Thread: I think I naffed off some God somewhere

Spanish wine SHOULD be the best in the world cosidering the amount of money Spain has managed to scrounge off the EU over the past 20 years. Everything in Spain is or should be brand new. However I think you are all about to experience a great change now that the charity shop has closed and you now have to contribute to the Belgian coffers in order to support the long list of new scroungers being admitted to the worlds most expensive charity
With the greatest of respect Val, your recent comments about French wine show that you know little or nothing about wine in general and French wine in particular. Of course there is a lot of rubbish made and sold in nicely labeled bottles, but by and large most of it is good, I think the same applies to wines from all over the world including Spain. I think the awful wines are the cheap ones, and as the man says, you only get what you pay for

backing away from keyboard, have a lovely day.

I was referring to the average French wine, which is not a patch on the average Spanish wine. The main problem is many crap wines have been talked up by morons like Oz Clarke and Jilly Goolden "that exquisite taste of petrol" and "smell of raspberry leaves" (or was it the other way round and the wine snobs (oh Ya) fell for it encouraging many producers of really rubbish wines to flood the market and contribute to the wine lake.

It is true that there are some GOOD French wines but they, like most good things, are few and far between - good Chateau Neuf Du Pape, for example. Many wines are over-produced because the inexperienced go by the wrong indicators and think that because a wine is labelled AC (Appelation Controlée) it just has to be good. WRONG all AC does is give certain producers the sole right to produce indifferent wine under that name; it is not a mark of quality (except, in some cases, bad quality).

The reason the Spanish wine industry has received a lot of EU money is for them to take vines out of production to reduce the wine lake. The French have not been required to do the same.

There are a lot of excellent Spanish wines which are not produced in overly large quantities so you don't come across them quite so often. On our way back from South America in 1990 we had a short stopover at Madrid airport an d, visiting the wine shop managed to pick up a bottle of 1978 Jumilla which we didn't open until 2000 for our 10th anniversary. It was the sweetest most delightful dessert wine we have ever tasted.

So can we put the knives away again?

Originally Posted by Jacklynn

Spanish wine SHOULD be the best in the world cosidering the amount of money Spain has managed to scrounge off the EU over the past 20 years..... I think the awful wines are the cheap ones, and as the man says, you only get what you pay for

As said previously the money the Spanish wine industry has had was not to produce rubbish but to stop producing a lot of quite good wine.

You only get what you pay for - one of the best tasting wines I found in recent years was a carton of Portuguese plonk at 60 cents a litre!

The AC on French wine labels only means that it guarantees to come from the area stated on the bottle. Having said that 2 years ago a big scam, worth several million Euro's was discovered when a gang was convicted here of substituting good wine labels onto poor quality wine. This scam lasted several years without any complaints from consumers. Most of the wine was exported, I could say to Spain but that would be untruthful
On a visit to Jumilla several years ago, and visiting a local producer, I was informed that the local wine was highly underated nationally and was believed to be amonsgt the best wine in Spain. It was further stated that the wine, due to it's high alcohol content was used a great deal to boost many poor quality wines in Spain
The knives are sheathed...Bless You Have a nice New Year

As far as I am concerned, there are two types of coffee..with milk or without. I went in a coffee shop in London and asked for a white coffee. My mistake. After the waitress had rattled off a load of incomprehensable types of coffee. I said have you got tea. She then started on English breakfast, earl grey, and a load more. I said, have you got tetleys. She gave me a strange look, and brought a tea. I don't know what it was, but I never went into a coffee shop since. I prefer a transport cafe where a tea is either strong or weak, and coffee comes with or without milk. (I won't get into the wine debate. I normally only drink it in a Chinese restaurant where they give you half a bottle with the menu)
CD

Originally Posted by CDThader

As far as I am concerned, there are two types of coffee..with milk or without. I went in a coffee shop in London and asked for a white coffee. My mistake. After the waitress had rattled off a load of incomprehensable types of coffee. I said have you got tea. She then started on English breakfast, earl grey, and a load more. I said, have you got tetleys. She gave me a strange look, and brought a tea. I don't know what it was, but I never went into a coffee shop since. I prefer a transport cafe where a tea is either strong or weak, and coffee comes with or without milk. (I won't get into the wine debate. I normally only drink it in a Chinese restaurant where they give you half a bottle with the menu)
CD

it's all part of a master plan......get you so confused about the simple things like a cup of coffee..... you won't notice the mp s ripping off their expenses, the introduction of sharia law, 22 new laws about which bin you have to put your rubbish in,salt shakers have no holes in them,you need a letter from your granny and a mortgage to buy a beer, and they have to power to cut off your internet.

No wonder I chose to live here

Well over the festive season we had a bottle of pink champagne (can't remember whose) and a bottle of Moet both tasted like vinegar........on the other hand give me a bottle of Vauban Freres......mmmmmm

I also drank a glass of Conte nasty.....yuck, again the taste was more akin to vinegar but give me a nice glass of Faustino Reserva or a nice rich Rioja mmmmmm