Fin vs History - France is a Toilet (with Tom Gilbey) | The History of Wine

Episode Date: July 24, 2025

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I'm here with the race show Gould. Hello. And Tom Gilby's with us. Look at that. An actual expert. It was a diversity outreach program. Yes. Thought we'd want to cross the divide.

We wanted to make sure that we had a lot of different voices, diverse set of voices in this podcast, you know. I thought it was getting too stuffy. Yes, it was. There were too many privately educated white men on the show. And so we've got one who is so posh. They could be homosexual. I think that's as far as we'll go.

Yeah. It's about as far as we'll push. it. Tom, thank you so much for joining us. My pleasure, I think. Tom, you're one of our most popular guests on the University. The first guest to do the double now of the history. First guest to look comfortable in a suit. First guest to not attach you a pair of smart

shoes and not just bring his trainers. Yes, you don't look like you're showing up to a court appearance for once. You look like you're... Maybe the judge. Yeah, you're the judge of wine. The KC. Tom, you're the wine expert. We've been talking about wine. Yeah. Now, how are you on wine history? Try me.

yeah so we've done the ancient world we've done Dionysus or geastic filth we charted its transformation through people tearing goats apart fucking each other in the forest to Christians having a sip with a biscuit which is where it's what it's all about

is we have the Christians and their biscuits to thank do you think a lot of it we do the good stuff how come so where are we going to start well to fill us in I mean we're going to just go with the early modern period but please any any information please

stuff us should we go stuff us stuff our asses for the did you Tom should we go take us back

to the old school place put a loan in my ass Tom put me in the oven shove a cork up my ass and tell me about wine would you

and I'll put you in Christopher Columbus's boat and we'll go across the pond yes please please do okay so it all really I think

an interesting point is when the Spanish yes went over and had a little crack at the Caribbean you can call it that and stuff is that what they call it

Let's have a crack. Yeah, crack at the whip. And so they started planting vines in the Caribbean, which is a positively shit place to plant vines. Yes. Because they needed wine. These are tonic wine vines. Yeah, tonic wine.

Yeah, took a while out. Yeah, get there in the end. Don't worry, it just takes a warm. Sure, sorry, of course. So for the, for the Catholic Mass, they need wine. Yes. And they couldn't, or they couldn't import enough Spanish wine. So they'd plant their own in the Caribbean.

Because is wine, now is wine surviving that journey in this day and age? No. No, it's going off. It's going off. I mean, it was all off, even before it did the journey, a lot of it then. Right. Because it's Spanish wine? Is that your opinion of Spanish wine?

Is it all off? So it's buckfast is what the early wines were sort of. Fortified wine. Yeah, that's a very special wine for the Scots, not Spanish. Yeah, that's Scottish. Yeah. That's my national drink. Well, it's made in Devon by monks.

Is it? But drunk by Scots. Monks still make buckfast. Monks still make buckfast. A lot of alcoholic drinks are like abbeys and monk, clergy's. They kind of build. Yes. Yeah.

And the Scottish drink a lot of it. Right. That makes a lot of sense, to be fair. So the Spanish attempt to take wine over. A corks around this. What does a wine bottle look like in 1492? Really wonky. Yeah.

Really wonky. And corks are not around. So what are they using? So they're using glass, but like all sorts of bits of glass. It's all generally. And what's going in the top? All sorts of things. So it's sort of like.

So a rum bottle, it's kind of whatever, whatever you've got in your house. Yeah, you'll see images of really wonky little bottles. So they plant what are vines in the Caribbean. Right. And then they go up to South America. Okay. And they suddenly find that actually the vines can grow in South America. Sure.

So their first bit of actually doing a decent wine is the late 16th century in Mexico. So, so the decent wine finds New World. That's interesting. No, no, it's not decent yet. It's really shit. Okay. But the beginning, the, the, the beginnings of what would end up being decent wine is happening here, these kind of early vineyards.

But what's happening before? Because obviously we talked about the ancient history wine, you've got Georgian wine, you've got Roman Greek wine. Is this, are these vineyards or are these just like a massive barrel that you're sitting on grapes? These are vineyards, but all the wine's drunk locally because there's no transportation around. Right. Okay. So really getting, so it doesn't need to last long. Sure. It's made, drunk, done. Fine. Yeah. Okay. So it's in Mexico and Pump and dump. It's the beginning of the... And also, oh, so about the wine bottle,

correct me if I'm wrong, this is a bit of fact that I like to bring out, which I think it's interesting. I hope it's true. Frasian thinks it's interesting. Is the modern wine bottle that size because it's the, how far a wine,

a glass blower can blow? It's like the depth that a wineblower can... No, it's how far up your ass it is for the male G-sport. A glass blower, how much he likes it up his ass. Yeah, that'll do. That bit. Yeah, just that bit.

I think most of that's true, but the bit that's really true is the blowing. Right. It's the glass blowing. So, go on, tell us, so why is it that? So it's how far you can blow, blow glass. It was all done manually. So that's why it's like that. So then he runs out of breath and that's the stem of the bottle.

And then we work out with what's the punt like and will it fit up anyone's? Yeah, I think that came later. And then it's ribbed for my pleasure. That's a different story. They're rosés. They're nice. It's ripped. Lovely stuff

Rose drinkers So we're in Mexico And we've got these beginnings Of plantations With a slightly better climate Yes Yeah So is this kind of

Are there Aztecs around Is this around the side They're being kind of stamped out We're getting rid of them To plant vines Yes And for For religious

Conversion And the missionaries It's for missionaries Yeah And wherever they go They plant a vineyard Right And they plant it

With generally anything that they can ferment Into an alcoholic drink So not just grapes No, it is great, but all sorts, nothing like that we'd know grapes as today's, all sorts of weird, weird and wonderful stuff. Right. But it is, we'll get to it later, it's European grape varieties that are planting there. Because what, Mexico doesn't have any of its own grape varieties?

No, it did have its own grape varieties. Yeah. But they knew about the European Spanish grape varieties that they planted there. So they wanted to replicate what they had at home. And these are still shit wines. You would think they're shit wines. Yeah, fine, fine. But they're basically moving up through the Americas, planting European grape varieties.

At these different, and you're moving up or down, it's different climates. So there's... Yeah, so the Caribbean is a way too warm to be making anything decent. Yeah. But as we hit Mexico, we're beginning to get a climate that can make... In fact, I do have a Mexican wine that if you'd like a little bit of... Well, it's been seven minutes. I reckon we should crack a...

