WSET Diploma

Halloween candy: Mark West 2012 Pinot Noir

Mark West 2012 Pinot Noir[Tasted during WSET Diploma – Unit 3 – Week 4: Workshop]

The second wine in our flight of three was clearly the lowest quality, though perhaps premature conclusions were drawn just from smelling the three without having tasted them yet. It’s that sort of jammy strawberry and vanilla thing, but it’s not a complex strawberry compote sort of deal. Maybe kind of like those Campino candy things without the yogurt connotation (and maybe even worse than that), but maybe candy is on my mind because I haven’t had my fair share of Halloween treats this year. Hrmph. I suppose this comes close. I mean it’s an orange label.

The palate seals the deal with a lightly-bodied wine and almost no acid to balance out the sweetness, but I suppose the saccharine fruit superficially lengthens the flavours on the back palate.… read more

WSET Diploma

I need to drink more Burgundy: Domaine Pavelot 2010 “Les Vergelesses” Pernand-Vergelesses

Domaine Pavelot 2010 "Les Vergelesses" Pernand-Vergelesses[Tasted during WSET Diploma – Unit 3 – Week 4: Workshop]

Out of the three wines we tried in our flight of, this was definitely the most old world – that is, the most earthy and austere, with fruits in the red section of the spectrum but geared towards a bit of a pleasant sour unripeness, so much that if you had me smell (but not taste) this blind not knowing the other two wines in the flight, I may have guessed something like Sangiovese, which is sort of known for just that. Sangiovese has much more tannin and scratch, though, while this was quite soft.

I remember studying a bit of Pernand-Vergelesses mostly when committing Burgundy’s Côte d’Or to memory for the CMS Certified Sommelier exam, and my imprecise definition of the area is a mere blob of an appellation within the Savigny-lès-Beaune appellation in the Côte de Beaune. … read more