Some of you might know that The Semillons is the name of the wine-trade stripper group that removes most of its clothes for charity. Their name comes from a funny but lewd pun relating to… well, ask your mother.

Anyway, such a state of nearly-but-not-quite semi-excitement more or less summed up this category’s performance.

The numbers entered were tragically small given the usefulness of this particular wine style to the restaurant trade, but the rather limp number of entries performed reasonably well. Maybe something for the merchants to consider for next year when they put their SWA entries together.

What the tasters found was generally very pleasing: good varietal character with a fresh, zippy edge and plenty of structure. There was, interestingly, only one wine with any real bottle age to it (the Glenguin Estate, which picked up a Bronze) but this didn’t seem to bother our tasters in the least; the youthful zip of juvenile Semillon came into its own when food pairing was taken into consideration.

‘The big thing here is that these were very food-friendly wines, with acidity and structure, yet a delicacy too.’ said Michael Moore of Enigma 88. ‘They would work not just with pretty much any fish and seafood, but with a range of textures from smoked salmon through to tuna and lightly Asian-spiced dishes.’

The problem, of course, is that, for all the food-match logic, it’s a harder sell than, say, Sauvignon or Pinot Grigio. But the trade looks to be up for it if you are, importer people.
 

‘It was great to see such an attractive flight of this generally overlooked variety. It should be on the list more often.’
Matthew Cocks, Cubitt House