Revealed: The winner of The K Club/Irish Times Food Month amateur wine competition

The winner of this year’s Irish Times Food Month wine competition is Fred Tuite from Kilkenny. Selected from a panel of five finalists at an event hosted by competition partner, The K Club Hotel and Resort in Co Kildare, Tuite wins a year-long wine experience worth an estimated €10,000.
The five finalists were chosen from more than 800 entrants based on short written submissions describing a moment or experience with a particular bottle or glass that sparked an interest in wine. The final of the competition took place at The K Club on Monday evening where the finalists undertook a practical and theoretical examination before meeting the judges, who included Irish Times wine columnist John Wilson and The K Club head sommelier Lisa O’Doherty, for a dinner in the hotel’s Barton restaurant.
The wine prize includes flights to Bordeaux and a two-night hotel stay for two people. While there, the winner and their guest will also enjoy a behind-the-scenes visit to Barton & Guestier’s Château Magnol for lunch and wine tastings. The prize also features an invitation to a professional wine tasting in 2025, where the winner will shadow The K Club’s chief sommelier. Also included is an invitation for the winner and a guest to a private wine cellar tour with Lisa O’Doherty, including a tasting, followed by dinner in The Barton restaurant and an overnight stay for two people at The K Club.
Fred Tuite’s submission stood out both for his telling of a story of young romance, and for the impact a first taste of Rose d’Anjou made on him as a young French teacher. He also nurtures his interest in wine through a wine club with friends at his tennis club in Kilkenny, and occasional wine nights they enjoy at a local restaurant.
“I’ve always had this interest and passion for wine, and the chance to really develop it this year is fantastic,” Tuite said. “I have never been to Bordeaux, I’ve driven around it, but it was always on the radar to go. I love wine as a complement to food, it enhances the whole dining experience. Someone told me once, they saw wine as a sauce to go with the food, and that that’s how I look [at] it. For years, I’ve been trying to learn, to improve – this is a great opportunity to leap forward.”
This is the third year of The Irish Times Food Month wine competition. Last year’s winner Jonathan Staunton from Dún Laoghaire, Co Dublin, used the opportunity to embrace his passion and build an online presence as a wine expert.
“The entrants have just got better and better each year,” said K Club head sommelier Lisa O’Doherty. “What I love about this event is meeting people that have great stories about wine. Our winner was one of those. Talking to him tonight, after doing so well in the exam and pairings earlier, about his wine club and meeting up with others and trying different wines, I just thought he was the perfect candidate. This competition is about understanding flavour and why some wines and foods go well together. Fred just really got it.”
The other four finalists were Derbhla O’Sullivan, Alison Kelly, Claire Corbett and Aidan O’Connor. You can read the winner’s written submission, along with those of the runners-up, below.
As a young teacher of French, I was attending a summer course on language teaching methodologies in Dublin. There was a reception at the end of the course hosted by the French embassy. The Irish teachers put on songs and sketches, and I performed a piece taking off some of the lecturers giving the course to great acclaim. Now I could relax and try the wine that was flowing. I was approached by a French girl who worked at the embassy. She had a halo of curling dark hair and twinkling brown eyes full of mischief. She presented me with a glass of wine and told me I deserved it after my performance. I sipped the wine and was amazed at its forward fruit, hint of sweetness but dry mineral finish. I had never tasted a wine like it. Rosé d’Anjou she told me. She was delighted with my reaction, and we enjoyed some more with the canapés that were on offer. At the end of the reception, I offered to accompany her to her bus stop. Having waited there for several minutes, she decided we should walk as it was such a balmy summer’s evening. So, we strolled from the city centre to her apartment in Ballsbridge. I was preparing to take my leave when she put her hand into her bag for, I presumed, her keys. But instead, she took out a three-quarter full bottle of Rosé d’Anjou that she had brought from the reception. “I was hoping you would help me to finish this,” she said. And Reader, I did.
Chateau Ricardelle La Clape Coteaux Du Languedoc Cuvée Juliette 2010. It’s 2012. My husband and I head off for three weeks in September on the boat to France with our two-man dome tent, a barbecue and our bicycles. I have my Hugh Johnson pocket Wine Book and a few clippings from Decanter. The days before marriage and kids. An adventure with a loose plan of the Loire Valley, Languedoc and Bordeaux. What a treat; 2009 Bordeaux on the shelves. Coincidence wasn’t intentional but luck is great. Of all the fantastic different wines I tasted on this trip, what inspired me most was visiting La Clape which I had read about. Arriving to Château Ricardelle, all was very quiet but with pidgin French, little English, lots of gesturing and sign language it was an inspiration and passion for quality winemaking that shone through. The weight of the bottle, the copy of original drawing, if I remember correctly, of Bruno’s granddaughter on each Cuvée Juliette and the smooth supple sun in each Syrah’s (mainly) slight oak sip. We bought 12 with shelf life advised for six to eight years. It just got better every year. I love wine and I love cooking. Eating a rib roast with friends telling a story about what we are drinking and the memories it invokes takes everyone on a little sunny trip. I only wish we had brought more home.
