These are Mr. Parker’s predictions for the wine business, made in 2004. Does any of these in not valid anymore? What about the cost of the iconic wines?

World wine market: long term predictions

“The wine Web will go mainstream”: there will be a full range of Web sites tailored to disseminate information about new wines and new producers supported by experts, consultants, specialists and advisors which will assume the role of today’s wine publications.
“World bidding wars will begin for top wines”: World’s greatest wines will reach a prohibitive price due to the increasing demand coming from new developing countries, i.e. Asia, South America, Central and Eastern Europe and Russia. The most limited production wines will become even more expensive and more difficult to obtain.
“France will feel a squeeze”: “France’s obsession with tradition and maintaining the status quo will result in the bankruptcy and collapse of many producers who refuse to recognize the competitive nature of the global wine market”.
“Spain will be the star, Southern Italy will ascend”: Both these countries continue to make regional wines as they have for centuries, but they have adopted the New World style to some extent to increase their share of the new wine market.
Spain will rise as a leader both in wine quality and creativity, benefiting from the combination of tradition with a modern winemaking culture.
In Italy the winemaking revolution has commenced and its rewards will become evident over the next ten years.
“Value will be valued”: Due to increased competition in the market, more high-quality and low-priced wines will generally be available.
”Diversity will be the word”: Quality wines will come from unexpected places like Bulgaria, Romania, Russia, Mexico, China, Japan, Lebanon, Turkey and perhaps even India.

This last Saturday I had my first big experience of tasting olive oil. Besides trying few different blends from my family’s production, I had never tasted commercial olive oils, from other producers, following the steps of a professional tasting.

When tasting olive oil, the color is not important. Due to this fact, we taste it in a blue color glass, as shown in the photo. What matters is the flavor and the taste. The flavor can be grassy or with tomato leaf notes if the olives were unripe or green. On the other hand, if the olives were full mature, the olive oil yields floral or tropical flavors. On the palate, an olive oil from green olives is spicier while other from full ripened olives is buttery.

There are negative characteristics in the olive oils as well. But at this tastings we only learned good things of the olive oil! Bad things will come in another post.

I enjoyed very much this experience. Our speaker, Pedro, is currently working at Dão Sul, a wine and olive oil producer headquartered in the Portuguese wine region of Dão.

Oscar

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It’s Carnival and I think I don’t like this day. People wearing strange clothes, masks and make-ups. I don’t find humor on this but it doesn’t mean I can’t participate. I know this may sound incoherent but this year I participated in a Catalan “comparsa“. This is a tradition parade, with people grouping in 40-100 members teams and walking and dancing at the sound of an individual band around the streets of a village. From 9am till 3pm we got together with our friends, dancing along the streets and throwing candies to pedestrians and to members of other groups participating in the parade. At 3 o’clock the big moment arrived: all the groups met in the middle of the main square of Vilanova i la Geltrú and started a candie-war. At this time I covered under Nadia’s “manton” and took a glance at what was happening around me. Actually this was a fun day!

Oscar

http://www.viatjo.cat/wp-content/uploads/2009/02/vilanova4.jpg

Yesterday, while cooking the dinner, I was discussing with some friends the relation between price and quality perception by wine consumers. Actually, some studies show that many people prefer cheaper wines rather than expensive when tasting them blind. Take a look at this interesting article from Tim Harford on FT:

You assume that the price of the wine and its quality can be neatly separated out. This seems reasonable, but is wrong. Price changes the very experience of quality. Neuro-economists have found, for instance, that while placebo painkillers work, they work best if the subject thinks they are expensive. Energy drinks give you less energy if you buy them at a discount. (Yes, really.) And of course, wine tastes better if you believe that it is expensive.

One possibility is to conceal the price of wine from your girlfriend and tell her you’re buying the expensive stuff when in fact you are buying the house red. This is a white lie: many people prefer the taste of cheap wine in blind tastings, and by claiming it is expensive you will quite genuinely improve the way she thinks it tastes.

Yesterday I really enjoyed the soccer match between FC Porto and Sporting Lisbon for the Portuguese Cup. I’m a FC Porto supporter and at the end of the match I was radiant with the result (5-2) and specially with the match. Moreover some good friends were there!

Oscar

This was the first time I tried a home-made sushi. We paired it with a full glass of water but next time I want to go for a glass of Oscar’s. Who knows if is this a wine made for Japanese?!?

Oscar

During this week I visited one of the top notch producers of Port Wine: Graham. Graham is currently owned by the Symington family, a major Port Wine producer, probably the biggest. I went there to see Zélia Reis and Gustavo Devesas on the left and center respectively in the photo, both working in the company. During the almost three hours of the tour, I visited the cellar and they gently shared with me a couple Vintage Ports from the 80’s. Great experience and at the end I bought some bottles to bring with me!

If you go there, and it is worth the visit, ask for Zélia and Gustavo, they are both very nice guys!

Oscar