Sarah’s blog…

Sarah here – as usual very behind with my blogging! Probably due to sleep deprivation as my husband keeps waking me up at some ungodly hour to discuss some new thought of his or, even worse, to excitedly shove a graph in my befuddled face and ask me to show the same enthusiasm he has for sales of sparkling wine the world over!

Anyway, lots has been going on .. and here are a few highlights.

Chapel Down – Frazer Thompson, CEO of Chapel Down, sent us a lovely welcoming email to the world of wine a few months ago, inviting us down for lunch. We had a brilliant time with him, me in particular, as he showed us all over the site and explained every part of the process, which I have never taken much notice of in the past when visiting vineyards, preferring (as is my wont!) to focus on the end result, while also using great decoration for the event, including flowers and chair covers so everything look perfect. We finished off with an excellent lunch (the best soup I have had in a long time) and a tasting of some of their wines and bubbly.

Without pretending to know, I’d say the following:-

Bacchus white wine – I really liked this (and I have drifted away from white wines with age (mine, not the wine!) finding them too acidic) – the smell was heavenly and my first thoughts were elderflower and hedgerows. Honestly! So proud of myself when Frazer said exactly the same before I’d said a word.

Flint dry – I liked this too – very clear and light and eminently drinkable.

Of course my favourite was the Chapel Down Sparkling but here I fall down as I can’t remember which one we had. I do know though, that I have a nice bottle of the Union to celebrate with tomorrow on the…

Royal Wedding – Can my husband really wield such influence? He’d like to think so since he wields little in the domestic arena. Check out this story to see just why we should all be patriotically drinking our own English wines.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1380903/ROYAL-WEDDING-2011-English-wine-table-Kate-Williams-big-day–costs-8-50-bottle.html

Well done Chapel Down!

Finally, we recently welcomed the English National Trust and Natural England to Rathfinny and we will be working closely with them, in our new National Park, to save our chalk downland meadow with the help of ponies. More on that later!