Yeah, I reckon. Let's pop it open, I reckon. We're at Mexico. Let's have a... Do you want to open it now for it? Do you do the honours? Should I do that? For like an unboxing. This is posh unboxing. so it's quite difficult to find Mexican wine in the UK now yeah I've not really heard of

because it's generally shit right okay but I managed to find one so I'm gonna pull you a glass of petite syrup right by the biggest wine producer in Mexico okay I haven't tried it so is this is the seeing as you're sort of start in this modern history of wine in Mexico almost does uh it have a long tradition then is this does this uh wine producer have a long history this wine producer have a long history. This wine producer is early 20th century. So not really, but Mexico does. Yeah.

But from Mexico, they went to Peru, to Chile, to Argentina. So all of these areas, and particularly Argentina, are now making amazing wine. But what's interesting is that it feels like the snobbery is with the new, around new world wine. Certainly there was for a beer. But from the way you're discussing it, it seems like new worlds been producing it, kind of modern wines as long as old world. I'd class Mexico's New World. Yeah, I'm saying, but I'm saying like the, seeing as we started the history in Mexico, it's interesting that New World wines have been around that long.

Yeah, they have. So here we go. This is a French great variety, funnily enough, Petit Syrah, and these guys were actually founded by an Italian family. Beautiful. Thank you so much. Look at this. Yeah, it's fantastic. It's a bit of class, isn't it?

Yeah. Well, it smells, but like, I'm getting wine immediately. Oh, yeah. That's wine. That's wine. I can verify that's wine. So Petit Syra is a really dark, spicy, grape. So sorry, I'm getting a fat man asleep on a chair, drinking incredibly sugary coke.

Yeah, I'm getting an afternoon now. I'm sort of hearing like, uh, mariachi bands, uh, the day of the dead. Invasion on the southern border. Wet back.

Is it a wet back? It smells like a wet back. Uh, very hard workers, I can already tell, made this wine. You know, Mexico is one of the most obese countries in the world? Yes, I can believe that. Is this because this is pure cane. It's in here. Yeah, I think so.

Yeah, I think so. is really pure sugar. That's an absolutely lovely wine. This episode of Finvan's History is sponsored by Surfshark, the premier provider of VPN. Do you know what a VPN is? I don't.

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Anyway, let's get back to the bloody episode, shall we? Please get back to some history. Hello, I'm Elizabeth Day, the creator and host of How to Fail. It's the podcast that celebrates the things in life that haven't gone right. And what, if anything, we've learned from those mistakes to help us succeed better? Each week, my guests share three failures, sparking intimate, thought-provoking and funny conversations. You'll hear from a diverse range of voices, sharing what they've learned through their failures. Join me Wednesdays for a new episode each week.

This is an Elizabeth Day in Sony Music Entertainment Original podcast. Listen now, wherever you get your podcasts. Isn't it a bang-up? I'd expect nothing less from... So juicy. Yeah. Wow. That's really...

rich yeah that's what I've got yeah yeah it's full bodied like a big fat Mexican it's full of body

yeah it's got fat batty I do think that the language around wine needs to be changed so I'd say this is a smoking hot fat batty

it's Mexican I mean I think it's very flexible the language around wine if you say it is kind accent you can I mean you could probably say whatever you want

I quite like that tasting note I think if you've got red trousers on you can basically say this is a fat batty Mexican of a glass of wine Fat batty

Stout Yeah Short-necked Yeah No nonsense Hoofs upfields Yeah A tall man up top

Sam Adelaise's team Yeah exactly It's a Sam-Aleis red wine I'm getting one word Answers from this guy This is a pint This is the pint of red wine That San Adelaide's drank

No I have long guys He got fired by the It's here It's Cancun Bonnie Blues there She's smashing through freshers I can I can taste

She's hitting freshest For six. I can taste the stale cum around the cheap motels of Cancote. Yeah. So, so Mexican wine starts. What is there left to tell? So Mexican wine starts,

is it the first wine in the Americas, then Mexican wine? Really? Yeah. So, and here we are just south of California. Yeah. But we don't see it much over here because.

So are we in Bayer, California? We're exactly there. We're in Bayer, California. There's cherry. There's cherry and a little, so you're being serious now, Yeah, I'm getting cherry. Body blue is popping cherries.

That's what I'm getting in Cancray. And really nice creamy texture. It's really juicy. Yeah, it is really. So it's warm, so you don't have too much tanning. You know that dry feeling you get around your mouth? And it's like thick and soily. Is that what tannin is?

Yeah, yeah. It's when you have a tea bag in your, with no milk too long. Yeah. It makes you want to do this. Yeah. But this makes you want to do other things. Oh, cl, cluck. and what's these these tram lines that's meant to mean good wines right is it not you know shit

this is exactly my my dad those are cum gutters my dad is um this is basically my dad's very uh sort of insecure about his class and the way that he's trying to make himself seem sophisticated is he's he's uh channeled some autism into wine autism right but he doesn't have any sense of smell and has really weak taste buds he doesn't really know at all what he's talking about He's been drinking whiskey for the last 50 years out of wine glasses. Go bloody hell, this packs of punch and stuff. And he's just learned all the things you should but has no real tasting ability.

But I think most people, and you're very good on this, you know, a £20 bottle of wine, really, if you're getting beyond that, you're just paying for the label, right? We're excluding people with wine. That's what we should be doing. Quite right. It's why I like the drink. It's not for everyone. It's really, it's just about, I'm better than you. You don't understand this. it's all the same

but this hasn't really come in yet we'll get to why this comes in how much do you think that costs um in in pesos or in in the day's work yeah five pound chandelies I reckon three naps which is um which is a day and a half's work

it tastes strong yeah um so that's that your tram lines are that's the amount of alcohol or sugar in the glass so if it's quite rich in what they call glycerol then you get big tram lines and that's good that's good well if you like a nice punchy wine that's good that means it's a full body wine if you like a sort of domestic abuse wine

well get to Australia in it shortly but so the Spanish I would say how much are you saying this is worth I'd say it's between 20 and 30 pounds I was thinking 15 but gone you're on the money yeah it's 14 quid wow right it's good value very good Mexican wine so the Spanish plant vineyards and quite quickly when does it get when would you say it gets good this Mexican wine it's roughly when all wine gets good

which is when we invent corks and proper bottles and proper storage and proper fermenting and growing. Because we were chatting about in the ancient world, obviously, it's probably quite low ABV back then. Yes. Right. So what kind of percentage of wine are they drinking? Sort of under 10.

Really? Okay. So it's more like a sort of special brew. But also with a lot with wine, I imagine it was similar with the way that medieval kids would drink beer at school. It's safer than water. It's safer than water, right? Yeah.

That's exactly right. That's exactly right. They plant vines and it's part of their diet. Yeah. So they're all drinking. Yeah. Because you have to. It must have been such a fun time.

