Lisse Garnett

Feature Writer, lover of stories. 

Copy, podcasts, features, shorts and ideas - lots of those..

Ex BBC Broadcast Journalist with a Masters in Radio from Goldsmiths, WSET Diploma Wine, GNVQ4 Broadcast Journalism, WSET Level 3 Sake. BA Hons English 2:1 Leeds University

Which London members club has the finest wine list? | House of Decant

Whilst the Groucho Club hummed with the distinctive, well-paid tones of Janet Street-Porter, Jools Holland, Oasis and Blur, The Savile could only counter with drab brown Windsor soup and libidinous salty uncles. Boasting London’s finest full set of rooms in the grand French style — not to mention Yeats, Hardy, Waugh and Kipling as past members — it still held the distant scent of past grandeur, but it was clear from the cut of the bibulous butler pushing the pudding trolley that times were hard.
Drinks Retailing - Championing the off-trade since •

Maison Wessman and Norah Jones lead bid for Issigeac micro-appellation - Drinks Retailing

Icelandic pharma-titan, Robert Wessman of Maison Wessman in Bergerac and his wine director, Lise Sadirac, have been fighting for a new Issigeac micro-appellation with backing from musician Norah Jones. Lisse Garnett visits the region to find out what the future holds.Prestigious winery Maison Wessman is currently seeking vinous validation for Issigeac and Conne-de-Labarde, which lie on a clearly defined limestone plateau in the Bergerac region in southwestern France.According to vineyard directo...

PERU’S NATURAL ABUNDANCE INSPIRED THE INCAS TO WORSHIP THE SOIL AND 16th CENTURY CONQUISTADORS TO PLANT THE FIRST EUROPEAN VINES IN LATIN AMERICA  – wineanorak.com

THUS SIRING AN EXPANSIVE INDUSTRY THAT THRIVED UNTIL THE EXPULSION OF THE JESUITS BY KING CHARLES III OF SPAIN IN 1767


Lisse Garnett reports from Viñas Queirolo in the Ica Valley, old colonial Lima and the pre-Inca Cloud Fortress of Kuélap on the intricate culture and flavours of this endlessly stimulating land of supercharged phenolics and epicurean prowess. 


Famed Consultant Viticulturalist & Winemaker Alexandro Sejanovich and Luis Gomez of Vinas Queirolo offer insight on Peru’s potentia...
Club Oenologique •

10 top summer reads for food and drink lovers

This book is a pertinent read, which naturally interweaves Lebanon’s wine story with the geopolitical landscape. Reading it engenders a greater understanding of contemporary political tensions, in an unusually enjoyable way. Intriguing historical photographs and wine-related images by the war photographer Norbert Schiller make this work vivid and powerful. I found welcome perspective and hope, the juxtaposition of time over human folly conveyed in a beguiling beautifully format – soothing mead for a thirsty soul.

SOUTH AFRICA LAGS BEHIND EUROPE WHEN IT COMES TO ORGANIC VITICULTURE – 12 PRODUCERS UNITE TO SEEK CHANGE – wineanorak.com

ALEX DALE OF RADFORD DALE HAS CO-FOUNDED A NEW ASSOCIATION TO FOSTER THE COLLABORATION AND GROWTH OF THIS IMPORTANT SECTOR IN SOUTH AFRICA. ORGANIC WINES SOUTH AFRICA’S TWELVE MEMBERS FOLLOW STRINGENT EU RULES AND OFFER A COLLABORATIVE OPEN-DOOR APPROACH TO CONVERTS – THOUGH GREENWASHERS NEED NOT APPLY


Lisse Garnett reports…


In the thirty-odd years since South Africa ended racial segregation, winemaking has evolved exponentially. The isolationist cellar palate of the nationalised KWV[1] h...

