Like the Australian wine industry, New Zealand’s has enjoyed a decade of unprecedented, export-driven growth. However, New Zealand’s southerly latitudes and cooler climate dictates a vastly different wine-industry structure than Australia’s. With New Zealand’s warmest significant growing region, Gisborne, sitting at about the same latitude as Melbourne, it’s only natural that the Kiwi industry focuses … Continue reading Oz versus Kiwi wine style differences
Bay of Fires Tasmania Riesling 2007 $30 The 2007 rieslings look terrific, right across the country – from Mount Barker in the West to the variety’s Clare and Eden Valley heartland, to Canberra, and way down south to Tassie. In a recent tasting Bay of Fires stole the show, even from stars like Grosset and … Continue reading Wine review — Bay of Fires, Peter Lehmann & Clonakilla
In a good year Australia crushes about two million tonnes of grapes, equivalent to about 150 million dozen bottles of wine. About one quarter of that comes from New South Wales, second in volume to our undisputed winemaking monarch, South Australia on fifty per cent. Scratch below the surface of these big figures and we … Continue reading Lots to like in New South Wales
With more than a hundred thousand visitors a year, you’d have to say that Moet’s Yarra Valley winery knows what its customers wants. That such a multitude of wine drinkers have opted for luxury and location consistently for almost twenty years is surely a lesson in the service standards premium wine drinkers expect and are … Continue reading Setting a bubbly standard
Tyrrell’s Brokenback Hunter Valley Shiraz 2004 $20 The best Hunter shiraz has a fine-ness that belies its warm-climate origins. In the old days these were often called ‘Hunter Burgundy’ – partly in keeping with generic labelling of the time and partly because of structural, if not flavour, similarities to Burgundy (i.e. pinot noir from France’s … Continue reading Wine review — Tyrrell’s, d’Arenberg & Marius Wines
Regional wine shows, says leading Australian wine man Brian Croser, can be marketing springboards. With the international fine wine market so focused on what grows best where, he argues, regional shows can highlight what varieties best suit a region and the results used to take that message to the world. Croser was in Canberra last … Continue reading Croser in Canberra — on regional wine shows
About half of the wine consumed in Australia reaches our dinner tables via a plastic container – the flexible bladder crammed inside chateau cardboard. But will we embrace the polyethylene terephthalate, or PET, plastic bottle so readily? Not since the cask appeared more than thirty years ago have we embraced any non-glass packaging so enthusiastically. … Continue reading Plastic set to take a slice of the glass wine bottle market
Leo Buring 2007 Rieslings: Eden Valley $18.99, Clare Valley $18.99 Leonay DW K17 Eden Valley 2007 $36.99 These continue a great tradition that began under Leo Buring in the 1940s, passed to Lindemans in the 1960s and then, via Penfold Wine Group and Southcorp, to Foster’s in 2005. Components of the three rieslings looked good … Continue reading Wine review — Leo Buring, Oxford Landing & Mount Majura
We’ve all heard of Seppelt, Penfolds, Saltram, Yalumba and Orlando – great and enduring Barossa names. But what do we know of Tuesner, Tscharke, Lienert, Hentley Farm, Clos Otto, Gibson, Schild, Jenke, Haan, Kabinye, Langmeil, The Willows, Whistler, Kaesler, Kalleske, Torbreck, Three Rivers, Rockford, Veritas, Turkey Flat, Greenock Creek and Murray Street Vineyards? – to … Continue reading Micro makers focus on individual Barossa vineyards
Brindabella Hills Canberra District Shiraz 2005 $25 Perhaps it’s the sandy, gravely soils, wonders winemaker Roger Harris, that makes shiraz from comparatively low-altitude, warm Hall so amazingly cool-climate-fragrant in style. It’s seductively floral with a matching delicate, juicy flavour and elegant, supple structure – a sensational wine. And I suspect that it’ll grow in interest … Continue reading Wine review — Brindabella Hills & Hewitson