Paco and Lola Albarino 2012: Newly dating. I have met his family. Now it’s time to meet the sophisticated and well-travelled Uncle Tim. Uncle Tim arrives, a polka dot bottle of Paco and Lola Albarino in hand. We sit for dinner and wine is poured. We relax into each other’s company, enjoying stories of Uncle Tim’s latest travels, amid fruity zesty sips. He loved a good story. 2016: Our wedding. The other “oldies” are in bed long before us newly-weds. Not Uncle Tim – he is at the heart and soul of the party. No children himself, his nieces and nephews adore him and he revels in their company. Among the gifts he brings, that vibrant and zesty bottle. We enjoy it in the following days, exchanging stories of the big day. He loved stories. Over the years: Uncle Tim arrives to visit, often a Paco and Lola in hand. Enjoyed with a main course of fascinating stories of his travels and the people he met. He loved a good story. 2020: Uncle Tim’s funeral. A sudden death of a youngest uncle. An unexpected heart attack. Weeks into the pandemic. We drive the eerie, deserted roads to Dungarvan and give him the best farewell we can. The streets are lined with people who want to pay their respects but don’t know how. His little Jack Russell standing loyally outside the church, looked after by a friend. They all have their own stories to tell. This evening: Bedtime chaos and getting ready for school. Barely time to chat. I arrive down the stairs after settling little Tim with a bedtime story. He loves stories. My husband has poured us both a glass of Paco and Lola. We sit and chat and tell each other stories from our day. He loved stories.
In the Baroque town of Scicli in southern Sciliy, eight of us sat down to dine outside in the Piazza Busacca. We were evenly divided between red and white wine drinkers. One of our party, Tom, a wine aficionado, always chose the wine. We trusted him. For the red, he chose a wine from a small nearby vineyard. The first drinker took a sip, said nothing and drank the white wine for the rest of the evening. The second drinker had had several Sicilian craft beers earlier so his taste buds were thoroughly deadened. That left Tom and myself to sniff and swirl thoughtfully. Earlier in the day Tom had seen me spit out my coffee ruined by sour milk that no one else seemed to have noticed, so he knew that I had a decent sense of taste. “Tom,” I said. “It’s rather brown coloured, smells quite pungent and tastes burnt. Do you think it’s corked?” “No,” he says. “Sometimes in small vineyards production standards are different, this is what’s called a barnyard wine.” He then proceeded to explain barnyard wine to me, compliment me on my sensory abilities and suggest I do a wine tasting course. Alas the wine did not improve with time or aeration and we decided against a second bottle. Did the barnyard wine spark my interest? It was certainly a novel experience and it has inspired me to trust my own sense of smell and taste when to comes to wine tasting.
In the late 1990s, a friend and I were introduced to the world of winemaking in Mallorca with an excellent “random” wine-tasting event in a dark basement store in the town of Andratx that was soon to close to make way for new apartments to be built in its place. We discovered that, against the backdrop of the island’s rugged landscapes and Mediterranean sun, small, passionate winemakers were reviving ancient vines and embracing native grape varieties like Manto Negro and Callet. These bold, rustic wines – distinctly different from the polished reds of the mainland – began to tell the stories of Mallorca’s centuries-old viticulture, grounded in soil rich with history and kissed by the salty breeze of the Balearic Sea. With minimal intervention, winemakers poured their souls into each bottle, letting the essence of the island flow unencumbered into the wine. Each glass tasted like the land: earthy, wild, and with a hint of the sun-baked herbs growing in every corner of Mallorca. These wines were not created to follow trends but to honour tradition and celebrate Mallorca’s distinct terroir. The red wines of Mallorca quietly yet profoundly began to turn heads in the global wine world. Soon, the world noticed. Sommeliers and wine enthusiasts alike praised the uniqueness and complexity of these reds, marking Mallorca as a rising star in the wine world. The late 1990s became a turning point when Mallorca’s red wines evolved from a well-kept local secret to international fascination. Bodega Ribas, one of Mallorca’s oldest wineries, has produced some of Spain’s finest wines from its 49 hectares of vines since 1711. Its Sió Negre, with its dominant black fruit, such as black cherry and plum, and spicy hints of vanilla, cinnamon, cocoa, and balsamic notes, is my favourite wine for any special occasion.