The Buyer | Terroir-driven gems drive Corney & Barrow's fresh look at Argentina

Four of the most exciting and cutting-edge wine producers working in Argentina today have been snapped up by UK importer Corney & Barrow, prompting a restructuring and enhancing of its entire Argentine portfolio. Eight new terroir-driven wines were shown by these producers in a masterclass hosted by Tim Atkin MW and Corney & Barrow buyer Rebecca Palmer followed by many more in a walkaround tasting afterwards, held at the Argentine Ambassador’s Residence in London. Lisse Garnett talked to all con..

South Africa in England: we taste the inaugural gold medal winning vintage of Tidebrook Wines, from medieval Mousehall, the Jordan winery and distillery in Mayfield, East Sussex –

Gary and Kathy Jordan are well known for their Stellenbosch winery. Back in 2018 they began their quest for the perfect soil conditions to inspire a UK venture in partnership with their daughter Christy. Today a small vineyard, sustainable gin distillery, botanical garden, bee hives and a herd of curious livestock are all housed in the beautiful East Sussex countryside. And it’s all down to the soil. What’s more this small but perfectly formed sustainable farmstead is now welcoming holidaying gu
Club Oenologique •

10 top summer reads for food and drink lovers

Having a cocktail poured for you by Agostino Perrone must be one of the world’s finest drinking experiences. The leading light of The Connaught Bar in London is a ‘director of mixology’ and a master of hospitality, someone whose service has its own motto: ‘straight up with style, and don’t forget the smile’; and whose Martinis are prepared on an extravagant trolley rolled up to your table, with the liquid delivered in an artful, boozy stream from a mixing glass held up high in the air. Let’s be

English Wine: Lost in Translation | The Arbuturian

As English Wine Week gets underway, Lisse Garnett reflects on the rise of this enigmatic tipple…

English wine remains the most underrated category in the wine world. I’ve lost count of the number of times I’ve sung its praises to foreign winemakers only to be given a derisive, pitying look. There are notable exceptions: the Vikings love our wines and buy them by the container load; the Americans are our loyal customers, as are Hong Kong, Japan, The Netherlands and Switzerland. In Denmark, Engli

The Buyer | Lisse Garnett on Sebastían Zuccardi and the new age of Malbec

“Beef Welling-Ton!” exclaimed Sebastián Zuccardi with delight when presented with Kerridge’s finest fillet wrapped in spinach, mushroom mouse, and crispy suet pastry.“This is a craze now in Argentina.” His unguarded happiness lit up the room.

There had also been a distinct waft of awe in the room as ten of us sat in hushed devotion although Zuccardi, clearly a visionary, appears immune to adulation; I’m not sure he even noticed.

Thanks to a population that loves to eat and drink its own produc

Ortega, Britain’s great white hope or just another white elephant? –

‘If there is one varietal that cannot be accused of a lack of flavour, it is the German vine crossing Ortega, but when it comes to this bodybuilding grape, less is most definitely more’,

English wine – far from a joke now

A critic I know was almost cancelled for using the term ‘vine racism’ during a stateside live in defence of certain vine crossings and PIWIS. I see his point. To many drinkers, Germanic crossings and PIWIs are verboten.

Lisse Garnett asked winemakers Salvatore Leone, Adrian

The Buyer | Francisco Baettig on where his new project sits within Chilean wine

Chile remains woefully misunderstood. There is one idea of Chilean wine, and then there are the terroir-focused winemakers to whom I dedicate this piece. For they are causing a quiet revolution of their own.

There is a reason why the third and final Sideways book was set in Maule and focussed on VIGNO, volcanoes, earthquakes (and sex). Francisco Baettig, Garage, De Martino and Bouchon have busted out of the straitjacket that ‘value and volume’ created. High-priced icon wines represent another s

The Buyer | Lisse Garnett: ViuManent and getting Chilean Malbec on the map

In 2021, I wrote a piece for the Spectator entitled 'How Argentina conquered Malbec'. I might just have easily cited Chile. The back story of Malbec's unlikely journey from Cahors to Chile to Argentina in the hands of a French agronomist from Tours is a good one. Human struggle drove Malbec's exodus to the promised lands of South America, and everyone from Eleanor of Aquitaine to Napoleon III played a part.

