In article ,
David Rance wrote:
On Tue, 24 Jul 2012 Sacha wrote:

There are very mixed views about whether their wine is ever
delicious, but let that pass.
None of those vineyards would say that they can rely on the
grapes ripening enough to make good wine - indeed, the ones I
have visited have all said that they can produce drinkable
wine most years, but some years are a washout (often literally!)

Sharpham and Camel Valley win many awards. The latter has, iirc,
beaten some French wines. I don't know how many you've drunk but we
have often lunched at Sharpham and enjoyed their wines, so we do have
some first hand experience. I'm not arguing about viability, merely
commenting.

If I remember rightly (and he is sure to correct me if I'm wrong!) from
previous exchanges I've had with him, Nick simply does not like the
kinds of wine that our northern latitude produces, preferring the fuller
flavour of wines grown in warmer climes.

Just a matter of taste.

Yes, precisely, but that wasn't the point I was flamed for making.

That was that grapes don't ripen reliably in the UK, which they
don't. In some places, and with some varieties, they do pretty well,
but they need a favourable location and a suitable variety for the UK
to get even acceptable reliability. And, in bad years, even that
isn't enough!

Most of the vineyards I have visited were pretty evasive about their
success rate, but the few that answered indicated that they had to
write off enough years that it needed budgetting for.

And, of course, chapitalisation is almost always used, which is a
pretty sure sign of less than optimal ripening.


Regards,
Nick Maclaren.