Yeah. I reckon there's quite a lot. Well, we actually studied that period. It actually seemed pretty fucking tough. What, the Aztex? Yeah, yeah, no. I wouldn't like to be around then. So it moves from Mexico and around the new world.

Around South America. Yeah. Before it goes up the West Coast. To Baja. No, no, to California in real. And when does it go up to, when does it? cross the border into California as we know it? I think it's about

17th century but a massive thing happens in the 19th century which is phyloxera which is a disease that killed all of the vines. Yeah. We export it over to America and it's this little bug that eats the roots of

European vines. So it's what smallpox did to the Aztecs. We did it again to our own wine. Which is the bigger tragedy is that what happened to an entire people, millions wiped how happened to French vineyards. Which the baby out of the barth and their vines. So all European vines throughout the world...

It's throwing the bathwater out with a baby. Yeah. All the European vines throughout the world were decimated. Really? In what period? Because... In what, like a summer? In how...

A period... Yeah, in a period of years, sort of 1865, I think it was. Right. I'm just going to get geeky here. European vines are called vittis vinifera. Right. Okay. I think I've had that.

Yeah. That freshest week, I think. I got a bad case of vittes blinks. And American vines are called Vitis Lambrusca. So basically everything that was there before the Spanish went over to America was Vitis Lambrusca.

Sitting happily in America, resistant to phyloxera, having a nice time, but making shit wine. Sure. Every vine now, with like tiny exceptions in places like Peru, are a vitis vinifra vine grafted onto the roots of a vitis

lambrusca vine. So if you can get your mind around that. Yeah. Why do they do that to stop this? Yeah, because the little mites can't eat the roots of the American root stock. And they're not going to jump over it because they don't, they can't do that. They can't get out of the walls. So, you know, if you go through a vineyard now, you'll see every vine has a little kink at the bottom.

That is where the grafting has happened. So it's throughout the whole of Europe, you'll see that. It's, they, the Americas have better roots or like the bottom bit. They're good on roots. And then the actual grape things, you want it on the top. Yeah. So I asked my dad to ask some questions for you, and one of them was, do you think,

what was this called philorat? Philoxera. What do you think it was more damaging to the French than a Napoleonic Wars or phyloxera? I think it's probably phyloxer. Really? I mean, it really did fucking properly good. Because it was there were big wine exporters.

That's the whole, I mean, the economy. I reckon he just talked to himself when he's having dinner, doesn't know your dad? Because there's no one's listening. Then they went to, they went to Algerian, started planting vines down there. Right. All right.

And there's a whole bit of history there. about Algeria and wine production and... But phyloxra fucks all European wines, pretty much. Yeah, so it fucks America and then Europe. This is the dark ages for wine, basically. Yeah, this is really, really bad. So when do corks and proper bottles come in? Corks and proper bottles, I think, in the early 20th century, but really...

Well, is it not when pastur... So I think, not to... You tell me. I think that what happens is that Napoleon the 3rd, emperor of France he's a big wino so he's the one that starts the classification

of the Bordeaux wines which we'll get to but also yeah he's the one that gets Pasteur who invents pasturation onto work out how to make wine

better I think so I think it's probably in the 1850s he also did he commission houseman to rebuild Paris into what we know it today a toilet could you make this toilet

Let's make this a giant latrine. Have you ever had prison wine, Tom? We were talking about prison wine in the last episode. I have actually had a prison wine, yeah. I've had a, I did a blind tasting the other day of a load of wines and one of them was made by a convict. In a toilet? In a toilet.

Wow. Yeah. And could you test, could you taste which one it was? Fun enough, I could. Yeah. If you were in prison, do you think that your love of wine would drive you to make toilet wine. You do very well. I mean, you would be, I think, and depending on what you like, you would be in high demand in prison.

Not really for your wine tasting skills. yeah you'd do very well in prison or badly um so sorry so let's talk let's move to france so spain has planted vines in america yeah um and so in the kind of 1600s am i right in thinking this is where france starts to give wine the sort of um elitism that maybe it's still tainted with today i think before then i think it's sort of the 12th century okay 100 years war sort of time exactly when Eleanor of Aquitaine marries Some cunt, doesn't matter

Yeah, it doesn't matter We skip through And we have Bordeaux The English get Bordeaux Yes, Eleanor Racketam She marries an English king Or like She marries an English king

Should we just get about there And then we can do That's kind of things That's like a brilliant time To be looking up Do your job Just do a brilliant time To be doing a job

Three people going on What's that? What's the name? Eleanor of Aquitaine We're saying it into your earphones Henry Henry the second Henry

Henry the second Yeah Is it Henry the second So to explain In the medieval period England are constantly

warring France And we're at various times Bits of France are owned by the English Right Particularly Bordeaux Yeah So we start

And because there's no Transportation there's no Railways There's nothing else But Bordeaux Is perfectly located To ship a load Over to England

In barrels And we were doing something Like a port Is it got a seaside Yeah it's got an amazing port Right Right And so we would ship over

In barrels because you don't need bottles you shove the barrel on a boat over we come so we basically that's the beginning of English wine got knocked up on Bordeaux red wine and so why does that give

how does the stuffiness come into because it's the only people who can afford it are the posh dudes who writes up so in the the posh cunts in the medieval period are drinking clara from English own Bordeaux in the sort of 12th century

It's marvellous and then moving moving onwards so when does you know when does France start to almost give itself the title of like the gatekeeper of wine the gay keeper of wine the gay the gay you know they see themselves as like the home of wine

when do they become the fruitish nation on earth when does it become why do I hate them so much why do they smell we give them we're the biggest consumers of wine the England the Brits are the biggest consumers how long for the for this whole period until recently really you know we've we've had a

we've got a good track record of boozing a lot of wine. Sure. And generally, it's Bordeaux. Okay. And drunk by our aristocratic society and we just ship it over and drink it. So we've given France the title of greatest wine country in the world. Because we can't really produce good wine, but we drink so much of it that we... So would you say that we essentially made France a winemaking factory for us to enjoy?

Yes. I'm very happy with that relationship. That's how I see France is our factory For how we get pissed Yes But it's also like We'll go skiing there And we'll go to the beach there

So we should really own it Yes, totally I think we're all agreed This is why we need to get Diverse voices on Yes, we would learn about It's so nice to someone Those different opinions

Then we can maybe come to Some of consensus That we should own France The diversity of opinion That we should own France I do think there's something interesting About having a single issue party, the invade France party.

