"Hewitson’s idiosyncratic choice is a relief in a world of standardised dross."
TIME OUT LONDON EATING & DRINKING GUIDE

Yes, the fault-ridden wines of the old days have almost disappeared. Yes, wine can now be relied upon to be an agreeable tipple without gut-searing acidity. But … is the wine industry, with its 21st century desire for squeaky clean products, in danger of throwing out the baby with the bathwater?  I didn’t become interested in wine to drink virtually the same taste sensation every time. I just love the bewildering variety...

Stuart Walton, in his excellent book “You Heard It Through The Grapevine” (Autumn Press £9.99) sums up the desire for conformity:
“The wholesale mediocratisation of wine in the UK ...as the monotony sets in, there is the Safebury’s wine buyer at the door, chequebook in hand and ready to spread the monotony all over the UK High Street. If the brave new world of wine was won in the 1980’s in the high summer of unsustainable economic bonanza, this is how it was lost – the drear chill of creeping standardisation”.

The good news is that this can be avoided when one is a small operator in a business striving for mass market globalisation. There are many wine producers out there with no interest whatsoever in making bland, boring wines. Even if they could make wines in sufficient quantities to satisfy the chains, they are not prepared to shave their costs to fit supermarket price points as they strive to produce the very best.

I don’t deal with ‘suits’ in England armed with price lists. I have travelled widely and love meeting the people who actually make the wines. Many have become long-term friends. Regulars have enjoyed for many years wines from  Jean-Marc Laforest, Gaël Martin and Frédéric Bénat (Beaujolais), Oliver Tricon of Domaine de Vauroux (Chablis), Domaine Arlaud, Domaine Mallard and Domaine Joseph Belland (Burgundy), the Boeckel family (Alsace), Domaine Delaunay (Loire), Barrière Frères (Bordeaux),  Yves Cheron Domaine Du Grand Montmirail (Rhone), Paul Uhart  Chateau Lavanau  (Cotes de Duras), Yves & Roseline Schelcher Chateau de Chausse and Betty Cundell Domaine Chaberts (both Provence), Aline Figueiredo Champagne Gardet, John Matta Castillo Vicchiomaggio (Chianti), the Farina Family (Toro), Anthony Hamilton Russell (Hermanus), Rob Hill-Smith of Yalumba fame, Grant & Helene Burge (Barossa), Peter & Sue Barry Jim Barry Wines (Clare Valley) and a host of mates from my home country, New Zealand, including  Andrew Hendry Coopers Creek, Nick Nobilo Vinoptima, Stephen White Stonyridge, Geoff & Dianne Smith Koura Bay and Terry & Linley Sowman Tindall Estate.

Wines by the glass at the Cork & Bottle