Wine DVD : Wine for the Confused by John Cleese

First and foremost, let me take this opportunity to wish everyone a Happy New Year 2007!
May your glass be always filled with wine, and your cellar always stocked with great bottles!

This is my first Wine DVD review, this programme has already been aired on Central TV channel this year, but as usual I did not manage to watch it on TV. So the next best thing I could do was rent the DVD and watch it :-) The presenter of the programme is John Cleese who is one of the stars of the Monty Python show. He delivers the programme in a light hearted manner and advices all wine drinkers to drink what they feel like drinking and not what other people say they should be drinking. In other words, trust your own palate.

The basic types of red (Merlot, Cabernet Sauvignon and Shiraz) and white grapes (Riesling, Chardonnay and Sauvignon Blanc) were introduced and also how to go about ordering wines in a restaurant. I liked the part where he did a blind wine tasting with his guests who included Brendan Fraser of the Mummy movie fame. The guests could not tell the difference between the $100 and $5 wines. In fact, in another wine taste test, they could not even tell the difference between red and wine grapes in a sealed container given to them!

The extras in the DVD was also quite useful, it is interesting that John associated wine with a “living breathing thing” and not only the way it changes in the bottle, but also in the glass. And how an originally unpleasant, unapproachable wine slowly mellows and becomes tasty after sometime in the open glass. Guess he is an advocate of decanting. The focus of the locations was mainly in California and Australia, primarily due to the lack of funding. In fact, the Gainey and Byron Vineyards were just 45 mins drive from his actual residential house! The Australian vineyards of Foxen and Carhartt were no posh setups like Domaine Chandon.

The DVD is available at EZY video River Valley branch in Singapore. You can call and reserve at 6737 3007. Enjoy!