The £80 Malbec Taste Test

23:17Alan Carr:It's a bit like a Hugo's spritz, I think, as well. That's what often they'll call it. You stir gently with a garnish with a lemon twist. It's a simple three ingredient drink, it's popular modern aperitif. Known for its light, crisp flavour profile. What you getting there on the nose? My L. Fragrant elderflower. Oh, it's lovely, innit? Yeah. Are you sure this is alcoholic? Yes, it is. So I'm gonna give this 10. Yes, and the sweetness, if you don't like elderflower, Ella, Ella de flower, okay.

23:55Alan Carr:Then I won't go for it. But what I would say is I would... You could intertwine between the two. You start with a little kind of... If people are on the cocktails, I would go for the lily. But if not, if you just want a consistent drink that you're enjoying, go for the elderflower spritz. So get rid of this. You're done. See you later. We've found you a new one. What are you going to go for then? Elderflower? I'm going for this. Yeah, I'm going to go for the elderflower. Delicious. But like I said, if you want to zhuzh it up a bit and you feel like you're having a cocktail, If all you make start getting like margaritas or a Negroni or anything like that, then get yourself a little Lillet.

24:28Alan Carr:Wonderful. Cheers, Ella. Good luck with letting go. Yeah. Bottoms up. This podcast is brought to you by Carvana. Selling your car should feel like one less thing on your list, not one more. With Carvana, it is. Just go to Carvana.com, enter your license plate or VIN, and get a real offer down to the penny. No back and forth, no surprises, just an experience you can trust. Like your offer? Accept it. Schedule a pickup, and we'll come to you with a check in hand. Your car, your timeline, your terms. Visit Carvana.com to sell your car today. Carvana. Pickup fees may apply.

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25:37Alan Carr:Our next guest is a man after our own heart. He believes that wine should be accessible for everyone and less intimidating. Well, he cut his teeth at Majestic Wine and then went out on his own. And guess where he is now? On Bottoms Up! It's Manny! Hello, Manny. Alright, how you doing, man? Thank you very much, man. Lovely. Now, listen, can I ask you? Yeah. What do you feel about Claire's accessories shutting down? You know what? Where are you going to get your clip-ons from now? Oh, no, you know what I mean? Like, I've been a long time since I've pasted my ears, so, like, I don't need my ear pasting, so I'm real good there.

26:13Alan Carr:Well, it's how I have my nipples done. and a chain and a corkscrew right in the middle. Sexy, sexy. So Manny, welcome. Thank you so much for coming along. I will say you've already, you're already winning. I'm winning. Because I've noticed you brought Malbecs. Yes. But tell us before we get into that, because you know we love a Malbec. Tell us how you got into your wine, the world of wine. What happened? So yeah, so my journey started, I used to be a train driver. Now this story isn't, I used to have a couple of bottles of red, then get in that cabin, I was ready to go. You can't say that. No, I mean I'm trying to stop you from saying it, Andy, please.

26:56That never happened.

27:00No, but yeah, I used to be a train driver and then I came out of the company and I needed a job for the time being. So I saw Majestic and I thought, okay, I didn't know much about wine, but let me try it, let me see what's going on. I wanted to stay there for about three months, ended up there for about three years.

27:15Alan Carr:What I love about you is you do champion like almost curveballs. Like I've seen you go to Albania and stuff like that stuff. The Albanian wine, really? But you do rave about it. Yeah, they've got some great stuff over there. They've got their own grape varieties like white shish and black shish. But then they also do grow stuff like Malbec, Tampino, Cabernet Sauvignon. Great stuff. If I was going to come into Majestic, right, what would your... What gets... not gets you off, but what... What as an advisor do you want? Do you want to find the customer exactly what they want? Or do you have a bit of an objective?

27:56Alan Carr:Do you get, like, a little bit of a buzz if someone's come in looking for something and actually you've then stirred them in a bit of a different direction? like what's your aim as an advisor at Majestic? My aim is to push you what I like. I ain't gonna lie. That's the reason. Really? So I know that if I like a certain type of wine, there's proper qualities in that wine that I feel like you probably like. Just getting to know you and talking to you. Yeah. So you might say you want maybe a Cabernet Sauvignon. I'll say, okay, cool. Let's try this Cabernet Sauvignon. And then I'll look at the country that it's from and then I might just start, okay, well, maybe the Melbeck or maybe the Carmenier, like try that.

