Gusbourne - Wine of the Week
I promised you a regular wine of the week a while back, didn’t I? And of course you’ll be the first to politely point out that many (many!) weeks have gone by, a good deal of photos have been seen of wine being drunk, but not a single wine of the week. I apologise. My trusty editorial contributor seems to be A+ at consuming the wine, yet rather tardy at providing anything of value to blog about. We'll do better. Starting right now with a tip off about a wonderful English winery.
English wine used to have a pretty terrible reputation, and I'd say for good reason. There’s still something of a hangover if you will, with a lot of scoffers and nay sayers out there when you mention English wine. But the wine in this country has come a very long way in the past 15 years, and has really taken off in the last five or so. Things are going so well that some of the big champagne houses like Pommery, Tattinger and others have planted vines here, and huge conglomerates like the Jackson Family are taking a good look at English vineyards. It’s a big reason why the three of us decided to head over here and jump on the bandwagon, Mr T for professional reasons, purely recreational for me.
There are many great English wineries making terrific sparkling wine, which as you know is my fav. Truly good English still wine is a little more scarce but is definitely picking up pace, and we were lucky enough to try both sparkling as well as red and white during a visit to Gusbourne this week.
Gusbourne is in the small village of Appledore in Kent on the northern edge of Romney Marsh. There have been vineyards in this area for quite some time. And this is England don’t forget, so when I say a long time, I don’t mean 50 odd years. More like it was mentioned in Willy the Conquerer’s Doomsday Book back in 1085. A few hundred years passed until the estate was formally named after owner John de Goosbourne in 1410, and lately Gusbourne has grown to be multi-award winning winery, earning a reputation for outstanding sparkling wines. But before we get too carried away, I thought Mr T should put them through their paces so we can see, or rather taste, for ourselves.
So on a cold and windy Thursday afternoon, we paid a visit to see Dan, who runs the newly developed tasting room called The Nest. It’s a cozy hideaway where you can get acquainted with the wines whilst strolling through a little Gusbourne history. While the WonderDog and I took a spin around the vineyards, enjoying the view (me) and trying to chase rabbits (her), Dan took Mr T through three sparkling wines as well as a white and a red.
I was the designated driver, so I only tried one of the sparkling wines, the Gusbourne Rose, and I thought it was outstanding. Someone who knows much more about wine than I said it has hints of delicate red fruit with depth and complexity. As for me, I say I could drink that stuff all night long (and probably half the day to be honest). Birthdays, anniversaries, Valentines Day, a random Friday night - it's b for all every special occasion. It’s tasty it's interesting, it's just darn good.
Having tried everything else Gusbourne had to offer, Mr T had the following thoughts:
The 2013 Brut Reserve was incredibly good, you get notes of lemon, apple and a brioche/pastry, and it’s rich with bright acidity (Me: great, now I’m hungry for apple pie, thanks a lot!)
The 2013 Blanc de Blancs was very interesting indeed, it has more citrus and green fruits with more acidity, it’s delicious and will go great with food (Me: like cheese, or salmon, fish and chips, ooh ooh or oysters. Geez, someone get me a fruits de mer plate this instant!)
Both of the still wines - the Guinevere Chardonnay and the Pinot Noir are some of the best English still wines Mr T has tried so far, so high praise indeed. The white wine was light and refreshing with subtle flavors of oak and the red had a nice presence of red fruits as well as spice and a lovely long finish.
They are also doing some incredibly interesting experiments like harvesting their own oak from a wood on the property and seeing how wine fares in their house made barrels. Intriguing stuff. If you go and visit, you can do a regular tasting and if something takes your fancy, most of the wines are available by the glass so you can head outside and drink at the picnic table or walking around the vines. They are dog friendly too which is a huge bonus.
If you’re reading this and you’re living in England, you should definitely go and see Dan and enjoy everything Gusbourne has to offer. If you’re in the US, I have good news for you. In 2016, Gusbourne started exporting to the US with a focus on San Francisco, LA, Washington DC, New York, Houston and Boston. In fact I have it on good authority that you can get Gusbourne sparkling at Sunshine Foods in St Helena, in the heart of Napa. So it’s really a thing.
English wine is on the move, baby - I’ll drink to that!
