Address: Kentford Lodge, Kentford, Newmarket, Suffolk CB8 7QS England
Private Cellar Wine Tasting Course Review
A highly informative and extremely pleasurable course given by Nicola Arcedeckne-Butler, the taster and Buyer for Private Cellar, and hosted by Camilla Shepherd. The course runs for Six evenings at 2 and a half hours each session.
Wine Tasting and a highly informative lecture take place each evening. The course starts with an introduction on how to taste wine, how wine is grown and produced, and how to match foods to wine.
The second course is on Europe: Alsace, Loire, Rhone, rest of France, Italy, Germany, Spain, Portugal, and Austria and the rules, regions, types of grape varieties, and history are all covered for these areas. With wine tasting, of course.
Course 3 is New World: Canada, USA South America, South Africa, Australia, New Zealand. Maps abound as usual and tons and tons of information about where and how the wines are grown, which types, etc.
Course 4 is the massive subject of Bordeaux. Left and right bank The meanings of the labels and names and awards given, the terrain, the History of the region, classification and quality, how the Bordeaux market in wines works, what grape varieties are in Bordeaux the differences in the regions and the vintages going from 1982 to 2010 which is invaluable information when choosing wine.
Course 5: The massive and most difficult wine region to understand and to knowledgeably choose wines from: Burgundy. The producer is the most important aspect regarding choosing a wine from this region. history, commercial setup and, geography and climate are explained grape varieties which grand crus are the best to choose, and vintage information from 1982.
The last course is Champagne.
All in all, this course is pretty good.