Spittoon - Details

Jeroboams is one of those little merchants that makes the UK wine scene so unique and dynamic - an independent, thriving, individual company. More than a front-room French wine importer though as the London-based companyoperates storesin Belgravia, Hampstead, Holland Park, St. John's Wood and other upmarket areas of London and also own Mr Christian's Delicatessen and whisky specialist Milroy's of Soho. By the locations you should realise they are not the place for a £3.99 bottle of Sangiovese to wash down a Friday night pizza; although the website does offer anunder £12 section:

"Although we have an extensive range of the world's finest wines, I am very proud of the amount of outstanding wines we stock under twelve pounds. It was tough work deciding what to leave out as the quality of wine at this price range has come on leaps and bounds in the last 10 years, as standards continue to improve every year. This is great news for an independent wine retailer like Jeroboams as it means we can offer a more varied portfolio and be confident of the quality of the wines."

It was in the depths under Milroy's in Soho that myself andman-about-town Mr Blydewandered for a wine tasting back in October. I should apologise for the briefer-than-usual tasting notes; the palate was fading somewhat after a morningfood and wine tastingacross town - and the effects of alcohol shouldn't be ignored either.

Manging to slurp and sniff twenty of the 66 wines open, the following received more than a VG in the margins of the tasting note booklet. [Another Jeroboam's wine that is highly recommended is theCellar Cal Pla Mas D'En Compte Blanco]

I am truly rubbish. Absolutely useless in fact. Not ateverything, but in the simple task of keeping my wine notes in order.

Not a great crime you would have thought but coupled with a really abysmal memory and disaster befalls my blog-writing regular-like. Coupled with an hereditary inability to ever find anything - before, after or during regular 'tidying up ' sessions and you may wonder how I struggle under the weight of shame and guilt to lift head-from-pillow every morning.

I've just discovered a rather well written intro to a blog post, scribbled on the back of a brown envelope. The witty and, dare I suggest, sophisticated missive references two superb sounding wines (one from Argentina, the other South African) but sadly fails to mention any specifics - like name or grape variety. The crumpled edge of the envelope has a paper clip attached... I am wondering where said 'attachment' is though...

I have attempted everything to become more organised. From designing and printing tasting note sheets and clipping them to a Muji clipboard (that could only hold 10) to using variously sized notebooks which were either too small or two cumbersome to manage at tastings. I had an eleastic band looped round one, quite well used, suitably sized, note book which held everything of import written for Spittoon over a period of several months. And then lost the book.

I even confused the 'bottles for photographing box' with the 'empties for recycling box' and now have a stack of picture-less wines to grace my graphic heavy website. Poor show indeed.

Bottles are currently lined up on a secondary table, 12 in number and all awaiting a write up on Spittoon. I have the notes and several references to the food match. But can I recall what half the foods were? Can I buggery. An attempt to match stored photos of food with each wine has just wasted a fruitless hour with three possibles and two no-shows. Some were sampled several months back; and as I can't even recall what I had for dinner last Thursday recollections from the dim and distant are simply hopeless.

The problem is exasperated by the sheer number of samples I have to write-up. In addition to the 12 there are four more empties downstairs and two whites in the fridge.

My wine tasting note hieroglyphics in use at trade tastings convert just weeks after the event into ancient Sumerian cuneiform of a type that even Mr I Jones would decree to be indecipherable (and they made so much sense on the train journey home!)

My new years resolution is, therefore, to become more organised, to write complete notes at the time of tasting and not relying on a 'yep, I'll remember that when I come to complete the write-up'. I resolve therefore to only have two 'to report' bottles waiting at anyone time and not to broach any further bottles until they have reached the pages of Spittoon. I'm sure I resolved something very similar last year... only I can't remember back that far.