Yeah. You know, that's just one issue. Let's reignite those wars, you know. Yeah, I think so. It'll come left field. No one will expect it. I think, look it, Ukraine, Russia, Israel, Gaza, all that. I tell you what, let's get into France. I'm not ready for it. They're never ready for it. And that's a great thing about invading

France, is that they're always pissed asleep, striking. I think that's an easy border to invade. They will not be prepared. It's a tapist. France is a fucking tapping. D-Day, Mark two, they're done. They're absolutely done. They would not expect it. And even if they did expect it, they wouldn't turn up. Let's invade France. And make everywhere a wine factory. So the climate

is super important to making good wine. So France, I guess part of the reason why it is because it has to make the perfect climate to make great wine. The air smells so bad that it imbues the grapes with a sense of like jeopardy. A lot of what drives a lot of French cuisine and culture is they have massive noses and I think it means that they also have a lot of

smells and they have a real fetishization with a bad smell I think the reason why French cheese is so good

is because a Frenchman would be brought a cheese and go not stinky enough send it back

till it's stinky it'll have a red wine not stinky enough everything is about huffing it with a big

French nose take it come back or maybe they can't smell like your dad and so

in order to register anything they need something fucking honk. Not stinky enough. Yeah, exactly.

Not stinky enough. Take this woman back. She doesn't smell bad enough. She hasn't got light in her armpits. I don't want to marry her. So when does the French kind of start to, you know, is it like Louis the, whoever the fuck? I mean, like, at what point does Versailles start into codifying, ritualizing wine amongst the society? Kind of what England did with cricket, right?

Yeah, I guess so. It's what we do in sport, but they're doing it with wine. Yeah. It's like, these are the rule. only a couple of people actually know about it if you don't, you're an idiot. Yeah, when does that all start? So really, before transportation,

like railways and everything, all the wines being drunk locally. So the guys in the Loire would drink their Loire wine, etc. We are pretty much alone in shipping stuff out for us, straight out of Bordeaux. And then the Dutch come in and have a crack

and think that this is, because they're quite good at trading as well. So they think that this might be nice to add to their special. spices and herbs and all this sort of stuff and start importing wines from burgundy from alzaz from the loire and this is what 1600s yeah and then they have a little fight with us about bordeaux yeah really there's a english actually i don't know there's a physical fight but there's a lot of sort of trade war trade stuff going on and uh and they back off a little bit from there

and go okay you've had your mitts in bordeaux for long enough yeah keep it and we'll deal with the rest and in your family you have a link to the english trade of wine yes yeah right yeah Can you tell us a little about that? Yeah. So my family was one of the first families to buy, in fact, they were the first English family to buy a Chateau in Bordeaux in 1875. Right.

And it's right, it's at the north of the, there's an area called the Medoc, which is a triangle above, above Bordeaux. And the wine gets, like, it gets better and better and better until it gets shit. Yeah. I think there's a special on Jilby for Comic Relief.

The point where it gets shit. Donate now. just get shipped for just three pounds a month. Yeah. That's why I ran that marathon. Exactly. But they shipped in all this wine in barrel before we had railways and bottled it in what's now the Camden Roundhouse.

It's amazing. Yeah, it's crazy. So the reason why it's shaped like a barrel could be because of that. Just back on the climate thing though. Yeah. So climate's such an important thing. Is that it?

Is that your chateau? Yeah, that's it. That's not actually my chateau, because it's now... Oh, okay. Some fuckers fucked it all up, so I don't have that anymore. It's really pink. Of course it's pink. Of course Gilles Chateau's pink.

It's like your shirts, Jane. Yeah, it's beautiful, of course. But the climate shifts, and the reason why English wine is now coming onto the scene, is because of climate change, is it now? Yes. Yeah. It's because the south of England is now the same climate as medieval France. Totally, but we cannot make a good red wine.

Yet. Yet. But if we keep CO2 emissions high. Yeah. Yeah. And the ozone layer gets destroyed. Pined Greta down and fast into her face long enough. Sorry, what were you saying?

I forgot what we were talking about. I thought what we were doing about. I was just my kink. If we do that, then eventually we'll be able to make red wine, which it would be Sussex and Mexico, right? And Hampshire and our best still wine. still white wine, comes from just outside Chelmsford.

Right. Crazy. Essex. Essex wine. Crazy. Well, I heard that Sussex, where I'm from, is recently won a thing that they are now like a brand. What's it called?

In the way that Bordeaux, that is like... AOC or something. Yeah, something like that. Yeah. So there's a dude down in the south of Sussex who decided that Sussex would be... He got a few together and decided that Sussex would be an appellation. A bit like Chate and Fisd-Pap. So it's like a glass of Sussex.

Yeah, but what he forgot is that no one actually gives a fuck, whereas it's Chateen-Ftypapap, they do give a fuck. So we should get to, I suppose, when the French start, you know, certain areas of France, certain vineyards, certain parts of certain vineyards, start becoming favoured by popes and kings, etc. Yeah. Which is a Chateau-Nuff-de-Pap is a papal favorite.

Chate-Nove-de-Pap is the first. The first Appalachian-Contrille wine in France. Yeah, and this Appalachian control, you must remember that our listeners are incredibly thick and fat. Ugly, smelly. Are they French?

Many of them are will be French. They listen to it just sort of like they're being fed liquid foods not not posh liquid food they're drinking their box wine along

this is our lunch yeah because we're of a certain class but no they'll be drinking sort of gruel through a pipe anyway and it's good for them yeah

but so France starts to kind of very quickly as opposed to other countries codify and it just becomes stuffy. That's what I'm trying to get to. I'm trying to take the thick listeners from this orgy of like partying

and ecstasy that is the Dionyssen cult to when does it become this sort of gate-kept thing. So when phyloxera hits, that bug that we're telling you about, the whole of France panics and things, what the hell are we going to do? It's like COVID, but for vines. Yeah.

And so they go to Algeria and other North African countries we can still grow wine and start producing and Spain because Philoxera hits Spain France first and then goes south and they're producing all of these

they're being paid in Algeria to produce loads of wine because the French need it because they're hooked and they can't produce themselves so when they fix phooxera they work out that putting one on top of the other

works they've still got they're beginning to grow again and Algeria are shipping Algeria was the third biggest wine producing country in the world really yeah they they produced a lot of wine right good stuff no no okay right right but they were shipping but big stuff yeah you know they had lots of alcohol lots of because it's warm climate so they

were shipping it all back into france and the french are going hang on a second we don't need you anymore we can do our own yeah but that's when they put in the appalassian controller system to make sure they're not getting shit Algerian wine yeah we don't want Algerian chate en fte de pat we want chate enifty pat the grapes have got to be grown there made in this way so that and this is This is 1870s. This is around the time Napoleon III, right? This is around... Yeah, I think this is around the time

that Pasteur and Vents Pasteurization, the Cork. Modern wine essentially is around the kind of late 19th century. Yeah, but the Appalachian system really all happened in the 20th century, sort of all like... Because it just started there and moved... Because 1855 is the classification.