28:35And then you kind of steer people into directions that they never thought about before. And do you enjoy the fact that if they walk out with a bottle that they would never have got, you're like, OK, I've done good. And then they'll go tell their friends about it. Like, yeah, that guy knows his thing. And then it's like, yeah, cool.

28:50Alan Carr:And do you love Malbecs then? Yes. Is that your favourite? Just a straight yes, there's no debate on it. No, no, no. What about the headaches? Don't you get headaches? I'm just sick. You don't get a headache? Don't get headaches. Oh, I get a headache every time. You're not a professional, man. I'm not professional in shame. How dare you? Get out. How dare you? You're telling me I can't drink red wine properly. Challenge X. We'll see today, innit? We'll see today. All right, then. Okay, then, love. All right, so what we've got today, what are you doing with us today? I've had some of these before.

29:18Alan Carr:Katina. Tell me the story about Katina. Is it Katina or... Katina. I wouldn't call it Katina. Like as in Tenner Lady? Yeah, like that. Campons to Tenner Lady. I was about to say, we're moving along that. It's Gaster Women's Day. Is it? No. Next week we'll talk about the menopause. All right, so we've got Malbecs. So you've got three different Malbecs. Oh, yeah, so can Catenna tell us about that? Are they all Catennas? Yeah, so we've got three Catennas today. So three different levels of Catenna. Can I just ask though, what is Catenna? So Catenna is the name of the family. Oh, OK. The name of the family there in Argentina.

29:55They're originally Italians. Because that's the trouble I'm getting now, because either sometimes the wine is called the grape,

30:00Alan Carr:the region or now the family? Yeah, so it can be either, but this one is definitely their family name, so it's the name of the company, it's the name of the family, and they've been there like three, four generations now, so they're really deep into the wine world. And is it true Pitbull, that's from the rapper Pitbull, does he make that wine, is that right? No, it's a pick-pull or... Oh, sorry. Yeah, it's a pick-pull the rapper. I don't know if he'd go wrong, I thought you had a wine, I did go wrong. Everyone's got a bloody wine at Pitbull, like that one week, it'll be on next week. Say pickle.

30:33So yeah, so they're originally Italians, they've moved over to Argentina like many, many years ago. And then they took, they had Melbeck with them because it originally starts off in France. So Melbeck was born in France. Was it? Yeah, Cahors.

30:49Alan Carr:I've been there and that's, the grape is black, isn't it there? It's such a deep, dark red. It tastes different, so you'll have more of a tannic, rustic kind of... It's delicious, isn't it? Yeah, de los costos. So what's the difference then between the grapes over in France and then over in Mendoza? In Mendoza. So France is more the old world. Mendoza is new world. Oh, this popped out, didn't it, the other week? Yeah, you spoke about this before. Yeah, yeah, yeah. We have, but the trouble is when we're drinking, we often forget. So this is why we do need to watch. This is why we've done it. We want it documented so we can watch back.

31:23Alan Carr:And actually, we've got an exclusive. we're doing an accompanying podcast for this one because we're so pissed. Yeah. And it's called Heads Down. Yeah, that's going to be the Patreon. Yeah. Heads Down. Because we're so embarrassed we've learned jack shit. You're embarrassed. Okay. Embarrassed.

31:48Alan Carr:All right. So, come on, let's learn something. We're not going to have our heads down for this one. We want to... Yeah, we want to learn a little something today. All right, cool. So we've got three different levels. So we've got more your entry level. So you've got your mid-range. And then you've got your piece de resistance. Your big boy. Yeah. If we go back into looking into reasons why wine is so expensive and why it's cheaper, then we'll look at stuff like the producer. We'll look at the area that it's grown in. We'll look at if it's old world, new world. If it's a single vineyard. if it's got loads of different vineyards that made one wine, if it's hand-picked or machine harvested.

