Now, to put it in perspective, just before sampling his premium shiraz I had just sipped and quickly tipped out a glass of the “Cat Amongst the Pigeons” Barossa Shiraz (sorry to those who enjoy that particular Woolworths label), so my taste buds may well have appreciated the uptick in quality. But even without the moderating influence of the ordinary precursor, the Brockenchack shiraz is a wine worthy of every accolade.

The Brockenchack label hails from South Australia’s Eden Valley but is owned and managed by a former Sunshine Coast local and business icon, Trevor Harch and his wife Marilyn, who have been investing in the South Australian wine industry since the late 1990s.

While Trevor and Marilyn live on the Eden Valley vineyard and are responsible for viticulture, the winemaking is undertaken by Jo Irvine and Shawn Kalleske who are no strangers to the praise of the best wine judges in the country. Nor, for that matter, are they any strangers to the best fruit of the Barossa and Eden Valley regions.

I have previously admitted to not having expected the Brockenchack operation to produce wines worthy of a 95 point rating but I am happy to concede to (once again) being proven wrong.

The Eden Valley locale is more elevated than the Barossa Valley vineyards and as a result, their wines tend to be less jammy and more elegant than those from the Valley floor. I do enjoy the Barossa shiraz, but often the (over) ripeness can lead to their wines being jammy and sweet to the point of becoming “fly-blown” (sorry for the uncomfortable analogy). And that’s where the Eden Valley provides the perfect compromise; delightful ripe and juicy fruit but not overdone and smelling more like molasses than an oenological treat.

The 2015 Jack Harrison Shiraz is now four or five years old and in it’s prime. Sure, you could lay it on its side and see what it looks like in five or ten years’ time, but by then, some of its lusciousness might have been replaced by elegant lineal layers of fruit and tannin.

Currently, there’s a delightfully ruby-esque colour in the glass and both cassis and brooding ripe plums from the first sip. You can’t ignore the influence of French Oak exposure as you sniff the woodiness on the nose and later taste the savoury oak characters through the middle. It’s brambly, savoury yet surprisingly fruit-driven. I love the balance and finesse which makes it.

At the end of the day, it’s the balance that sets the Jack Harrison apart from those over-ripe Barossa styles. How can they sell this at $55 or so a bottle when the super-premium counterparts are over $100 a bottle? Spicy, silky smooth and graced by layers of fruit and complexity, the Jack Harrison seems destined for greatness. I’d suggest tucking a few away in the cellar and trying again in a couple of years’ time.

The Brockenchack team continue to over-deliver on quality and I suspect that it’s only a matter of time before the price of their premium wines heads north. How much room do you have in your cellar?

Speaking for myself, I much prefer to read reviews and articles which tell a story, educate or showcase a region, winery or winemaker. But being asked to pour through paragraphs of jargon, waffle and BS is like sandpaper on my eyeballs! But having said that, a little bit of understanding of wine terminology makes it much less confronting to have a wine list thrown at you in a swanky fine dining venue or to endure a grandiloquent wine review written by a stuck up snob!

So I thought I’d try and demystify some of the lingo that wine wankers use to demonstrate their expertise when their discussion with the sommelier inevitably becomes a soliloquy!

Aroma – this is the bouquet of an older wine or how a young wine smells when you stick your snoz into the glass.

Balance – this term describes the harmony between the elements of the wine; such as that between sweetness and acid or that between fruit and oak/tannin.

Finish – what you can taste once the wine has been swallowed.

Blanc de Blancs – a sparkling wine made only from white grapes (usually chardonnay).

Blanc de Noirs – a white wine (likewise, usually sparkling) that is made from red-skinned grapes.

Brettanomyces – a yeast that can live in barrels and causes a “barnyard” tasting taint.

Brix – a scale used to measure the sugar content in grapes before they are fermented.

Brut – a term used to describe a very dry style of French champers.

Cuvee – usually describes a wine which is a blend of several different vats

Flabby – describes a wine that feels “fat” in your mouth, usually because of low acids.

Grand cru – in wines from Burgundy the term denotes wines of a particular official status. Elsewhere it means “Great growth”.

Grand vin – another French term which is normally used by a winemaker (mostly in Bordeaux) to identify what they believe is their best wine.

Lees – the sediment of dead yeasts, seeds etc that settles after fermentation and is separated by a process called “racking”.

Legs – no, not a reference to Elle McPherson but rather the running droplets that fall down the side of the glass after swirling (which can reveal alcohol concentration).

Maceration – the process of allowing contact of the grape skins with the juice (called the “must”) to allow phenolics like tannin to impart character on the wine.

