The challenge for Georgian wine

Back at the beginning of all of this, a friend took me to his friend's cooking school late night gathering. It was past midnight and they were a cocktail swilling smart set. I tried whatever was going around in the martini glass but it was too sweet--strange for a country were sweet is a rare event.

Shortly after, one of the school's partners offered me a glass of wine and hesitantly I said "Sure."

It was  deadened, undrinkable boxed Provençal rose. "It's cheap and it's good," he said. It might have been cheap, but good was overstating its charms.

Then he told me how he was studying for the second round of the WSET and was giving his own wine classes at his school. 

"Bio wine is bullshit," he said. "Too expensive."

There are some battles one takes on and there are others that I simply take to the blog. Here is a sophisticated school that prides itself on the ingredient. One of the partners is a wine expert giving food and wine pairing classes, dislikes his local wines with skin contact or 'naturalness' but will use Niki Antadze's rare wines because he is a friend. As Georgia moves forward with it's remarkable wines, in what might well be a government supported natural wine initiative--really showing up the rest of the wine world--they will have to deal with experts who can't understand having the same attitude towards wine as their food. 

I didn't engage with him I wished him luck on Georgian wine and food pairing. Which by the way, is a cinch. Just drink and eat. Simple. 

 

 

 

Comments

[Brigitte Armenier]

France invading Georgia, Herio Bichebo!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DuqaX1IuDlQ
Just Kancheli and Kakhidze. Simple.

[Cutter Knox]

As someone in the hopitality biz a very long time I too never understand this attitude. People get religious about how local and organic their food is but think nothing of the wine, or dismiss 'natural' wines as hippy bullshit. The cognitive disconnect simply boggles the mind.