We find out about regional wine from sommelier Dan at the Ubiquitous Chip
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00:00Some of the favourites for the tournament here, three of the ones that are most fancied for winning the tournament are France, Germany and England.
00:09They didn't make it through here, but tell me a bit about the wines that you chose to represent those countries and what they're all about.
00:19With Germany I chose this Pinot Blanc from Maxwell & Gruenhauser.
00:24I think German wine is quite underrated on the whole.
00:28People always think what springs to people's minds is sweet wines that maybe aren't of particularly good quality.
00:35That's what I think of as well.
00:37I think a lot of the time when you buy those kind of cheap German wines in the supermarket then a lot of the time that is what you get.
00:43But there are some fantastic examples.
00:45This Pinot Blanc's got this really nice kind of almost oily sort of texture.
00:49Lots of weight to it and this kind of almost floral character.
00:52I think things like German Rieslings you can get this incredible acidity and there's so much complexity.
00:59They can age for a really long time as well.
01:01I think because of that stigma of people's association with Riesling and German wines as being quite sweet.
01:10I think people sometimes struggle to... I miss out on some fantastic wines to be honest with you.
01:19German wine is some of the best in the world.
01:23They make some fantastic red wines as well.
01:25Some Pinot Noir is kind of the key grape.
01:30Tell me about that English wine.
01:32English wine is...
01:34What kind of springs to most people's minds with English wine is sparkling wines.
01:38There's some absolutely fantastic sparkling wines down in areas like Suffolk and Kent.
01:44They've got the ideal soil type for it.
01:48You get these almost chalky kind of soils that work really well with grapes that kind of work in sparkling wines.
01:57England is very cool.
01:59There is a lot of restrictions on what kind of grapes they can grow.
02:04A lot of the grapes come either from Germany or from kind of northern France.
02:09You see a lot of Pinot Noirs when it comes to reds.
02:14There's a grape called Bacchus, which is quite common in England.
02:18Because of that coolness, English wines tend to be quite fresh and quite sharp.
02:24They have lots of acidity, which can work really nicely with food.
02:27What about the French wine that you chose to represent?
02:30This is probably one of my favorite wines.
02:34Just one of my favorite wines ever.
02:36This is from Demain Jaeger De Fey.
02:38It's a winery that's in Burgundy, run by the fantastic Hélène Jaeger De Fey,
02:42who's just got this amazing no-nonsense attitude towards winemaking.
02:47It's 100% Pinot Noir, and from the village of Ruy, which is in southern Burgundy,
02:52a little area called Côte Chalanaise.
02:56The wine itself is aged in oak, but they use very old oak for this particular wine.
03:02That allows oxygen to kind of start opening up the wine.
03:07Allows a lot more complexity to come through.
03:10This is actually wild fermented, which means they don't add any yeast strains.
03:14It's just what's prevalent in the vineyard that ferments the wine.
03:21That lends the wine almost this musky, smoky, almost meaty kind of quality.
03:28One of the interesting things about the wine list here
03:31is that there are lots of European countries that are represented that have their own story.
03:36I suppose one of the lessons here today, if there is any lesson,
03:42is that some countries that you don't necessarily think that are at the top table for wine are right up there.
03:49Were you surprised that Italy and Austria made it to the final, for instance?
03:53I definitely expected Italy to be there.
03:56I'm really impressed that the Austrian wine went so far.
04:00Austria is a fantastic winemaking country.
04:04The wine that got there was Weigel, one of my favorite grapes.
04:09Really nice and light and fresh.
04:12You get these little spicy notes running through it as well, which I think is great.
04:17I was really pleased to see the Turkish wine did quite well.
04:20Again, not a country that lots of people associate with making wines,
04:24but they've been making wine for thousands of years in the area.
04:28Right back to the very start of winemaking.
04:32You can see that kind of expertise running through.
04:35The Italian wine that we had is from Tenuto or Limbaro.
04:39It's Nebbiolo d'Alba, the same grape that they use in wines like Barolo and Barbaresco.
04:44It has lots of body, but still maintains this kind of real freshness to it,
04:53which I think is a key to it.
04:56I think with food as well, it's absolutely amazing.
04:59I think the one thing we've proved this afternoon is there's an exciting summer ahead of wine and football.
05:04Cheers.
05:08Oh, that's good. That's really good.