{"id":21345,"date":"2013-01-01T14:56:46","date_gmt":"2013-01-01T14:56:46","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/noexpert.co.uk\/?p=21345"},"modified":"2013-05-20T23:47:47","modified_gmt":"2013-05-20T22:47:47","slug":"serious-about-dessert-wines","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.noexpert.co.uk\/food\/?p=21345","title":{"rendered":"Serious about Dessert Wines"},"content":{"rendered":"<h6 style=\"text-align: left;\">Product Review for <a title=\"Fine Wines Direct UK\" href=\"http:\/\/finewinesdirectuk.com\" target=\"_blank\">Fine Wines Direct UK<\/a><\/h6>\n<p style=\"text-align: left;\">When it comes to Wine I know I am no expert, but I do know what I like, and over the years have been lucky enough to have endulged in quite a wide range of different dessert wines.\u00a0 I started off playing it safe with some basic <a title=\"Sauternes\" href=\"http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Sauternes_%28wine%29\" target=\"_blank\">Sauternes<\/a>, moved on to <a title=\"Tokaji\" href=\"http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Tokaji\" target=\"_blank\">Tokaji<\/a>, found some bargain <a title=\"Coteaux du Layon\" href=\"http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Coteaux_du_layon\" target=\"_blank\">Coteaux du Layon<\/a> wines<strong>, <\/strong>tried some great bottles of late harvest <a title=\"Riesling\" href=\"http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Riesling\" target=\"_blank\">Riesling<\/a> and <a title=\"Gewurztraminer\" href=\"http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Gew%C3%BCrztraminer\" target=\"_blank\">Gew\u00fcrztraminer<\/a>, got blown away by <a title=\"About PX\" href=\"http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Pedro_Xim%C3%A9nez\" target=\"_blank\">PX<\/a>, found a favorite in <a title=\"Eiswein\/Icewine\" href=\"http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Eiswein\" target=\"_blank\">Eiswein<\/a>, got hooked on <a title=\"Moscato d'Asti\" href=\"http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Moscato_d%27Asti\" target=\"_blank\">Moscato d&#8217;Asti<\/a> long before it got popular with the US Rapper fraternity and even had the chance to share a bottle of ridiculously expensive <a title=\"Chateau d'Yquem\" href=\"http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Ch%C3%A2teau_d%27Yquem\" target=\"_blank\">Chateau d&#8217;Yquem<\/a> (arguably the most prestigious of all Dessert Wines).\u00a0 So when <a title=\"Fine Wines Direct UK\" href=\"http:\/\/finewinesdirectuk.com\" target=\"_blank\">Fine Wines Direct UK<\/a> said they would get someone who specialises in Dessert Wines to pick out a couple of bottles for us to review I was happy to oblige.<\/p>\n<div id='gallery-1' class='gallery galleryid-21345 gallery-columns-3 gallery-size-thumbnail'><figure class='gallery-item'>\n\t\t\t<div class='gallery-icon landscape'>\n\t\t\t\t<a href='https:\/\/www.noexpert.co.uk\/food\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/10\/tn_IMAG0768.jpg'><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"150\" height=\"150\" src=\"https:\/\/www.noexpert.co.uk\/food\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/10\/tn_IMAG0768-150x150.jpg\" class=\"attachment-thumbnail size-thumbnail\" alt=\"\" \/><\/a>\n\t\t\t<\/div><\/figure><figure class='gallery-item'>\n\t\t\t<div class='gallery-icon landscape'>\n\t\t\t\t<a href='https:\/\/www.noexpert.co.uk\/food\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/10\/tn_IMAG0770.jpg'><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"150\" height=\"150\" src=\"https:\/\/www.noexpert.co.uk\/food\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/10\/tn_IMAG0770-150x150.jpg\" class=\"attachment-thumbnail size-thumbnail\" alt=\"\" \/><\/a>\n\t\t\t<\/div><\/figure><figure class='gallery-item'>\n\t\t\t<div class='gallery-icon landscape'>\n\t\t\t\t<a href='https:\/\/www.noexpert.co.uk\/food\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/10\/tn_IMAG0780.jpg'><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"150\" height=\"150\" src=\"https:\/\/www.noexpert.co.uk\/food\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/10\/tn_IMAG0780-150x150.jpg\" class=\"attachment-thumbnail size-thumbnail\" alt=\"\" \/><\/a>\n\t\t\t<\/div><\/figure><figure class='gallery-item'>\n\t\t\t<div class='gallery-icon landscape'>\n\t\t\t\t<a href='https:\/\/www.noexpert.co.uk\/food\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/10\/tn_IMAG0779.jpg'><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"150\" height=\"150\" src=\"https:\/\/www.noexpert.co.uk\/food\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/10\/tn_IMAG0779-150x150.jpg\" class=\"attachment-thumbnail