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A wine route from Georgia to Soho
A traditional red wine from east of the Black Sea offers something very different
AT Christmas one of us shared a bottle of wine from Georgia, the former Soviet republic bounded by the Black Sea to the west and by Chechnya and Azerbaijan to the east. The bottle carries a photograph of the country’s former leader and Gorbachev’s foreign minister, Eduard Shevardnadze, with the nickname ‘Grandpa’ used by members of his close circle. The wine was laid down in 2006, on his birthday – January 25. A well-known family from the Georgian capital, Tblisi (main picture) produced some 90 litres (120 bottles).
This was sufficiently interesting to provoke further study. Irakli Asashvili, the Georgian Consul-General in London, knew of this and directed us to Soho Wine Supply (confusingly in Percy Street off Tottenham Court Road rather than in Soho). They stock four Georgian wines, two red and two white under the brand name of Tamada, priced at £6.50 and £7.50. The 2002 dry red (12 per cent alcohol) we tried was from the indigenous Saperavi grape (£6.50).
This came as a real surprise, an unpretentious and robust wine, deep red in appearance with a fruit and mushroom aroma. Not surprisingly, Georgia’s capital Tblisi being due north of Baghdad, it has as much in common with eastern Europe and the Lebanese wine Chateau Musar as with anything closer to the English Channel.
Initially acidic, almost medicinal, it gradually becomes fuller in the mouth with a lasting and very satisfying taste. It should complement most spicy foods well.
Soho Wine tell us that their main demand is from Georgian restaurants and Russians living in London. What is most interesting about it, however, is that it closely resembles medium quality Bordeaux from the 1960s and early 1970s, thin, acidic but also complex and enjoyable.
Another interesting issue is that this wine was introduced through the restaurant trade and hasn’t attracted much other attention.
Georgia makes the proud claim to be the birthplace of wine, dating back 8,000 years and it still stores some of its wine underground in large clay amphora jars, as did the ancient Greeks and Phoenicians.
A wider point is that wine can be an important link in agriculture, tourism, culture and industry. Many former Soviet republics have seen their economies shrink under the pressure of globalisation since the fall of Communism in 1989. An interesting experiment in Hungary has been the local enterprise agency centred in the historical city of Eger, home to Bull’s Blood (Egri Birkaver).
This may be a lesson for Georgia, whose wine makers have traditionally looked north (to Russia) for their exports.
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