That's it. The classification of... That's Bordeaux, I think. And that's because Napoleon the 3rd was... It was the... They used to have world fairs. Okay, yeah, yeah, yeah. The Crystal Palace,

was the first one right that was yeah the great exhibition great exhibition all that kind of stuff it's the which they still do they have um paralympic games look what these fuckers can do that's kind of what it is no but now they have it in like abou dabby and duby those are world fair yeah you're right they are the expos are the same thing it's this huge carnival of soft power basically um and so paris was holding one and for this he goes right let's codify the wine let's make it um rigid yeah uh you know i i think it's in the palace of versa i maybe in the century before this, where it starts to become the idea of table wine versus proper wine. Totally.

So table wine is like off sour wine that they give to the smelly, the smelly-eur French people, peasants. That's stinky in it. Yeah, exactly. Well, I think the rich people were smellier because it was a sign of a prestige about how stinking can you be? How much stink can you afford to rub on yourself? Yeah.

So the honkiest of honk French people are drinking very good wine and the people who are using a little bit of links against table wine. I think actually we're drinking the nice wine. Right. The French are drinking the honk. So we are having the... I love that. I absolutely love that.

The stuff. So what you're talking about, the 1855 classification is like a football league. So it's like the five chattos that were the most expensive would be the Premier League. Anyway, so it was a way of pricing all of the wine for the breads, really. Because it's all marketing, really, all that stuff. Of course it is.

Yeah. And so much of wine originates here that that whole the prestige of it the kind of bullshit around it is all basically from this 1855 idea of like it's a marketing ploy for French wines

yeah but we are the best wine tasters of wine the French don't know how to taste wine they know how to grow it can you expand on that what do you mean by that well because

they're very smell no we've covered that I think they don't work you can invade them tomorrow they wouldn't expect it England's always Sliner and Finn heckling

in the background England's always been a great market The Capital City is a toy Sorry, Tom. And if you think about all the influential wine journals at the moment, they come from the biggest markets of wine. So it used to be all English wine critics. Now there's a few Americans.

And there's a few Chinese. Chinese wine critics? Yeah. My God. Yeah. Go on. That's PC gone, Matt. What they're saying?

There's not enough rice in it. Do you want to try something else? Yeah, I'd love to. Let's talk about champagne. I thought you might as do that. champagne now. No, we're somewhere else.

I think we're at the chateau. Right. Oh, have you bought French one? We're at the Fizz. That's not a champagne there.

Oh, right. So this is where we're at. This is right. Right, come on. Carry on Tom. I'm sorry. Tom, I have a question. You know how like white wine

should be in the fridge? Yeah. What did they do before fridges? It was colder. They didn't need fruishes. Oh. They put in caves. Yeah, they put it in, so if you go to the cellars,

underground cellars of any any wine place underground, it will be 12 to 14 degrees, which is actually the right temperature serving any white wine. And keeping it? And keeping it. Right.

Yeah. And when does white wine, because this is all, you know, what we're talking about, really red wine is the thing, isn't it? Red wine is wine, as they would understand it. And it's healthy for them. Yeah. It's got tannin, it's got phenols, all these good things. One of your five a day.

Yeah. It's five a day. And when does white wine become a thing? Pass. Right. Should we do this? Suffragettes, I imagine. They're on white wine.

White wind. They're running in front of horses. Yeah. So this is not. a champagne this is made in the abbey in limu which is arguably where sparkling wine was first ever produced here we go here we fucking go they could only make sparkling wine in champagne because they couldn't get the grapes ripe enough to make a still wine right okay which is why we in england make mostly sparkling wine because we can't quite do still wine yet but we think we will

but what i'm very excited about is with climate change surely france will become a desert soon and they'll fuck all their wines up. They'd better not come over here. Stop the... I'm about to sleep, Uncle. He's woken up for a second. Stop the toilet boats. Stop the Portaloo.

It's coming over here. The Great Stink. The Great Stink. Or France, as I call it. Right, good. Brilliant. Crawling up the channel tunnel. There you go.

Thank you. There you go, done. So talk to us about... about when does champagne now this is there's a myth around this guy don perignon this time thank you so thank you for this what a lovely idea yeah so talk about don perignon and the sort of the myth around champagne because as you say it's sort of it's in retrospect that it's imbued with this sense of class right yeah so everybody thinks that sparkling wine is made in champagne invented in champagne it's all a mistake really because sparkling wine was figured out because

someone left a little bit of sugar in a wine and stopped it and the fermentation happened and made it like penicillin but yeah yeah but it was either made by a brit called christopher perrott i think it is this is brilliant or a lot of great stuff we meant to champagne no no sparkling wine actually the the person who tried to make sparkling wine properly is i think he's either a brick called christopher perrott or it's the monks down in the um centi lair abbey in limo the french you got I just feel like we don't get enough We don't get enough credit Why do it?

Next thing you'll tell us Is the British invented striking This is incredible The French have got nothing So yeah we either invented it Or the monks in In the Santillera Abbey in Limu Yeah

Well I'll drink to that And this is a bottle Fomented Sparkly Wine So what they do is start with a still wine Put a little bit of sugar in it And some yeast Yeah And then the yeast eats the sugar

Gives us the carbon dioxide Jobs are good Brilliant And so Don Perignon is now that that's seen as now that like again it's been marketed as the highest class it's moa isn't it yeah and so he was a monk and he's credited with accidentally discovering champagne but that that's bollocks isn't it yeah but then the the discovery of champagne wasn't the discovery of what we see there which is a clear sparkling sparkling wine i'm getting a bit of a scouse accent

yeah yeah you know i mean you know gerard and a postmatch into that's i'm getting like what's your favorite cheese melted melted cheese Yeah. Like, do you know what I mean? That's the noise I'm getting. Yeah. It hits your back of the throat, isn't it? The back of the throat's the course.

Per. You're right, pet. You're right. Is that because you like it. That's lovely. No, it's new money, Phil, I think. It's absolutely delicious. Thank you.