32:29Is the price linked to how much effort they put into the wine? It's a lot. It's a lot. So with that as well, you can tell why the price starts to creep up a bit. Yeah, they've put a lot of effort into it, a lot of thought's gone into it. More quality, more class into sometimes the more expensive ones and sometimes even you can get a cheaper one that's still quite good, depending on who is it that made it. So when you pointed here, you said entry level, mid-range. So what prices are we looking at here? So we've got under£20. Right. We've got over£20. And we've got over£50.

33:02Alan Carr:How much? Over£50, mate. OK, so we are going high-end here. God, I'm excited. Yeah, yeah. Can you get me some Majestic wine? You can get me some Majestic wine. I might get myself a five-finger discount when I'm in there. Manny, can you get me that one up there? Yeah. I'll distract you before you run. Quick, Manny. There's boxes to move. Or just knock some bottles off the shelves. No, no. Spin it on aisle four. Even though I said it's over 50 pounds, I just tried to be a bit more modest. It's basically around 80 pounds for the bottle. I don't want a hangover if I drink that. 80 pounds? That's 80 pounds.

33:39Alan Carr:Do you get a better hangover if it's a bit more... I find that the quality tends to mean that you have less of a hangover. I agree with that. I find if you have a cheaper bottle of wine, you're more likely going to have a hangover due to the processing. the sugar in there don't they ella needs to know that i've got the free wines i'm gonna disguise them in uh these bags here oh great bags oh yeah so should we look away you put them in the bag i'll put them in the bags and we're gonna figure out which wines are which and for those of you listening on the podcast we've covered our eyes with the cards we have indeed and we're very excited this is my kind of taste test because i love malbec yeah don't worry about the bag because Lee drinks Malbec out of a carrier bag.

34:22Alan Carr:Or the black bag. A big bag. Well, if that's the case, then, don't bother pouring it into a glass, Manny, because he drinks it out the bottle. Oh, if I could just... I can't see. If I knew where you were. Oh, you get it. Are you shaking your piss? You, where are you? Come here. Shake harder, boys. You. All right, cool. Say that to my card. The thing is, Manny, I'm liking that you do like a Malbec, because we've had a few people on here saying that sometimes Malbec is just the easy option to go for, and sometimes they're saying it's a bit of a, not rip-off, but it'll always be a bit more pricey.

35:03Alan Carr:You can show your eyes now. How long has this been, W? You've made me look stupid. I've actually been looking at you guys for the last two minutes. I know a lot of people talk about Malbec as an easy option, But just to say like for a lot of people, when they're trying to get into wine, Malbec is like a very approachable wine. Something that people can start drinking and then move on into other wines. So it's not about putting it down, it's more about lifting it up. So are we going to taste this and we're going to guess either it's the£15, it's the£80 or what's the other one? £12. Right. Oh, this is exciting.

35:41Alan Carr:I love a blind taste test when, well, it's kind of a blind taste. Why are you shutting your eyes? Oh, God, Jack, it's in the bag. It's in the bag, mate. It's in the bag. Sorry.

35:54Alan Carr:OK, so Manny, we're around your house. All right, in my house. And we're doing taste testing. OK. All right, so, swirled. Go on. Would you give it a sec? Ooh, that swirling does change the smell of it, doesn't it? So when you swirl it, it does allow the air to touch the wine so it opens it up a bit more. What do you think? Well, it's not heavy enough for me, that. I think it's mid-range, don't you? I think that 80 quid one is going to be like... Ah, orgasm in a glass. I'm going to reserve guessing just yet until I have the next one comparatively. I need to see. But that, to me, feels quite light for a Malbec.

36:31Alan Carr:It does feel light, yeah. So I don't think it's the 80. That's my first thing. For£80, I want fireworks in my mouth. I want to be having a cigarette afterwards going. You want the berries to slap them in the face? Yeah. I want to hear the sound of the berries. The berries, they call me bitch. You love it, yeah? You want another glass? But then when we're over, I want a nice cuddle with the berries. Oh, OK, yeah. It's rocking to sleep. Yeah. All right, I'll see you. Oof. Should we just take a minute? I think we need to do it like decompressed. It's like, look, look, look. All right, cool. So what are you getting from that, Manny?

