What's In A Name?

Names can be misleading, so don't knock a wine before you've tried it. 

Well to answer the question in the title, in this case quite a lot.  When you taste, drink, think, worry and dream as much about wine as I do, you soon start, subconsciously in most cases, to build very fixed ideas of what wines are like. 

The mere sight of a label or the mention of a name can be enough to make you think, ‘Good,’ ‘Bad,’ or most damning of all ‘Boring’.  This can be a good thing, it saves me having to think twice when offered a glass of Blossom Hill to say an emphatic ‘no thanks’, but it can also work against you.  For instance until very recently when I saw the name Campo Viejo, two things usually sprang to mind; firstly that I was once hideously and publicly embarrassed when I pronouunced the wines name in front of a former, Spanish speaking, friend, and secondly, that the wines themselves were sound, if a touch unexciting.  So it was with interest that I recently had the chance to look at the range again and you know what?  Names can be misleading.

As regular readers of this column will know I am a vast fan of Rioja, and most other Spanish wines for that matter, but Cava has always been the wine that got away.  They seem to fall into either the camp of supermarket mediocrity, big on bubbles, short of flavour or on the ultra traditional rather hefty flavours of monastrell et al – big on flavours, none of them particularly pleasant.  So it was with only marginal interest that I tasted the Gran Campo Viejo (Sainsbury’s £6.99).  However, it was something of a revelation, for here is a proper, serious sparkling wine.  The nose was full of creamy, bready yeasty notes, tones that continued on the palate and were helped by the delightful addition of clean, crisp apple and melon fruit, with just a suggestion of limes to the acidity.  In a time when we are clambering for cheap, and often decidedly nasty, so – called bargain Champagne at £12-£15 or sweet, confected, characterless New World fizz at a around a tenner, this seems to be something of an affordable gem.  Buy some, its great!

Now I cannot, these days it seems, get through an article without mentioning one of the ‘R’ words, but don’t worry I am not about to start barracking you about your below average Riesling consumption again, but I am going to recommend another rose.  This time the Campo Viejo Rose (£4.99 Asda and Threshers).  Let’s face it sub five quid for a super wine these days is a rarity and this is a super wine, not that complex, but by focusing on the delightful red apple, sweet strawberry and gentle raspberry fruit tones, this luscious, low acidity wine is a real little treat.

Viura is a grape that has in the past had a bad press – not least from me – but if you had been forced to taste some of the heavy, woody, lifeless leaden, used chip fat tasting white Rioja’s I have in the past then you wouldn’t blame me.  But happily those days seem to have been consigned to the past if the Campo Viejo Viura (£5.99 all big supermarkets) is anything to go by.  It is a fresh, clean, fruit driven wine that firstly refreshes with green apple, melon, lemon and grape flavours, before giving a satisfyingly yeasty finish.  A great wine for seafood and poultry, I would recommend it served chilled (but no cold you can stick a lolly stick in it) with roastedd goats cheese – yum yum!

Finishing on a high, I had the Campo Viejo Reserva (£7.99 all big supermarkets and Oddbins).  Now Reserva level is to my mind the greatest of all Rioja categories, striking for me at least, the right balance between fruit and wood, between freshness and oxidation.  This one is one of the best I have had recently, boasting as it does a good solid helping of blackcurrant, raspberry and cranberry fruit, with a supporting, by no means dominating dollop of creamy vanilla and warm spices.  Medium bodied and supple I would be looking to serve this with the Sunday roast, or better still do as they do in Rioja and serve it with lamb.

So the moral of this tale is that just if you haven’t looked at a wine in a while because you think you know it, take a look now and again, you might be pleasantly surprised!

More soon,

Theo

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