New Northern Wine

Source it, painstakingly pair it with food, store it for a special occasion years hence. All good things and much appreciated by guests. But when it comes to new wines breaking into the market, eyebrows – and sometimes noses – rise.

1. Swedish Wine
Blaxsta, Sweden’s first vineyard, produces wine which won a couple of international awards. Darn that blind-tasting, you can’t see the logos. HLL can vouch that the dessert wine is excellent and goes well with a simple bowl of wild berries picked from a forest (or from a supermarket for those not in close proximity to hundreds of acres of lush landscape). Check out www.blaxtawine.se

2. English ‘Champagne’
Ok, it can’t be called champagne unless from that region. Anyway who would want to? - cue flag-waving rendition of Rule Britannia. Like its Swedish counterpart, English wine is also making a nuisance of itself by winning awards it shouldn’t. Sad that it has taken these countries so long to get to grips with wine-making but there is nothing like making up for lost centuries of Akvavit and mead.

Check out the following website www.coatesandseely.com - try to see past the dodgy bow-ties, strange hairstyles, men demonstrating severe backpain and pictures of nothing growing in the snow.

HLL says good luck to those who refuse to be sidelined by centuries of tradition.

Take heart, HardLuxeLiving
http://facebook.com/hardluxelass and hardluxeliving@gmail.com