#22: An interlude of sorts, I guess? | 2024 wine travels
The Sardinian and Sussex adventure wrap up as a means to get the show back on the road!
Long time in your inbox/Substack feed, no see.
Over 18 months, in fact. And it’s taken a few days of twixtmas this year to shuffle through my various social media personas to see a sad, dusty shop front that was once the biweekly commitment to post!
The motivations for Dosage changed, as most things do. I finished my WSET Certificate, had a career pivot and life came in to have me on other projects. While I still enjoyed a glass or two here and there, learning more and reflecting sans blogger hat on. I’m itching if not a little nervous jumping back in to write more, but I know it’s going to be a more leisurely affair to start off and see where the wind takes me.
To get the ball rolling and without much further ado, a little 2024 low-down of my wine infused travels to share. And really, to make sure I don’t go a calendar year WITHOUT writing.
Sardinia.
For sun holidays and me, going back to the same place year on year rarely has an appeal. Except if that place is Barcelona (twice this year, but both business, little opportunity for pleasure) and now, Sardinia. The less pronounced island in pop culture since the White Lotus imploded on Sicily, this is the island that Italy chooses to jet to when the summer months hit.
I went at the end of April on a solo excursion and I’ve never been more enchanted by a place. The water is exquisitely turquoise, food fresh and simple, and the best of all is going at shoulder season means that all of the beaches and towns are practically yours alone.
Wine wise, Sardinia gets little traction in comparison to other Italian wine regions. Probably as it’s incredibly straight forward - but may I say, impressive. For red, there’s cannonau, which is also better known as garnacha or grenache by the Spanish or French. Regardless of what you call it, Sardinia and cannonau are said to be the OG of the cluster and as oldest sibling, the most genuine. Grenache is a wine that’s HEAVY on alcohol content due to it being a warm climate lover, plus global warming. Chateauneuf du Pape which is a grenache dominant blend in most cases, are starting to reach 15.5 - 16% abv as the norm every year.
While the climate can get into the 50 plus mark of degrees celsius for June and July in Sardinia, it’s coastal vineyards and mediterranean gusts can come in to provide some sweet relief. What you get from cannonau is a fruiter, fresher yet still full bodied and complex wine, compared to French and Spanish counterparts.
The big clincher was the whites, as Sardinia is vermentino dominant. A pretty stack ‘em high, sell em cheap table wine that I went into the trip thinking. I was quickly corrected and mistaken. Vermentino is an aromatic variety, so should be more toward the “tutti frutti” side of floral, herby and fruity notes that you’d expect out of a savvy b, but not quite at that level. It’s said to be best grown by the coast and where it’s in its prime and enchanted me is when it has the name Vermentino di Gallura on the bottle, relating to a specific region on the Northern coast. I’m not one for super fruity whites, much more of a chardonnay hun until I tried this properly. A good vermentino is the perfect summer apero for me - there’s a bit of sea salt and mineralty to it with the fruits there, but not quite so in your face. It’s giving Piqpoul, but not the bottle of vinegar in the pub that’s quickly becoming a horror as it trends.
Sardinia is a tricky one to pick up anywhere if you want to dabble, so I’d recommend truffling around a good wine shop or Italian deli to see if they have any. Those in London, Passione Vino in Shoreditch is as-ever a delight or Svinando has an excellent choice for every region in Italy that you may ever need a wine from.
Sussex.
Summer was out of London for the most part, and by the East Sussex coast for what I thought would be quite the brat summer. Being beside Hastings, jumping into the sea or driving up to the farm shop on my lunch hour was something I was incredibly grateful for but soon became a lockdown-esque monotony. Can take the boy out of the city, etcetera etcetera.
Before I came back up to the big smoke, however, there was a bucket list box to tick while I found myself in English Wine Country. And that was to learn how to make wine.
Plumpton College, just outside Lewes, is mainly focused on agriculture but has been running winemaking and viticulture courses for the last 20 years. When I came over to London with the bright eyed and bushy tailed dreams of doing journalism full time, I covered the launch of part time courses from the school of winery when English Sparkling Wine was something still to be quaffed at.
Fast forward a good chunk of time, a boom in the industry and my curious brain into a week long course to run you through the Principles of Winemaking, just as harvest season was about to begin.
Half theory, half practical in basis, this was geared more toward the winemaker that’s already in motion or in the industry. Luckily for the learning curve that brought on theory, the analytical chemistry and calculations element were heavily overlapped in my early analytical chemistry practicals from my undergrad: so easy to pick up, bizarre to re-use the knowledge in another lens and mildly anxiety inducing to think back on some lab procedures and the insecure brain used to run through them a good decade on.
I’ve kept the notes and am grateful that I have the hands-on experience of making a batch of wine with my comrades (although it was a bunch of Thomson seedless grapes from Aldi, no fine vintage) should I need to scale and whip up a batch in the years to come.
Although I’ve missed the boat on what was a crap 2024 harvest in the UK, you never know if Dosage is going to become a product in 2025 and beyond…
Et fin.
Not all experiences made the list, but I hope you enjoyed them. Until the next time and as always, it’s really good to hear feedback on what you liked or what you’d like to see for next time!