Wine tasting on Voyager

As part of our cruise on a sea day we did a wi e tasting in the fine dining Silver Fork restaurant.  We were a group of twenty with the tables set in fours with the five wines already poured and a cheese platter each.

Our wine hosts were very good, the first wine tasting since our ship came out of dry dock so a special event for them. They had great knowledge of wine and the five we tasted which were a mix of Old World and New World wines.

Our first white was Canyon Road Sauvignon Blanc from California, a 2023 vintage it was a soft sauvignon blanc but with plenty of citrus flavours. Produced in stainless steel vats this wine had a crisp cleanest and paired really well with the Brie cheese from or platter.

Our second white was Spanish, much lighter in colour made from Macabeo and Chardonnay. From Andalucia it had quite a floral nose and slightly oily in the mouth. A very easy drinking wine from the Old World.

The rosé wine in our tasting was quite dark in colour. Made by C K Mondavi this White Zinfandel from California was quite sweet and for me had an abundance of dried fruit along with a strong flavourof quince, however other tasters discovered strawberries and sweet fruits. This was paired with red Cheddar which softened the wine's sweetness.

Moving on to our red wine with Morpho Helena Pinot Noir from Chile. A grape always distinguished by its light redness this red also had the expected Pinot Noir flavours of strawberries and cherries. Our hosts suggested pairing this with the Gouda cheese and it did add to the wine's flavors.

Our final red, and final wine, was Bottega Chianti Acino d'Oro from Italy. Certainly the darkest of our wines with an intense deep red in colour, this Tuscan wine made from Sangiovese had plenty of ripe dark fruit flavours. Our final cheese was a very salty blue and paired very well with our final wine, reducing it's tannins and adding to its fruit flavour.

We really enjoyed our wine tasting, a good opportunity to learn more and chat with our fellow cruisers. However we were a little disappointed as the wines displayed next to the event advertising and sign up sheet included a Sancerre but it wasn't in the actual tasting line up. Hubby did comment this to the wine hosts: today we had a call to our cabin to say we would have a complimentary bottle of Sancerre at our table at dinner.

What a treat, the wine manager came to see us personally and yes we had a complimentary bottle of superb Sancerre, a real treat .... thank you Marella Voyager