When I read this story my initial reaction was to check the calendar once again, to see if it was April Fool’s day. Either an outrageous story, or perhaps just an excellent piece of marketing? Are you sitting comfortably? Then I shall begin.

OK, so an ex-pat British wine maker (from Norwich) who now lives in Chile, has two passions. His vineyard in the Cachapoal Valley and Astronomy. So, how do you go about combining the two? Easy – first borrow a 10cm meteorite from a wealthy American, dip it in a barrel of your wine for a while, blend this single barrel with a lot more wine, and then sell it as Meteorito – a wine in which you can allegedly taste the origins of the Universe itself! Brilliant! Why didn’t I think of this myself?

Sorry, do I sound a little sceptical? Well, maybe it’s because I am! Suspending a small meteorite in a single oak barrel of Cabernet Sauvignon for a year is one thing, but then taking this single barrel, blending it with another 10,000 litres and claiming that you can still taste the effects of this maceration is quite frankly, beyond belief….

Just a minute, I’ve had an idea – the soil in our vineyards contains both granite and quartz that originate from the magma of the earth’s crust, and you can actually taste this in the mineral character of our wine. In future I’m going to claim that in our albarino you can actually taste the very origins of our planet!

When I read this story my initial reaction was to check the calendar once again, to see if it was April Fool’s day. Either an outrageous story, or perhaps just an excellent piece of marketing? Are you sitting comfortably? Then I shall begin.

OK, so an ex-pat British wine maker (from Norwich) who now lives in Chile, has two passions. His vineyard in the Cachapoal Valley and Astronomy. So, how do you go about combining the two? Easy – first borrow a 10cm meteorite from a wealthy American, dip it in a barrel of your wine for a while, blend this single barrel with a lot more wine, and then sell it as Meteorito – a wine in which you can allegedly taste the origins of the Universe itself! Brilliant! Why didn’t I think of this myself?

Sorry, do I sound a little sceptical? Well, maybe it’s because I am! Suspending a small meteorite in a single oak barrel of Cabernet Sauvignon for a year is one thing, but then taking this single barrel, blending it with another 10,000 litres and claiming that you can still taste the effects of this maceration is quite frankly, beyond belief….

Just a minute, I’ve had an idea – the soil in our vineyards contains both granite and quartz that originate from the magma of the earth’s crust, and you can actually taste this in the mineral character of our wine. In future I’m going to claim that in our albarino you can actually taste the very origins of our planet!