The Scouts bloke has won the lottery and got a big TV. That's what I taste. Yeah. And so it's sherbetty, right? Yes, it is sherbetie. And it's a really, and the best place to get good value sparkling wine now is in France, in all these pockets that aren't champagne. because it doesn't have the branding

associated to it champagne's just got the most fantastic branding so champagne's where sparkling wine became really good it became the clear they worked out

how to get the yeast out which is called disgorging and gives us a clear fizzy discorging that's what my wife needs she needs to be disgorged

I think a couple of glasses because that was there you I've never seen you leave my wife joke that there was a slight lag on that which I've never seen my wife

I'll tune back in the second she needs to be thoroughly disgorged run like a flannel to get all the yeast bubbles out but champagne as a region is just north of Paris and so this is where they accident is that where the sparkling wine

starts where they master sparkling it starts in Limu down in the south so right down in the south and then if Paris is a toilet literally to urinal. And then Don Perignon takes it to champagne

and starts doing it in the abbey. And he's a monk and he does it in the abbey. Yeah, he does it in the abbey. And so how is, is it just marketing? Is it all Moe's marketing that's meant that Don Perignon is now, how much does a bottle of Don Perignon go for? Like, 170 quits, that's crazy. And that's a load of bollocks, right?

It's all bollocks. It's actually really good. No, I'm sure it's really good. But it's not worth the hundred and you should be 170 quids. But there's equally as good things for much cheaper, right? This is so good, isn't it? It's delicious. It's delicious.

How much? The day's work in the average. 35? Yeah, it's 14 quid. 14 quits. Christ. So champagne's just become this incredible, like nowhere else in the world, marketing machine.

Yeah. And it's now controlled by LVMH. Which own every. They're the big ones. Is that like Diageo? Is that similar? Yeah. Louis Vito-Moe Hennessy.

That's a parent company that own all the brands. Is it on? Yeah, it's one of the richest guys in the world. So they do two-thirds of the whole of the volume of champagne. Right. And champagne produced three hundred. 300 million bottles a year. Yeah.

We, the English, produced like 12, 12 million. He's worth 139 billion U.S. dollars. Bernard Arnaud. I think it was the richest man in the world for a little bit. Yes. Wow. Yeah. He loves champagne. He's got five kids. It's going to be like a real

life succession when he dies. He's not spent any of that money on your eyebrow trimming. It's a sign of wealth. Yeah, of course it is. Yeah. He's got lice in his eyebrows. Yeah. Grocery shopping. Chuching. Ordering food.

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Cha-ching. Then, redeem your points on gift cards from over 200 grand. Your idea of rewarding happens here. Conditions apply. Visit RBC.com slash Ion Cards. So, Don Perignon, it's all marketing. but it's also all to do with Christianity Go on

So it's all being done in monks By monks in monasteries So they're the ones who are making The wine for Sacrament For sacrament But basically they They completely see it as vital to their diet

Yeah Whether it's red, fizzy, white or whatever Because it's safer than water And it's religious Yeah So wherever they go They make wine So you think the link between

Wine and Christianity is completely intertwined. Because I guess if Christianity hadn't made wine slightly less kind of like women orgies in the forest eating goats. More formalised, more elitist, more focused. It would always have been a fringe, mad thing.

Yeah, well, because when they were doing it it was buckfast under a bridge. Yeah, exactly. It's now becoming more formalized, more holy, more sacred. It's what wine can we pair with this burning tire? Yeah. Yeah, yeah. So let's

return to the Americas, because around the 20th century, as you say, wine starts to get good in a way that we'd appreciate it. And in America, in 1920, we're going to do a whole series on prohibition. I find it fascinating. But the Volstead Act, the 18th Amendment, they destroy the wine, the burgeoning wine culture that has happened in America. So, as you say, it starts in Mexico, it starts to spread up. California, I think it's not good at this point, but it's definitely the most,

it's the best climate in America for growing wine is California wine. and then I think something like over the course of Prohibition which is 20 to 33 the vineyards in America go from maybe the 700 vineyards it goes to less than 100 in the space of 13 years

because the amendment allows for sacrament wine you can still produce wine if it's for churches and you can brew wine for home use but you can't distribute cleaning a toilet out yes if you were doing like a French themed night so it just

destroys the California wine industry. Yeah. And what's also fascinating is that, you know, if you've listened to this podcast long since the beginning, you'll know that obviously we talked about Cromwell and the whole East Coast of the New World of America in the 17th century as being very Protestant, very Puritan. Yeah. Prohibition is essentially it's the meeting point.

It's the conflict between that Protestant Puritan legacy and all these Italians and Spaniards and Greeks and Germans that all come in in the, from the 1850s. trying to turn America into a big party. Trying to turn it into a big toilet. So the Germans spy an opportunity. So 1848 is a huge year of flux in Europe, year of revolutions. The Germans will flee and they see that the climate in the Midwest of America would be great for Pilsner.

So they all start making Pilsner. And that's a form of Lager or is it Lager? It's, well, Lager is German for beer. Cave. But yeah. For cave. Because lagering is when you store beers and cool caves and it was like the beginning. So Pilsner, yeah, so Americans don't have the right. They don't have Lager at this point.

So the Germans introduced lager to America. Right. And then the Italians bring their, you know, sleepy wine culture with them to the American. And obviously the Jews come in and they've got a massive Abrahamic tradition of wine. Okay. And whining. Oh, shucks. Yeah.

So they bring all that, you know, all that stuff there. And so actually a lot of the prohibition is wrapped up in an anti-immigrant sentiment. It's the puritanical elements on the East Coast. Here first. Yeah. Stop doing that. That's not naughty. Don't drink wine.

Yes. And so it's wrapped up in anti-immigrant. Because it was our most boring hunts we sent out there. Yeah. America is founded by boring cunts. And then it's made... Our most boring. Those are our boys.

And we're already boring. Yeah. They might be boring cunts, but there are boring cuss. They were people who left here because it was too much fun. Yeah. At the most boring time. It's ever been. But meanwhile, are all the guys on the East Coast, just getting hosed and having a really

great time? Well, the West Coast, because it's the... Is there all the Spanish? Yeah, they come up through Mexico and then it's slowly pushed further, further west. Yeah, there's the American-Mexican war and all that expansion. But by the 1920, that's kind of that's started. That's set, as it were.

It's also massively wrapped up in women's rights in that women at this point don't have any rights at all. And this is when white wine comes in, right? Yes, the white wine starts. The white whining, I think. White women whining starts about here. No, because in 1920s, America, if you're a woman, you have no legal rights. So if you're, and your husband is drunk a lot of the time to get through the industrial hellhole that is his life.

So, you know, domestic abuse, if a husband hits his wife, he might as well legally have hit his fridge. It doesn't, it doesn't mean anything in the law. Sure, go on. So the law are like, well, who cares? Yeah. It's his fridge. You can do what he wants. Yeah. Yeah.