37:14So, obviously, small wives, you get a lot of berries. A restraining order of action.

37:21A car home.

37:23Alan Carr:Taxi. A marriage proposal. Oh, eh? I'm going to go mid-range for now. The next one may change my opinion. Oh, cool. See if I pour this away. Just give it to Alan. Yeah, yeah, you drink it. Go on, man. Go on. Danny! Danny! Danny mate, Danny! About£7.50 there, worth of it. Cool. So we're gonna go to number two. Number two. I'm still worried about seeing a glimpse of the label, I don't want to spoil it. Alright, number two. Smell that, tell me what you think. Already... Ah! What? Already? You just can't. I know that when he swirls it, right, he'll put his glass down, he'll swirl it. I know he's going, for God's sake, he just wants to drink it.

38:18Alan Carr:It's a waste of time. It's like... Get to it. It's his own. Okay, already... Listen, you know what this is? This is when you're trying to log on the internet and it's buffering.

38:32Well, the old school one. Yeah, yeah. It's like the dialogue. Yeah, yeah. Boring! Don't have a cup of tea whilst he does the thing. Yeah, yeah.

38:41Alan Carr:All right, based on that smell alone, I might stick my neck on the line. Yeah. I think that could be the 80 pound one. Yeah, what do you think? It's smooth, it's good. It smells good, right? It's got layers, it's textured. Can you smell like the violets and stuff like that? Some violets, some cassis. Do you know what, with the other one before, I thought they'd used Tesco value fruits. Yeah. But this to me is like... Finest. Tascos. Finest. Tascos. It's the wrong company. You didn't work in Tescos. I did. Don't make me mention those codes again. Now this to me, this feels more mature. It feels well thought out.

39:23Alan Carr:Do you get what I'm saying, love? I think it's 80 quid. More structured. Well, the smell is a lot. The smell to me goes, I got a better smell there. The taste, I'm still a bit... I need the third. So you guys like that though? I like them both, but yeah. I definitely don't think that's the lowest one, that's all I'll say. Right, cool. We're going to the last one now. All right. All right, here we go. Look at the colour on that and then tell me what you think. Does that look like a proper Melbeck? Oh. Just buffer it up. Slugging in. Buffering. Buffering. Like a robot.

40:11Alan Carr:Tiling up. Tiling up.

40:20Oh, curveball. There we go.

40:23Alan Carr:So what do you think now? God, you're good, Manny. Do you know what? I think I'm going to have to have a glass of all three again. Do you want to start again, yeah? Oh, here we go. No. All right. OK. I've got it. So, from the first to the last, which one do you prefer? I know which one do you think is the cheapest. I prefer this one. I prefer the last. The last one? Yeah. But, you know, we're not talking about this isn't about, is it, value for money or fancying the most expensive one. It's what you like, isn't it? It is, but I do think if you are buying an£80 bottle of wine, the expectation is you should like that the best.

41:03Alan Carr:Of course, yes. What's the point then? Yeah, so, you know, even that's my favourite. I would expect that to be£80. I think for like an£80 bottle of wine, you want velvety texture. You want like quality, you want flavours, all of those kind of things. What's wrong? You're stressed. I think the first one maybe was£12 and this is either the 80 quid or the 22. Yeah, that's the thing. Have you selected them randomly? Yeah, yeah, I just mixed it up so that way you wouldn't even be able to tell. I mean, if he'd just done them in chronological order. Well, I know, but that's what we're saying. Maybe he has, because the first one's...

41:41Alan Carr:See? Have I or haven't I? Double bluff. All right, guys, I'm just going to top you up a little bit. Yeah, this is the third one that we like the most. So, OK. Are we going to do this? I think I'm the same as you. I think the first one,£12. I think the second,£22. And I think the third,£80. But I'm slightly dubious because I'm like, would you have put them all in that order? But then it's a double bluff. I think you've just put them in a bag. You just let them straight... You haven't even mixed them up. Because you think we're stupid. No, no, no, no. He's seen the podcast. Shall we reveal? I'm going to reveal it to you.

42:21Oh my God. So, which one did you say, the first one did you say was the cheapest one? The first one? Yeah.

