Meeting 308 - The Art of Microvinification     Speaker:  Henry Laithwaite

Held at Waltham St Lawrence         Friday 16th November  2007

      Members of the Berkshire Branch of the IWFS did not really know what they were coming to on Friday 16th November when the secretary, Julie Graham, arranged for Henry Laithwaite to address the group and provide the wines for tasting. Was this to be a talk on how to make wine? What sort of wines were we talking about? Well, the evening turned out to one of the most instructive and enjoyable we have had. Not many wines ever achieve scores of 10 out of 10 – more than one of Henry’s did!
      Henry is the son of Tony Laithwaite, one of the UK’s leading quality wine distributors, and has inherited a love and a deep knowledge of the subject. Henry made his first wine at seventeen and at just 26 he is already making world class wines in locations around the world. His presentation to us came from the heart and was a combination of technical approach, where Henry believes that small scale vinification can significantly raise the quality of the product, and an innate ability to select the right fruit. Henry says that is a vital part of the process and he walks the vineyards, tastes the fruits and chooses those rows he wants for his wines. Picking and selecting is by hand and he uses small open, and sometimes wooden vessels for vinification, cap depression by hand or sometimes hand pump-over. The rest of the process is much as we would expect.
      Henry works mainly in Côtes de Castillon in Bordeaux and in Mclaren Vale, South Australia and wines were drawn from these two areas although we also tasted Khwezi 2004 from Stellenbosch. The stars of the evening were the Côtes de Castillon, Aux Trois Frères, 2005 poured from an unmarked bottle as the bottling was to take place the next week. This was a great opportunity to get an early tasting of the 2005 vintage. 100% merlot with a very deep dark colour, lots of legs and soft tannins indicates that this wine will last in the cellar. A very sophisticated flavour and I would not have been able to tell the cepage from the nose or the taste. A good buy at £12.99
      The second star was Redheads Mclaren Vale, Wilson Gunn 2005, 70% Grenache and 30% Shiraz. A rich dark wine with very good balance, long in the mouth and having many subtle overtones. Several members gave this one 10 and it averaged 9 across the room – an exceptional score. At £13.99 this was not unreasonably priced. Henry makes his wines in volumes of 100 to 400 cases only and sells direct to the consumer through www.hjhwines.com. These excellent wines were complemented by a supper of chicken, pepper and parmesan bake served with new potatoes in parsley butter and green salad followed by a piquant lemon tart and cream. This was the first time that Alison Marshall had cooked for us and her style of cuisine complemented the wine well.Wine writers have recently been predicting the demise of the “garagiste”, whose aims were primarily financial, in Bordeauxbut here is a very modern British “garagiste” working around the world, whose aims are only to make world class wines. Long live the Art of Micro-Vinification! (CG)

Click here for a full list of the wines.