world is offering and I've decided to head west - about 750km from Provence - to Bordeaux.

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REAL: The Kombucha Champagne
Wine Recommendations, Zero Alcohol Sophia Longhi Wine Recommendations, Zero Alcohol Sophia Longhi

REAL: The Kombucha Champagne

REAL make kombucha brewed from hand-picked, loose-leaf fine teas which have been carefully selected from small gardens around the world. They have worked with winemakers, Champagne producers, beer brewers and microbiologists to perfect the art fermentation and produce a high-end, all-natural product that, due to its complexity of flavour, pairs with a wide variety of different foods.

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Cramele Recas: Why you should be drinking Romanian wine

Cramele Recas: Why you should be drinking Romanian wine

What are your thoughts on Romanian wine? Have you ever tried Romanian wine? I hadn’t and, admittedly, I didn’t know too much about it either. Yet, located at 45 degrees latitude, with sunny summers and cold winters, stunning natural landscapes, which comprise of mountain peaks, lush valleys, glacial lakes, rivers, mud volcanoes, salt mines and the shores of the Black Sea, it is actually the perfect place to grow grapevines. In fact, Romania is one of the world’s largest producer of wine and is the fifth biggest producer in Europe, after Italy, France, Spain, and Germany. Who knew?

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