by Albert Cilia-Vincenti

 

The ‘Grape Expectations’ title to these series was thought up by The Synapse scientific editor Ian Ellul.  He had initially suggested the setting up of educational wine-tasting sessions for The Synapse medical, pharmacist and dental readers. My first reaction had been that tutored wine-tasting sessions would not be easy to set up, as they required considerable time and effort input, both expensive to put together.

 

We therefore started with the Grape Expectations descriptive introductory features to wine appreciation to give us time to think how to eventually organise wine-tasting sessions. As you professionals know very well, the theory is a necessary prerequisite to any skill attainment, but without actual practice of the skill, no real proficiency is possible. So also with acquiring wine appreciation and enjoyment experience – it requires actual practice of tasting wines and not just reading about them.

 

In his initial choice of the Grape Expectations title, Ian Ellul was therefore hinting at the expectation of actual wine-tasting sessions at some stage in the future. Well, perhaps the time Ian was hoping for has arrived. We recently discussed the setting up this year of such a wine-tasting events for medical, pharmacist and dental readers of The Synapse. The format will be similar to that of ‘Il-Qatra’ wine club which is now 10 years old and has over 60 members.

 

Let me tell you how Il-Qatra wine club started and about its format.  In 1996, Wands Ltd, the wine retailing branch of Farsons, organised a wine exhibition at the Manuel Theatre’s Isourd Hall. The Sunday Times published my write-up about some of the wines on offer for tasting – this feature had important consequences. Apart from the fact that it caught Roamers eye, because no critical wine article had apparently appeared before in this newspaper, it also caught the eye of Dr Antoine Schranz, the people at Marsovin, and some others.

 

When I bumped into Antoine Schranz soon after, he told me he was surprised to learn that I was interested in wine like he was, and immediately expressed his desire to organise a wine tasting club.  Philip Tonna, the Bordeaux-trained enelogist at Marsovin, invited me to taste not only the 1995 red Antonin and 1995 Cheval Franc before these new wines were launched on the market, but he also invited me to a number of blind-tastings of their wines together with other producer’s wines. These blind-tastings left me with a lasting impression – that there was no more objective way of comparing wines and judging which you preferred.

 

Each time I subsequently came across Antoine Schranz, he would ask when we’re going to get the wine club started. I can unhesitatingly state that it was his enthusiasm and persistence that eventually got Il-Qatra off the ground – he also came up with the ‘Il-Qatra’ name. Dr Roberto Balbo, a Sicilian veterinary surgeon resident in Malta, and Mr Mario Mizzi, an accountant, both wine aficionados, together with Antoine and myself, constituted the founding committee of Il-Qatra, and us four remain in-charge of Il-Qatra as we approach its tenth anniversary.

 

My main contributions to Il-Qatra at its onset were two, namely, that the format of the tasting had to be blind, and that the wine-tasting had to be accompanied by dinner, because wine was invented and evolved to compliment a proper meal and not just a few biscuits or some cheese. The committee decided that members would blind-taste four wines with a monthly dinner, and the first session was held at the former Bologna restaurant in Valletta. The club subsequently moved to a number of five-star hotel restaurants and eventually chose the Petillant restaurant at Radisson St Julians as its base. The blind-tasting format was slightly refined over the years to the present set-up of members anonymously scoring the wines out of a maximum of 20 points, without any pressure to guess correctly the wines. It is therefore primarily an exercise in learning how to judge wine quality by working out what you prefer and why.    

 

We are proposing a similar format for the Grape Expectations events with dining at Radisson St Julians because of the consistent quality and experienced service of its Petillant restaurant. The first session will be held in the 3rd quarter of this year. Details of the event will be communicated in due course through The Synapse Magazine and the The Synapse Web Portal.