wine tasting england style

My surprise from Tom for finally getting a job was that he signed us up for a night of wine tasting with his colleagues at Amex. I was very happy to hear that the group included our friends Ade and Gemma(Tom works with Ade and Gemma is his girlfriend who works in Hove for the city council doing really cool marketing stuff.) So a couple of weeks ago an evening sampling wine is what we did. It was hard to focus at work all day as I do enjoy a glass of wine and after spending the summer in the heart of Washington's wine country I was curious how this night would compare.

The event was hosted at Butlers Wine Cellar....

http://www.butlers-winecellar.co.uk/

I spotted differences right away. We were fashionably late, as one should always be, and had slight difficulty finding the place. Rather than driving through orchards to a beautiful tasting house we drove through the streets of Brighton a bit confused. Calling to ask for directions we were told to look for the large red door, it is unmarked and knock three times to be let in. Slightly creepy? We thought so. But found it.

We found ourselves in what seemed like the front room of the mans house (turns out it wasn't)which was full of Amex employees standing round. The walls were covered floor to ceiling in wine. We tasted numerous rounds of both whites and reds as we were tested on if they were oaked or unoaked, new or old world and attempted to rank the price. The four of us had a hard time focusing on the competition bit though as we were far too busy chatting.

The man, Henry, did have a Washington state wine! I was excited by this, but a bit disappointed to see it was Walla Walla Valley rather than Yakima. It was a Leonetti.

"Leonetti is one of the most famous small wineries in the Pacific Northwest - and perhaps in the nation. The Walla Walla, Wash., winery's cabernet sauvignons and merlots have received lofty ratings by international wine media and are ranked as some of the best in the world."
http://www.northwest-wine.com/Leonetti-Cellars.html

It was a wonderful night and at the end we bought a red, to not be rude of course, and carried on to a house of one of the girls who lived nearby for one last glass. Then it was off to the station and home for a late bedtime to get some rest before an early morning of work the next day.

A wonderful night! Just the other day Gemma and I were even discussing how we would love to get a group together and do it again.

I learned wine tasting in England is much the same as in Washington as I am sure is most everywhere... A little bit of many different wines no matter what the venue looks like.

Thank you for the surprise Tom!

Love