The Briery Reserve
About the reserve
The Briery Reserve is an independent set of wine notes for the table: how to serve, what to pair, which grapes to know, and how a vineyard's land shows up in the glass.
Edition of
What this reserve is
The Briery Reserve keeps wine notes for people who are about to open a bottle. Every note answers one question a reader asks at the table or in the shop: how cold should this be, what goes with the roast, why does this grape taste of stone fruit in one country and green apple in another, what does an unirrigated vineyard do to a wine. Notes are written in plain English, held in four sections, and dated on the day they are checked.
The four sections
At the Table covers pairing and service at the moment a meal is served. Cellar and Service covers storage, temperature, glassware and opening. Grape Guides introduces one variety or one family of styles at a time. Estate Stories reads a vineyard landscape: soil, water, weather, old buildings, and the decisions a grower lives with for decades.
How a note is written
A note opens with the answer, then gives the reason, the measure and the exception. Where a claim depends on a document, a region's published rules, a technical study or a wine law, the note names the source it read. A wine, an estate, a grower or a merchant is always described in the third person, on the record of what can be verified. Measurements are given in degrees Celsius and grams per litre, because those are the numbers a reader can act on.
What a reader can expect to do afterwards
Hold a bottle at the temperature a dish wants. Choose between two glasses. Read a label and know what the words on it mean. Cook a lunch that suits a plummy red or an aromatic white. Ask a better question of a wine shop. The notes are written to be useful on the day, and durable a year later, which is why each one carries its date.