Producer on the bike – Albert Jané

by Charles Lea

Dreary day in London town, but no day so dreary it cannot be lightened by adding to our occasional series of visiting producers on Patrick’s motorbike. The old Ducati ST4 has been worn through pounding round the restaurants of London, and has been replaced by an even more ancient Sneeze sorry Cagiva ‘Grand Canyon’ which was obviously previously owned by a real fair-weather and weekend-only biker, since he had only managed 4500km in ten years. So far so good, apparently.

Anyway today we have Albert Jané from Bodegas Acústic on a flying visit which was planned to take in several west end and City restaurants, where his amazing old vine Garnatxa y Samso (Grenache and Carignan) wines from Monsant (Spain) are a cult phenomenon. These wines deliver spicy power with old vine depth and real delicacy and finesse.

After a brief consultation he decided to brave the weather, and fully loaded with his luggage and some tasting samples they set off…