On the Road with the Grape Guy
Report from - Sherry Tasting ... November 28, 2007
04 Dec 2007- Details
- Category: On the Road with the Grape Guy
Ah Sherry … that misunderstood wine from Spain. I have known a few Sherries in my day (Cherie, Sherry, Shari …) and like the wine they have proven themselves to be just as mysterious and perplexing. The making of Sherry (the wine) is long and complicated; the making of Sherry (the person) does not have to be so – in fact many have been created by using the wham-bam-thank you-ma’am method. Sherry (the wine) comes in a variety of styles – the same can be said for the person. And Sherry (the wine) can be aged a long time and contains dozens of different influences from a variety of vintages – Sherry (the person), only if she is open to that type of lifestyle … and then ewww.
Now let’s get serious for a moment … Sherry comes from the Sherry Triangle in Spain. Like Champagne, Sherry is a regional designation and true Sherry comes from this triangular region – all others are imposters and should be designated as ‘Traditional method’ or ‘Sherry-method’ as would be the case with all other sparkling wines not made in the Champagne region of France. The Sherry Triangle consists of Jerez (pronounced “Hereth”) – the most inland, and Sanlucar and El Puerto – the coastal towns. This region boasts over 300 days of sunshine annually with mild winters (4 degrees) and very hot summers (40 degrees) with an annual rainfall of no more than 620 litres. Sherry is made using three authorized grapes only: Palomino, Pedro Ximenez and Moscatel … these are white wine grapes and thus Sherry is considered to be a white wine, no matter how dark the final product is.
The making of Sherry is a long complicated process having to do with oxidation, living organisms, barrel ageing (minimum 3 years), a step down system or “solera” system, testing, re-testing and many many years … but suffice it to say the final product is great value considering the time, money and effort wrapped up in making it.
I hear you saying, “but Sherry is an old persons drink, my grandma drank Sherry.” ... (Read more)