Right. on. So women form the bulk of the temperance movement which is the thing driving prohibition. Stop fucking smacking me

about. So prohibition is wives stopping the boys from having fun. It's women saying stop drinking. So it's interesting we built up a lot of

information and I like how you condensed to that. It is why stopping the boys and having fun. Right. So in 1920 like a bunch of states

have already been doing it but it becomes a federal thing and it has the opposite effect on booze in that booze just fucking goes through the roof. Yeah. Black market. Black market, speak-easies, the jazz boom, organized crime.

Yeah. All this stuff kicks in. It becomes more fun. Is that why? Yeah. It's more dangerous. It's more of a culture has to fall. There's a whole, you know,

the whole American story is of like economic entrepreneurship, right? So then people just go, well, people want this. So let's just keep it up. But anyway, but it's all distilled. It's unregulated, basically. It's all whiskey and gin and moonshine. So wine essentially is destroyed. in America, having been, you know, burgeoning and doing quite well.

So 33, they realized, oh, this is actually all fucked. We should probably let people drink. Because Hitler comes to power and they go, fuck it off. We need a drink. We're in 30s. I want to drink. I want to drink. If we ever are in the 30s entering the world, Finn's checking in on Hitler from above.

He's the greatest man of, he's the greatest man that's ever lived. I don't know. So 33, Prohibition ends. Hitler comes to power. That can't be a coincidence. Right. people have gone fucking hell I want to see what this guy

I want to have a drink with this guy yeah what I like by it is you can have a beer with them yeah that's what I like about you can't say the same of Lenin

or Stalin or Mao you can have a beer with him no one's saying you know what I like about Mao I can have a Chinese rice wine with him and I'm a pint of rice wine and really get into the stats

about agricultural policy cause millions of deaths um Prohibition kills the wine industry yeah and then in 33 it's whatever

reneged or what's the world revoked and wine starts to having been decimated it starts to be build back again and we need to get to you know probably the like

the defining moment of of this story there's a lovely little bow tie that ties up this story which is American wine having been decimated starts to get so good

that what would you say Tom by the 60s Californian wine is good again really like really good. Really, really good. Yeah. And so why, do you know anything about that,

that sort of reemergence of California and wine after prohibition? Well, there's a lot of immigration, there's a lot of Italian immigration into California. So there's a lot of European influence going into bringing all sorts of vines there. And this is the, the northern California is the, that's the wine growing country. Napa Valley. Really centered around Napa, yeah.

Yeah. And so we get to this point in 1976. Oh, yes. called The Judgment of Paris. Yes. And do you want to tell us about this? So this is a tasting organised by a great man

who's no longer with us, sadly, Stephen Spurrier, who organised a tasting of the greatest wines of America versus the greatest wines of France. It's like a World Cup, a World Cup of Wamp. So it feels because it's a British wine merchant.

It feels like the Brits' role in wine is it's not to make it or even, it's more to critique it and drink it. We're almost the great gatekeepers of wine. Yeah, we are. We're the critics. We're the critics. culture. We're not doing it. We're just

sitting and saying, not very good, that's good and getting pissed on it. Honestly, I joke and say, like, the French don't know how to taste wine. We are much better tasters and evaluators of wine. It's fascinating. They just make the stuff. I love that. I love that they make it. They just make it. Like as a

factory. You don't understand it. I love that. I've learned so much this episode. And it all completely fits in with my existing prejudice. I love it. It's perfect. It's perfect. You can come in any time, Tom. So Stephen Sparrier...

It's great to cross the divide. It is great to get other opinions that perfectly match mine. So Stephen Sparrier organizes this big tasting of the greatest wines, America versus France. You've got like the most extensive wines of Ordo. Yeah. But the beauty about it is that... And there's a group of similios judging the wines, quite a few of which are French.

Right. Not knowing what they're... Well, they're smelier. Well, they're smelier. That's where the word comes from I believe And it's all blind Who is the somelier

Person here Than me He better not be smelly out than me And anyway Long story short The US wins Who's testing this? The semiliers

They're all blind tasting Marking each of these wines So it's French and Californian chardonnays And French are California cabsavs What's the fallout from this? Well everyone assumes that France as the with wine

so central to its culture and its idea of itself on the world stage would walk it but now is it like a unanimous decision it's the number of votes so the winners

France wins but sorry US wins both yeah Napa Val Stag's Leap Stag's Leap and Chatea Montalena which are amazing wine yeah I mean like amazing

but I've heard that like this was so devastating to the French mind that the press wouldn't report it Yes. Because he was like, well, this is bollocks. What happens if we print this?

Like, who are we? Yeah. Do we even smell? Like, like, who are we as a country? There are maybe stinkier men out there's an off. This is impossible. No one can smell as bad as us. And this kind of, is this when you say...

And the new world can now race ahead. Yeah, this is 1970s the mix where the greatest pallets in the world are saying... It's hungry beating England six three in football. Yeah. Yeah, in the 50s. It's Australia beating England. England and the ashes. Yeah, yeah, this is, yeah, the,

is this when the marketing bullshit of the French wine industry is sort of... No, but it hasn't. Oh, no, the marketing is, it still maintains so strongly. Yes. We all know this, but it's still product of France, great, I feel, it feels... Safe, I do feel safe drinking French wine in a way that I don't feel...

I feel held. Mexican, I don't know what the fuck's going on there. But the French are masters of marketing. They've nailed it. They've nailed it. And champagne, better than anywhere. yeah in the world so tom what what when does to talk about the history of wine from 76 onwards it's obviously it's become much more open yeah um people are pallets are much more welcoming people are much more open to the idea of like you know fuck it bolivian wine why not go for um georgian wine still no it's the oldest one no thank you um it sounds like petrol yeah and i mean the soviet era

basically buggered all wine production because it essentially tries to make fortified wine I think out of Georgian wine which killed it what is the deal we were saying the last episode with natural wine and all that shit it started in Georgia and it's all shit wait so do you think natural wine shit I think because we all both think is absolute dog shit and I think what do you think in the natural wine trend I think it's a load of bollocks and I think in 15 years we'll stop it and look back to saying what the fuck are we doing the amount of complex in shit flavors. I think it's the only thing that has that much focus on making shit quality stuff. The history and tapestries of shit flavors that they make is extraordinary. I think the thing is

is, if you sat someone down, an expert on natural wine and said, what is natural wine? They wouldn't really be able to answer. They would just say minimal intervention. But every time I taste natural wine, it has a distinct flavor. I could tell you that. It smells like a horse's bum. Yeah, it It tastes like dirt. It's got like a shittiness to it. Minimal intervention. Yeah. So it's like Syria.