Mousse – the effervescence of a sparkling wine.

Oaky – unsurprisingly, the term used to describe the wood and toasty characters in a wine.

Premier cru – another French term that means “first growth” and denotes quality. In Burgundy and Champagne the use of the term is highly regulated.

Punt – nothing to do with betting, but rather it is the hemispheric indentation shaped into the bottom of a wine bottle.

Racking – the process of moving wine from barrel to barrel and removing sediment in the process.

Stemmy – a term used to describe the stalky green flavours found in some wines.

Tannins – matter from skins, stalks and seeds that give a desirable astringency to the finish of red wines.

Terroir – the geological and climatic influences of a particular region that are expressed in wines from the locale.

Ullage – a term for the gap between the level of the wine and the top of the bottle.

Unctuous – a favourite term of wine wankers which describes a luscious wine which is rich with a delightful mouth feel and finish.

This handful of wine terms won’t make you the next Len Evans or James Halliday or get you a gig as head sommelier at a two-hatted restaurant, but you should at very least be able to call BS on the next wine tosser you encounter at a work function or social gathering!

Having recently visited the land the locals call Nippon, I can’t help but commend the locals on their focus on the production of the world’s best sake rather than subject themselves to the scrutiny and criticism of a marginal wine industry. And that’s not to suggest that the Japanese winemakers aren’t able to produce perfectly palatable wines, but rather, in my view at least, the quality versus price equation isn’t able to match the value proposition of other parts of the wine-producing world.

It is thought that Japan’s wine industry started in a low rainfall region that can’t produce rice, Yamanashi, in the township of Katsunuma. There, the first commercial winery was established in 1875 which is now owned by the corporate Mercian group who are the second-largest wine company in the country. Leaving aside the local market strength of sake and spirits, the Japanese winemakers have always struggled against the headwinds of high humidity, less than ideal soil profiles for viticulture, rainfall during the growing season, and a limited amount of available land for grape production. Then there’s the battle with ripening of the fruit – because the local producers struggle to get the grapes to the right baume, a lot of sugar is often added during vinification.

As you’d expect, the country is best suited to cool-climate grapes but the challenge presented by fertile soils and unfortunate monsoonal wet seasons is omnipresent. This ubiquitous feature of the climate and geology means that seasonal variances can be significant and that vintages of the same wine can produce strikingly disparate outcomes in the glass. At times, the outcome of vintage is perhaps not as high in quality as the winemaker would have hoped.

The local riesling is popular with consumers but to my palate, they lack any character or any statement of terroir. The local varietal which is most widely grown is a pink-skinned white grape called Koshu which produces a delicate and fresh aromatic white wine. Of the varietals that Australians would be familiar with, there are a number of red blends on offer but the stand-out varietal is probably chardonnay – and particularly those from the Nagano district.

The Chateau Mercian Nagano Chardonnay 2017 was probably one of the better ones that we sampled during our recent adventure. You’ll have to shell out more than a handful of yen for a bottle, but at the equivalent of $34 AUD you could justify the experience. On the nose, there are hints of mandarin peel and cut grass but through the middle, there’s Granny Smith apple, lime and subtle lemon zestiness. It does wash out a little on the finish and the lack of acid or oak backbone does highlight its vulnerabilities, but the mouthfeel is nicely rounded and the flavour profile quite attractive. I wouldn’t rush out to swap a bottle of the Mercian chardy for two of our lower-priced mid-range Aussie whites, but it’s an experience worth savouring and an opportunity to expand one’s oenological horizons.

They’re a bold new breed of winemaker who defy the odds in eschewing the temptation to strive for profitability and deliver a product that is consistent with their own vision and ambition, paying scant regard to what the textbooks would say is the secret sauce for oenological accomplishment.

The Sinapius story starts in 2005 when the youthful but visionary young couple purchased the small two-hectare Golders Vineyard near Pipers River in Tasmania with the intent to produce some of the country’s best cool-climate chardonnay and pinot noir.

The vineyards were then some 20 years old, but Vaughn and Linda renamed the winery Sinapius and then packed the vineyards with additional closely planted vines of other clones with a plan to focus on lower bunch weights and yields, as is the custom in Burgundy.

Vaughn has remained a very “hands-on” custodian of the vines, personally undertaking vineyard management from pruning to canopy management and even removing the grapes on the exposed lobe-like edges of the bunches (which receive the most sun exposure and ripen the most) prior to picking, so as to ensure even ripeness.

At Sinapius, low scale production is worn as somewhat of a badge of honour – the goal is to keep the vintage to no more than 100 to 200 dozen of each of their three different pinot noir and deliver quality in spades!

