Everyday Drinking_ The Distilled Kingsley Amis - Kingsley Amis [96]
There is an intruder in the answers above, a fact offered as a plain fact that is not a fact at all. You will find the solution.
WINE—GERMANY
1. (a) “Qualitätswein mit Prädikat,” quality’s-wine with title or mark. Official designation for top-grade wine that must not be chaptalized (have sugar added to boost the alcohol).
(b) “Qualitätswein eines bestimmten Anbaugebietes,” actually, or quality’s-wine of a definite cultivation-territory, in other words of a named wine-growing region. Good wine, but may be chaptalized.
2. Like much else, not easily discoverable from a modern atlas, but the line from Bonn, which is about right for the northernmost German vineyard, passes through or near Bournemouth and Exeter, which incidentally is north of at least four modern English vineyards.
3. From the name of the local port of Hochheim on the river Main, whence most or some of it was presumably shipped.
4. Not this time. Hocks come in brown bottles, moselles in green.
5. Ice-wine, made from frozen grapes with the ice, i.e. water content, taken out, and so very heavy and sweet, also good, though not the best Germany can do, it appears.
6. “Edelfäule,” the exact translation of noble rot or “pourriture noble.” A less regular visitor to the Rhineland than to Sauternes.
7. “Das Rheingold” is of course the preludial opera of Wagner’s “Ring” cycle, and the Rheingold also is or was an early-morning express train from the Hook of Holland to Milan. The other four are denominated wine-producing regions of the Rhineland.
8. (a) Foam-wine, i.e. sparkling wine, lower grade.
(b) Sparkling wine, higher grade, or “Qualitätsschaumwein” if you prefer.
(c) Almost meaningless term for all-right, nothing-special hock. Well defined by COD as “mild white Rhine wine.” Legally a qba, which says something about qbas.
(d) The best and commonest German grape. Also used for wines from Alsace, Austria, California, Australia, etc.
(e) Table wine. Equivalent to “vin ordinaire.” A blend of German wines and those of other EEC countries. “Deutscher Tafelwein” indicates a blend of German wines only.
9. Quite easily. “Trocken,” like “dry,” can mean at least two things. “Trockenbeeren” are dry, i.e. withered, nobly-rotten, sugar-concentrating grapes.“Trocken” on its own equals “sec.”
10. Königin Viktoriaberg (Queen Victoria-hill) and Bernkasteler Doktor, the doctor in question being Edward vii’s.
WINE — ITALY, SPAIN , PORTUGAL
1. “Asciutto” (bone-dry), “pastoso” (off-dry), “abboccato”
(lightly sweet), “amabile” (“amiable,” a touch sweeter), “dolce” (sweet).
2. “Denominazione di origine controllata,” controlled designation of origin. Result of belated (1963) Italian attempt to follow the French aoc example and regulate descriptions and methods. No assurance of quality as such. A higher category is supposedly on the way.
3. Yes, something. It means the wine comes from a reputed best area within the larger area indicated by a doc.
4. This refers to age. Barolo Riserva and others are three years old, but many named wines have no such grade.
5. Barolo is a red wine, one of Italy’s best, from Piemonte in the north west. The others are whites.
6. (a) sparkling
(b) rosy, pink
(c) “current,” ordinary, like “vin ordinaire”
(d) red
(e) “of table,” denoting a table wine. (A mesa in Arizona etc. is a table-land.)
7. A flavour of vanilla is imparted to the wine. Some people like this; I find it intolerable.
8. Ice, fresh fruit, sweetness, a kick, bubbles—you can do sweetness and kick together by using a sweet liqueur, or sweetness and bubbles together with fizzy lemonade. Oh, and wine, which after all need not be Spanish.
9. Do, rhyming with “cow” but nasalized by the conscientious.
10. Moscatel de Setúbal, a fortified dark-white dessert wine made from the muscat grape and redolent of Victorian elevenses. They do a nice red table wine round there too.
WINES — OTHERS
1. (a) Standard Tokay, with added “aszu” syrup from “nobly rotten” grapes.
(b) Even sweeter version, low in alcohol, supposedly lifesaving “essence,” very rare today. Hugh Johnson