size-thumbnail\" alt=\"\" \/><\/a>\n\t\t\t<\/div><\/figure><figure class='gallery-item'>\n\t\t\t<div class='gallery-icon landscape'>\n\t\t\t\t<a href='https:\/\/www.noexpert.co.uk\/food\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/10\/tn_IMAG0765.jpg'><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"150\" height=\"150\" src=\"https:\/\/www.noexpert.co.uk\/food\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/10\/tn_IMAG0765-150x150.jpg\" class=\"attachment-thumbnail size-thumbnail\" alt=\"\" \/><\/a>\n\t\t\t<\/div><\/figure><figure class='gallery-item'>\n\t\t\t<div class='gallery-icon landscape'>\n\t\t\t\t<a href='https:\/\/www.noexpert.co.uk\/food\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/10\/tn_IMAG0752.jpg'><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"150\" height=\"150\" src=\"https:\/\/www.noexpert.co.uk\/food\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/10\/tn_IMAG0752-150x150.jpg\" class=\"attachment-thumbnail size-thumbnail\" alt=\"\" \/><\/a>\n\t\t\t<\/div><\/figure><figure class='gallery-item'>\n\t\t\t<div class='gallery-icon landscape'>\n\t\t\t\t<a href='https:\/\/www.noexpert.co.uk\/food\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/10\/tn_IMAG0782.jpg'><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"150\" height=\"150\" src=\"https:\/\/www.noexpert.co.uk\/food\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/10\/tn_IMAG0782-150x150.jpg\" class=\"attachment-thumbnail size-thumbnail\" alt=\"\" \/><\/a>\n\t\t\t<\/div><\/figure><figure class='gallery-item'>\n\t\t\t<div class='gallery-icon landscape'>\n\t\t\t\t<a href='https:\/\/www.noexpert.co.uk\/food\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/10\/tn_IMAG0784.jpg'><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"150\" height=\"150\" src=\"https:\/\/www.noexpert.co.uk\/food\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/10\/tn_IMAG0784-150x150.jpg\" class=\"attachment-thumbnail size-thumbnail\" alt=\"\" \/><\/a>\n\t\t\t<\/div><\/figure><figure class='gallery-item'>\n\t\t\t<div class='gallery-icon landscape'>\n\t\t\t\t<a href='https:\/\/www.noexpert.co.uk\/food\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/10\/tn_IMAG0785.jpg'><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"150\" height=\"150\" src=\"https:\/\/www.noexpert.co.uk\/food\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/10\/tn_IMAG0785-150x150.jpg\" class=\"attachment-thumbnail size-thumbnail\" alt=\"\" \/><\/a>\n\t\t\t<\/div><\/figure>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\n<p style=\"text-align: left;\">Fine Wines Direct UK supplied:-<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: left;\">A bottle of <strong>Santinela Semi-Dulce Marques de Caceres Rioja 2011<\/strong> which is very new to the UK market and popular in Spain.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: left;\">A bottle of <strong>Vale Perdido Late Harvest Chardonnay from Patagonia Estate Winery 2009<\/strong> &#8211; this is exclusive to <a title=\"Fine Wines Direct UK\" href=\"http:\/\/finewinesdirectuk.com\" target=\"_blank\">Fine Wines Direct<\/a><\/p>\n<p><strong> <\/strong><\/p>\n<p>I had not tried either of these before.<\/p>\n<p>The Marques de Caceres Rioja is a very light refreshing wine, with a\u00a0 pleasant fruity bouquet.\u00a0 To me it had a faint taste of peaches. It reminded me a little of\u00a0 <a title=\"Moscato d'Asti\" href=\"http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Moscato_d%27Asti\" target=\"_blank\">Moscato d&#8217;Asti<\/a> but without the fizz.\u00a0 This is an easy wine to drink on its own. I tried it with some rather fabulous baklava from <a title=\"Arabica Food and Spice\" href=\"http:\/\/www.arabicafoodandspice.com\/\" target=\"_blank\">Arabica Food and Spice<\/a> which was a bit too overpowering to be a good match, but it did work surprising well with the <a title=\"Comte Cheese\" href=\"http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Comt%C3%A9_cheese\" target=\"_blank\">Comt\u00e9 Cheese<\/a> I recently purchased from <a title=\"Borough Cheese Company\" href=\"http:\/\/www.boroughcheesecompany.co.uk\/\" target=\"_blank\">Borough Cheese Company<\/a>. This is the kind of wine you would have no problems drinking a lot of, especially on a nice summer evening. So can fully understand why it&#8217;s popular in Spain. It&#8217;s a fun wine with a low <a title=\"Alcohol by volume\" href=\"http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Alcohol_by_volume\" target=\"_blank\">alcohol volume<\/a> (12%) and a very practical one with a screw top cap which you might use if you don&#8217;t decide to drink it all at once.