Thanks to copper, gold, and nitrate reserves, Chile became richer than Sweden and twice
Roussillon •

Beguiling Banyuls

Lisse Garnett on discovering the enthralling sweet wines of Banyuls in beautiful, picturesque Collioure.

I supped sweet Banyuls in Collioure and fell in love with this complex, sensual, alluring,

unfathomably affordable ancient cure for melancholy. Octogenarian vines furnish the

grapes for these poetic endeavours, which now languish under-priced, unseen, and

undervalued by a world set on dryness.

Collioure lies on the cusp of Spain, a fishing village set in a bay protected by cliffs, pep
Academie Du Vin Library •

Why the Douro Valley should be on every wine lover’s wish list

The oldest wine region in the world is a marvel of ancient vines and beautiful landscapes

Portugal’s Douro Valley is the ultimate three-day wine destination. Porto, with its international airport, hilly vistas, elegant iron bridges, fish-focused cuisine and ancient Roman roots, is a marvellous architectural and epicurean prelude to the delights of the Douro.

Scenic travel upriver via Pinhão may be accomplished by train, road or boat. The once tumultuous Douro, now dammed, allows for gentle pas

Gateway to Patagonia: Hotel Antumalal | The Arbuturian

Hotel Antumalal and Spa in Pućon offers the most authentic marriage of man-made structure and nature I have ever encountered within a commercial setting. The hotel is a mid-century modernist masterpiece with unrivalled views of Villarrica Lake and its namesake picture-perfect snow-dusted Volcano. Built in 1948 by Czech wartime refugees in a Bauhaus style from local materials, it was meticulously designed to enhance the natural contours of the 5-hectare park that surrounds it.

This is both indig
The Buyer •

Tim Atkin MW's Best of Rioja - the best new Rioja wines to have on your radar

Tim Atkin MW’s The Best of Rioja tasting in London last week delivered the very finest of fine wines to enraptured city mouths without missing a beat. Terroir-focused beauties dominated the proceedings with whites making an indelible mark on Lisse Garnett and the many educated savvy consumers she met. This was a far cry from the “Rioja is in crisis” headlines that have been regularly appearing in the wine press of late – with splits within the regulatory council, high profile bankruptcies, overs

Chateau Lagrazette, a film with Alain Dominique Perrin

Lisse Garnett visits the romantic castle of Château Lagrezette, which was purchased as a ruin and renovated by Alain Dominique Perrin in the 1980s to house his extended family. He shows her around his beautiful home, filled with antiques collected from Europe, especially the north of England. This fortified house was built just after the Hundred Years' War; before that, the farm had been known for the black wines of Cahors it produced. Transported on the waters of the River Lot, these wines travelled as far as England, where they were used to bolster wines imported from Bordeaux. The war put paid to this trade, and the Castle dungeon or oubliette, unearthed by Alain during renovations, contained human remains from this dismal period. Today, the castle is surrounded by vines and offers the most inviting accommodation to the weary wine traveller.
Wine Anorak •

Why should we care about the age of the vine that made our wine? –

Man’s history with the vine predates the written word. Old vines map man’s passage to the new world and our genesis in the old. Prized for complexity, flavour and their marked tendency to express terroir they offer up a stimulating smorgasbord of taste and nostalgia; a living link with summers past.

As Lisse Garnett prepares to attend her third Old Vine Conference, she reflects on what inspired her about the last. Sarah Abbott MW led the charge, brilliantly assisted by Michèle Shah, Belinda Sto
The Buyer •

Best wines of 2023 - a selection of top wines that should be on your radar

For Lisse Garnett her Best wines of 2023 were inextricably linked to the wine regions she visited, the estates and the many inspirational people she met on her travels. From an empowering winery in South Africa, to the second Wine Writers Retreat in Bordeaux, a Quinta in the Douro and a wine odyssey along the Loire, 2023 was a year in which Garnett re-evaluated her career and found that it is always the wine that takes pride of place.

“2023, for me, was the year I took a good hard look at mysel
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