Yeah. It's just devastated. Having minimal intervention intervention on wiping your ass means you got a shitty ass. Yeah. Let's bottle that. Well, they do. I actually have a very natural asshole.

I haven't wiped it for two years. Yeah, it's like that perpetual stew you were talking about. It's just a buildup of flavour. And so now when I do a poo, it doesn't smell because I always smell. because it could be anything at this point. Can I just take you back before natural wine? Go on. In the 70s and 80s,

the only wines that we could get in this country really were French. Right. Because they didn't export any wines from California or they drank it all there. So we had all this French shit wine because they had the monopoly on what we'd be drinking. It's only really throughout the 90s that we begin to get New Zealand wine, Australian wine,

California wine. And why is that like in terms of economic? Because the Australian suddenly woke up and thought we can actually make a wine that tastes nice. Yeah. Rather than the barn pits. Yeah. Let's have a go. Selling it. And so they did that. We don't need to drink this stuff

to hit our wives. So why don't we make money off it while we drink Castle Main and pound Sheila? Yeah, as long as it's alcohol it doesn't matter. I don't need this complex shit. No, no. I need to be pissed. I want a clean taste to refresh me after I've tired myself out, hitting my wife. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. But it made the French wines better

because suddenly they're on a shelf alongside these wines that were clean. So the main thing is the Australian wines and the New Zealand wines they were clean in flavour. There was no armpit or arsehole or anything. You don't get like little notes of arsehold. The French all had notes of arsehole

and they thought... Should we end on this wine as well? This is a French wine without notes of arsehold. I'll believe it when I see it. Can you hold this ratio? Of course. Have you seen the documentary Sour Great? Oh, it's a brilliant film.

It's fantastic. You've not seen sour grapes. It's an amazing film about wine fraud in New York, I think. I mean, it shows the whole thing up. It does show the whole thing up. It's complete bullshit. So everything is Tom has been saying about how essentially, you know, the myth of wine is it's a marketing success, really. And if you're paying more than £20 for a bottle, it's because you have been tricked by a brand.

Well, I didn't say that. You said that. Yes, but you endorse that. He's got a lot of friends in the industry. You endorse that. And, you know, my words, your sentiment. But it's basically about this rich Indonesian wine collector who basically becomes this big star in the wine world

selling shit wines, but pretending they're great. But he has, well, he pretends to have this palette that can distinguish Amargo from a Lafitte or whatever. But he then brews them in his kitchen out of different bottles of wine, sort of blends wine. And so when the FBI uncover his kitchen, it's just this mad, you know, garage. full of like vials and buckets and stuff

and there's an amazing scene which is the scene where him and some other wine nonses are running round New York in a cab trying out different wines in bars and they're trying bullshit counterfeit wine that he's made but they don't know it and they're like going on they're going along with it they're going oh yeah this is this is whatever

and he's just made the wine himself in his kitchen It varies a lot of that in the wine trade. Yeah. So I've got your nice wine. So where's this from? So this is from Burgundy. Right. And the beautiful thing about the French is they won't tell you anything about it at all.

That does smell absolutely terrific. Literally nothing. I disagree. There's a definite hint of arsehold in there. Yeah, but it doesn't tell you it. It's a good arsehole. It doesn't say anywhere on the back that it smells of arseholes. It's good though.

I think you want a little bit of arsehold on your wife. So this is from Burgundy, which is basically completely made. by monks, monasteries and everything. And their great variety is Pinot Noir. So they worked out that the best great variety to plant there was Pinot Noir, which makes a beautiful red wine that's really smooth. And this is from year 2050.

So basically, the French learned to make good wine from the new world. I really like that. Yeah, that's very good. And they still make the best wine in the world. Burgundy, you think? France do. France. That is nice.

But it's because, To wrap this up, because in many ways, my view of this has basically been like, this is a conversation Horatia is having with his dad, where his dad's actually interested in him. That's what this has been like, Horatio's like, Dad, and then the wine did this. And he's like, yeah, yeah, whatever. But to wrap this up, what we've learned in this episode is that France is essentially a wine factory for the English. Yes. And that England are the rightful heirs to wine.

Yes. It's for us. And everyone else is sort of beholden to our tastes, really. Does that give you a different viewpoint than you had before? I thought this story would be about how the French decide to gate keep wine and how it's slowly becoming less pretentious with things like the Judgment of Paris bringing in the new world. But really you're saying that it was the English that made France

that up its own ass about wine because we wanted to use France as a wine seller. But the French did gate keep wine from the Nazis. Right. And that's what we're going to talk about on the Patreon. Yes. Very nice. What a cell that is. Do you want to ask how much the wine was? Oh yeah, how much was this bottle of wine?

We need to guess. We need to guess. I'd say, 2015, I think that was a good year. That must be 45 quid. It's a burgundy Pinoa, I'd say, 30. I'd say 35 quid. Fucking out. Your dad would bring this sort of stuff out, wouldn't he?

Yeah, yeah. I mean, he likes, the more pretentious he'd go, the more classic he'd go for. He thinks anything organic or anything like that is complete woke tosh. I agree with them on that. I agree with them on that. I mean, a great tip when you're travelling, don't go for local wine unless it's one of like eight countries basically or you're carrying

a lot of loo roll exactly exactly yeah so listen tom thanks so much for coming did you have anything you want to promote no no great um nothing at all no follow you follow you follow you follow you're on instagram oh i'm gonna have a book out oh brilliant well that's that's that's something to promote oh i've got a book yeah i keep forgetting that you must you must lose sight of your enticement for one second when you're promoing things you must learn to flog it's a different world yeah yeah gone. Is that what the book's called? The chate, fuck, the chateau's gone.

Fuck. Mum, I shrunk the chattos. Fuck, I've lost my chate. Mommy, I lost my chateau. Can I have a book deal? When's the book out and what's it called? November. It's got thirsty.

Brilliant. It's one big thirst trap. Yeah. For a certain type of prison gentleman. Yes. For my dad. Your dad. You're sending thirst traps for my dad.

Oh, he'd love it. It's got all his wines in. All that kind of. It's all assholes. Yeah. Brilliant. A history of, Asshole of the Glass by Tom Gilby is out in November.

Tom's going to stick around for our Patreon bonus episode where we're going to talk about wine in the Third Reich. Yes! And if you'd like to join the Patreon, you get a bonus episode every week for £3 a month and you get access to all the series in one go. Thanks so much for coming in. This has been Finn versus History.

We will see you next week for where, if you thought this is a bit fruity, don't worry next week. We will be in the warm bath of World War II. Brilliant. I can trail that now. Tom, thanks for coming in. We'll see you next time.

Goodbye. Thank you. I'm going to be able to be.