<\/p>\n<p>The Vale Perdido Late Harvest Chardonnay is very different (I think it is a wine that you would more typically drink with food), it has a higher <a title=\"Alcohol by volume\" href=\"http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Alcohol_by_volume\" target=\"_blank\">alcohol volume<\/a> (15%) and is a lovely golden color. It&#8217;s almost sherry like, not overly sweet and has subtle hints of caramel (at least to my untrained palette), it worked really well as an accompaniment to both the rich nutty baklava and to the <a title=\"Jomara Date Chocolates\" href=\"http:\/\/neuheiten.koelnmesse.net\/250\/2011\/us\/products\/view\/product_id:3466\" target=\"_blank\">Jomara Date Chocolates<\/a> my drinking companions brought back from Jordan.\u00a0 That is after I managed to open the bottle as it had one of these new <a title=\"Synthetic Wine Corks\" href=\"http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Alternative_wine_closure\" target=\"_blank\">synthetic wine corks<\/a> that I hate (they may be safer but they can be a pain to open).<\/p>\n<p>A bottle of good dessert wine is generally a lot more expensive than the equivalent volume of non dessert wine, which is why it makes a lot more sense to order online rather than pay the restaurant mark up. Having said that I still love to see a good dessert wine selection on a Wine List, generally because so few places give Dessert Wines the prominence they deserve, for example on one of my trips to Scotland, we had dinner at a modern rather flash venue that was perhaps trying a  bit too  hard to be cool. The Restaurant Manager served us and he was really  enthusiastic  about having put a Dessert Wine on the Wine list for the  first time. We  ordered it (off course), but didn&#8217;t have the heart to  tell him that it was  not a particularly good one. Regardless I  applaud him for the effort, a lot of places sadly just do not take Dessert  Wine seriously. We casually mentioned a few of the better Dessert Wines and hoped that he would take the hint, because if you are going to treat yourself to a dessert wine, you really want it to be a good one.<\/p>\n<p><a title=\"Top page - Noexpert.co.uk\" href=\"https:\/\/www.noexpert.co.uk\/food\">Return to top page<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Product Review for Fine Wines Direct UK When it comes to Wine I know I am no expert, but I do know what I like, and over the years have been lucky enough to have endulged in quite a wide range of different dessert wines.\u00a0 I started off playing it safe with some basic Sauternes, &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/www.noexpert.co.uk\/food\/?p=21345\" class=\"more-link\">Continue reading<span class=\"screen-reader-text\"> &#8220;Serious about Dessert Wines&#8221;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[633],"tags":[638,639,635,641,642,636,637],"class_list":["post-21345","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-product-reviews","tag-arabica-food-spice","tag-borough-cheese-company","tag-dessert-wines","tag-fine-wines-direct-uk","tag-jomara-date-chocolates","tag-santinela-semi-dulce-marques-de-caceres-rioja","tag-vale-perdido-late-harvest-chardonnay"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.noexpert.co.uk\/food\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21345","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.noexpert.co.uk\/food\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.noexpert.co.uk\/food\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.noexpert.co.uk\/food\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.noexpert.co.uk\/food\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=21345"}],"version-history":[{"count":182,"href":"https:\/\/www.noexpert.co.uk\/food\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21345\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":22440,"href":"https:\/\/www.noexpert.co.uk\/food\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21345\/revisions\/22440"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.noexpert.co.uk\/food\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=21345"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.noexpert.co.uk\/food\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=21345"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.noexpert.co.uk\/food\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=21345"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}