Wine competitions & Nasik visit

Time flies. Since my last post I've been to Mumbai as one of the judges at Robert Joseph's 'India Wine Challenge' (the third year running), part & parcel of te 'Taste' exhibition at the Gurgaon Exhibition Centre. I also spent 3 days in Nasik visiting vineyards and seeing what's happening there - and have written about this in 'the Wine Club' article for Business Standards' 'Weekend' section last Saturday.

India Wine Challenge

Robert Joseph is a well-known wine expert based in London, and has self-admitedly managed some 57 wine competitions to-date - he was for many years managing the International Wine Competition (the world's largest such exercise). I've been on the tasting panel in 2007 (the first such event) as well as in 2008 (they skipped the event in 2009). This year there were 12 judges - including 7 from overseas, and we tasted 240 wines in 9 hours (80 wines each by 3 panels) - check out the details in www.taste-expo.com/iwc.php

The wines come all bagged and sealed - it's always a blind tasting at these competitions - one knows the grape, the vintage, and the origin (country of) of each wine; tasting is in 'flights' of anywhere from 4 to 8 wines each, with wines in any one flight being similar. One swirls, sniffs, sips, and spits (the last is essential, if you're not to end up under the table after just a few wines).

Vineyard visits in Nasik

The grape harvest in India happens Feb - April, and being invited to the Zampa Crush, I wangled visits to a few new vineyards in that area.

I've already written about the Zampa Crush and York winery in last Saturday's 'Weekend' section of Business Standard - you could check out http://www.business-standard.com/india/news/three-cheers-for-enterprise/384734/

People may be amazed to know there are some 67 wineries operating in Maharashtra, 5 in Karnataka (with at least 5 more in the pipeline), and some 10-odd units producing Goan-style ports in Goa. will talk about numbers later- suffice it to mention that the old joke of "How do you make a small fortune in Wine?" "Start with a large fortune"! holds true, even in Bharat Desh.

Bangalore

8th February 2010

Wine Musings

Wednesday 20th January 2010

While I've been writing on wine since 2002 (the fortnightly column "The Wine Club" in the weekend section of Business Standard has been around since Dec-04) this is the first time I've ventured to doing a blog - which probably reflects my vintage. Better late than never.

Will try posting here on a weekly basis, let's see how it goes.

I got into wine quite by accident: when in the Corporate Planning cell for spirits in Vijay Mallya's UB Group I used to talk about the potential for wine (this was 1987) - so got picked up by Deepak Roy when the latter was looking for someone to head IDV India's 'Wine Division' in 1995. We launched Cinzano in 1997, but the merger of International Distillers & Vintners (IDV) with United Distillers (of Johnnie Wlaker fame) in 1998 (to give birth to Diageo, the world's biggest alcoholic beverages company) saw wines getting short shift, so I came back to Bangalore in early 2000, and after casting around for a bit decided to become a Wine Consultant.

In the last 9 years I have been consulted by (among others) Diageo, the UB Group, Moet Hennessy and Foster's; among other things started the Bangalore Wine Club (2001), write on wine, have an 'advanced' certificate from WSET (Wine & Spirits Educational Trust, London), teach about wine, and am a jugde at wine competitions in India (Sommelier India Wine Competition 2009; India Wine Challenge). The job barely keeps my head above water, but it's interesting.

So much for my background.

As yet I have no clear idea what to do with this blog, but will probably post my thoughts on wine in India and see if there are others who i can connect with on the subject.

ALOK CHANDRA