September Wine Club II

Just in case you hadn’t noticed, the Rugby World Cup kicks off this Friday with England vs Fiji at HQ. The delicious prospect of six weeks of international rugby prompted sports-mad Laura Taylor and Amanda Skinner from Private Cellar to present a fine selection of wines for me to taste drawn only from those rugby nations that produce wine.

I whittled their original selection down to what I like to think of as a formidable wine/rugby half-dozen from France, England, South Africa, New Zealand, Argentina and Italy. Thank your lucky stars we’re not offering you kava from Tonga. The age-old, mildly narcotic national drink might — supposedly — calm nerves, ease stress and cure syphilis, gonorrhea, boils and stomach cramps but it can also lead to temporary paralysis of the legs if overindulged in. Oh that Spanish cava was blessed with such exciting properties.

Anyway, back to our offer. From France (currently 14/1 at Paddy Power) we have the delicious 2013 Domaine Montmarin Chardonnay (1) from the Côtes de Thongue, an up-and-coming Languedoc-Roussillon region expected to be given full Appellation Côntrolée status soon.