Monday 5 March 2012

With a touch of Elderflower....

I'd like to pretend that I don't like starting fights or rubbing people up the wrong way, but this would be a lie. I love it.

I noticed a link to a Pinterest (which I instinctively tried to type as Pinoterest, I might be a lost cause) describing a wine as having a 'charming elderflower creaminess'*. Now I've certainly notices an elderflower like note in many a wine. However today I was reminded of the 1993 Intellectual Property ruling that found against Allbev (& another) in favour of Taittinger (& others) over the use of the term Champagne.

Now I fully understand that no beverage made with elderflowers, sparkling or otherwise can fulfil the legal requirements of being labelled a Champagne, however if I was an elderflower wine seller I might bristle at my unique ingredient being used to describe a product which by dint of the laws governing it's right to use it's unique regional identifier cannot contain any elderflower, essence or otherwise...

I've long though that given the unique litigiousness of the French wine producers, c.f. 'Vendage Tardive' being a term only useable within Alsace that there ought to be some sort of karmic rebalancing. Maybe the good burghers of Tramin (or Termeno) ought to complain that Alsatian Gewürztraminer has no reason to appropriate their towns name (Gewurz-Spicy, Traminer-from Tramin) and as such needs renaming.. Or maybe I should stop being mischievous... 

*I appreciate that Bolney Bubbly is an English Sparkling Wine and not a Champagne, but I couldn't be bothered to find a tasting note for a Champagne using the term...

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