1. What is your wine mission?
To explore as much as possible, but always with an eye or taste bud to history
2. Next big thing in wine?
Armenian and Crimean wines
3. Your ‘go to’ glass after a hard day?
White Burgundy
4. Music paradise?
Tough one! … so many … Elgar, Wagner, Tchaikovsky, Rachmaninov, Puccini or Tallis
5. Preferred colour?
Depends on the wine!
… but blue for the rest of life
6. Favourite film?
Cinema Paradiso
7. Fondest vintage?
1996
8. Oak or stainless steel?
Oak
9. Best place to eat?
If not at home, then the Ritz, Wiltons or Le Gavroche
10. Food and wine matching purgatory?
As a theologian, this might not be such a bad place to be (!) … but ceviche and sweet rosé
11. Guilty food and wine match?
Sauternes and foie gras or Caviar (only Russian!) and Champagne
12. Favourite wine writer (apart from yourself)?
Simon Field MW
13. Wine ‘fad’ irritation?
Low quality wines in restaurants at absurdly inflated prices
14. Most delicious cheese?
Moliterno with Truffles
15. Inspiring novel?
War & Peace
16. Damascene wine moment?
I required no conversion, but love of White Burgundy has been etched in my soul after trying Bâtard-Montrachet and visiting Beaune
17. Most beautiful vineyard in the world?
Lanzerac, South Africa
18. Ideal last sip?
Chateau d’yquem 2001 or Dom Perignon 2002 or Sir Winston Churchill 2002 … don’t make me pick! Haha!
19. Next place to visit?
Bordeaux
20. Best advice?
Listen to Rebecca Lamont