#FlavourTectonics - Flavours Recommend

Flavour Tectonics is an interest group of like minded individuals exploring the world of flavours in all kinds of drinks.

Written by Chen XingSheng

I first had this wine at a tasting session, it was when Orh Gao Taprooms was planning new wines to feature, and this beauty was brought in by Racine Wines. As it was close to the festive season, this wine immediately caught my attention as I took a sip. A light red with succulent flavour that was reminiscent of a good Christmas dinner.

Produced in the Loire Valley in France, by Jennifer Bariou and Thibaut Bodet, this heavenly red is a blend of Carbenet, Grolleau and Gamay. A minimal intervention wine with crazy complexity. It reminded me of a Christmas fruitcake soaked in rum, the acidity was like berries, and the sweetness like rum, with a lovely chocolatey finish.

As this is the first feature of Natural wine, here is a quick break down of what natural wines are. Natural wines are essentially wines produced with traditional methods, without additives from the farming to bottling. The common market wines have added sulphites to stabilise them for storage, however, natural wines do not contain sulphites, it is purely fermented grape juice. This results in clearer and more distinct flavours, and sometimes, a fermenty, stanky flavour. We call this flavour “funk”, with all love, which adds to the complexity.

The second time I had this wine was at a Christmas dinner, the bottle was opened next to a scrumptious centrepiece of roast turkey. An impeccable pairing, I must say, turkey, cranberry sauce, gravy, and a sip of this wine, the whole dinner course is complete in your mouth.

I was extremely excited to see this wine available on the Racine Wines website again, and true enough, I bought another bottle at a BBQ party, guess Christmas came early this year. If you’d like to try a bottle, you can get it via this link: https://www.racinewinesco.com/products/vigne-dys-2020

A little update on the recommendation frequency, we will be taking it chill and only uploading when we truly feel compelled to recommend something, but you can still keep track of what we are drinking via our Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/flavour_tectonics/

Keep a look out for our overseas features as we embark on our exchange semesters!