42:28Alan Carr:The first one we think was£12. It was. It was. It was? Yeah, the first one was the cheapest one. Yeah, it's fine. So you guys did a good job. So number two. Number two. Oh God, have we risked it all? Have we ruined it? So this one is the£22 one. I'm so proud that we got that right. So that's more the mid-range. So you got like definitely great flavors, a longer finish on that, as well as like a couple of more things like... I'm feeling quite emotional because we do a lot of drinking and I'm glad that it just doesn't all go to waste. I guess in this segment, Yeah. it would have been good to go, oh my God, you don't need to get an 80 pound bottle of wine, blah, blah, blah.

43:10Alan Carr:But it does prove that an expensive bottle of wine, you are going to get good quality. The worst thing would be if we were like, oh I hate that and we've chosen that as the£12 one. That would be the worst. Yeah well with the taste test like this you tend to see more of what your flavour palette is, how much quality you like in your wine and the thing is just because it's cheap it doesn't mean it's not good. No again which is why I'm saying this£12 one delicious but what I'm saying is this£80 one. Yeah it's the one I love you. Yeah yeah yeah. Yeah because when I say it was the big boy it's the big boy.

43:42It really is the big boy. So yeah, the last one obviously is the£80 bottle. The Catena Zapata. That's it, Alan, the big boy.

43:51Alan Carr:Do you think you could handle that?

43:57Alan Carr:What are you asking? So before you go, we'd like to ask you a question. This one is from Hayden Thorpe. Hi Alan and Lee, love the podcast. Thank you Hayden. I'm new to drinking wine as I've always found it too acidic to the point that it feels like I'm drinking bleach. Where are you getting your wines from? I get my wine from being you. I'm trying to narrow down which ones I'll have more success with, as I've even tried low-acidity wines but they feel acidic. I'm trying to figure out what the problem is or if the problem is just me. Oh, Hayden. Hayden. The problem is you. That's that then we've sorted that.

44:35Alan Carr:Thanks for coming, Ben. I can go now. No, no, no. What does Hayden have to look out for? The main thing is probably the regions and the countries that he's getting his wine from. So if it's a white wine, he's probably getting it from the northern MSM. So you're looking at maybe France and stuff like that. So if he wants something that's not as acidic, something that has a little bit more body, they might have to go to the south. So a lot of the new world wines tend to be quite good for that kind of stuff. So you're looking at Australia, you might also look at Argentina, South America, South Africa even.

45:08and breaks from those kind of areas. So look out for that and then start from there. That's where you go. Yeah, start from there, like go to the south and then move on to new world countries more or less. Yeah, and then maybe even the Great Barret. Love it. You can move away from the Sauvignon Blancs, but you're going to get a lot of Bacillus Civi girls. Thank you, Manny, so much. What's your Instagram handle again? Yep, so it's MannyDoesWine on Instagram, TikTok. It's full of bargains, hints, and you go all over.

45:38Alan Carr:You love your one. He so loves you. You go everywhere. And you're so knowledgeable. So thank you so much for coming. Thank you very much for having me. Well, before we go, shall we have a little Bottoms Up? Oh, wait, I'm empty. Oh, let me sew you up with a good one. Oh, thank you. Just pop 40 quid in there, love. Let me keep pouring. Tell me where. Tell me where. If you've enjoyed this episode of Bottoms Up, you know where to find us. A brand new episode drops every Wednesday on YouTube or wherever you get your podcasts. And next week we're going to be joined by the King of Etiquette himself, William Hansen, will be here.

46:12Alan Carr:We're super excited but also a little bit nervous. We're going to be asking him whether we need to be slurping, sniffing, spitting, sniffing, shitting our wine or whatnot. Yes, but we'll be on our best behaviour, won't we? Yes, no, shitting please. Not in front of William. We can't wait to have him. We want to hear your etiquette questions as well. like you know no question he will answer anything so send us any questions that you've got at Bottoms Up Show or email us bottomsup at listen.co.uk Bottoms Up with Alan Carr and Lee Peart is a Listen production as always please do drink responsibly for more information visit drinkaware.co.uk Bottoms Up

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