Sherry – old hat or new fad?
I recall when is was a kiddy, my Mother used to keep a bottle of a well known brand of dry sherry under the kitchen sink. Those were the days when Sunday Lunch was a real family affair. Nowadays, Mother’s tipple has shifted towards jolly nice white wines supplied by yours truly in bucket loads. (Curiously, I don’t remember there being wine on the Sunday Lunch table, but I cannot imagine she drank sherry throughout the meal. I assume there must have been wine – either that or she’s busy makng up for lost time..)
So how surprised were we, in our recent outing to the Canaries, to discover there was very little in the form of sherry available. Clearly, these Spanish islands prefer to stick to their local wines. One waitress looked blankly when we asked for sherry, though she did turn out to be Argentine so we let her off the ignorant hook and made no mention of the Falklands.
Fortunately, we did find a very delicious bottle of dry Manzanilla during our travels and some exceptional roasted almonds – a must with any dry sherry. Socks chilled off, this makes for one heavenly sun-downer! The incredible dryness is something one has to become comfortable with. Once that hurdle is overcome, the challenge is not to polish off the bottle in one sitting! But beware – the alcohol on dry sherries is between 15 and 17% ABV.
Duty Free out of The Canaries sells litres of sherry for just 5 euros, so indulge we did and continue to enjoy the distinctive nutty ‘flor’ character that makes sherry so unique.
Old hat? Not in my book – watch this space whilst we source the perfect Manzanilla for you…
More on sherry in tomorrow’s blog.