And it wasn’t until a mate returned from a trip to the Apple Isle with a bottle of the Sinapius 2017 La Clairiére Pinot Noir that I realised just how good their wares are!

The wine received its moniker from the French term for “the clearing” because the block from which this single-vineyard wine is crafted was planted after the area was cleared in 2010 and 2011. It’s a rather unadulterated style with whole berry fermentation and after maturation being bottled unfined and unfiltered.

It’s a very pretty wine on the nose with herbaceous rose petal scents and a hint of redcurrants. But take a sip and the strawberry and violet characters grip the front palate and later morph into rivers of red fruits and cherries through the middle. The tannins on the back end are fine, carbonesque and understated and certainly don’t detract from the ripeness of the opulent fruit. Overall, it’s up there with the best Tassie pinot I’ve sampled – though at the $68 price tag, I guess you’d be entitled to expect something special.

If you ever find yourself at a loose end while in the northern parts of Tassie, there’s probably no better way to while away a couple of hours than to take a wine flight through the Sinapius offerings at their Pipers Brook cellar door!

When a wine wins a major award, I’m like a moth drawn to a flouro light and in what must be a form of FOMO, I find myself compelled to track down a bottle to find out what all the fuss is about.

So, when I found out that the Josef Chromy 2017 Pinot Noir was judged as the best pinot noir in Australia at the KPMG Sydney Royal Wine Show, how could I resist the urge to crack the stelvin on a bottle?

Fortunately for me, some close friends turned up to a recent dinner party with a couple of bottles which included Josef Chromy’s award winner and as luck (read “strategy”) would have it, it was one of those soldiers still standing sentry on the kitchen bench by the time the last guest left, so I got to sit down with the company of the bottle and my favourite Reidel late one Saturday afternoon. And what a treat it was (thanks Nigel and Rebecca)!

The Josef Chromy story is one of the most fascinating ones in the Australian wine industry. A refugee from his war-torn Czech village, after years of occupation by Nazi and Soviet forces, Joe escaped as a completely broke 19-year-old and after evading minefields, dogs and armed soldiers made his made to the golden shores of Australia.

Having used his butcher skills to establish and grow a very successful meat products business which eventually listed on the ASX, it gave him the capital to invest heavily in the wine industry. He acquired a 60-hectare vineyard site in the Tamar Valley and launched Josef Chromy Wines in 2007. Since then, the winery has gone from strength to strength and has earned 14 trophies and 170 medals and made its mark as one of the successful wineries in Tasmania.

The Josef Chromy way is to produce wines which express the “sense of place” and focus on the individual characteristics of every vintage. The wines are vinified in one of Tasmania’s most advanced wineries and embrace technology while trying to utilise traditional techniques. Their sparkling wines are world-class but that’s not what we’re here to talk about!

The 2017 edition of Joe’s accolade winning pinot noir shows a spicy smokiness on the nose but spice and dark red cherries on the palate. There’s a hint of stalkiness on the edges but persistent sweet and rounded red berries through the middle. I really enjoyed the medium palate weight, fine tannins and the gentle passage of the fruit through a well-balanced and fruit laden finale.

You could pair it with pork buns, quail or even Peking Duck (yum!), but a wine this good can also be appreciated on its own as a pre-dinner aperitif. Think I’ll have to go and pour myself another glass…

On 15 December 2019, the annual Langton’s Rewards of Patience Auction closed and a set of Penfolds Grange from 1951 to 2015 sold for $372,800 in what was a world record amount, knocked down to an Australian collector. The previous record was for a Penfolds Grange set from 1951 to 2014 which sold for $349,500.

I remember being surprised when a new world record was set for a full vertical set of the Penfolds flagship red when in 2017 du Plessis Auction House in Adelaide sold a set for $260,000. And that’s only a couple of years ago!

It’s probably fair to say that there aren’t too many investments that are showing that rate of capital growth in the current climate. So why the rapid surge in prices for our most collectable wine?

There are undoubtedly a whole range of reasons, but at the end of the day, it’s largely just the laws of supply and demand. Every time a rare bottle of Grange is consumed, the value of those remaining go up. The first and rarest of Grange, the 1951 vintage, regularly sells at around $80,000 a bottle.

And when it is estimated that there are less than 20 bottles left in circulation, it’s hard to imagine the value going in any other direction than north. Basking in the glory of such a successful sale, the General Manager of Langton’s, Jeremy Parham, said “We’ve seen fewer and fewer of Penfolds Grange sets on the markets, and the collectors are certainly looking for them, so watch this space – I’m sure the demand will keep going up.” And with increasing interest in collectable Australian wines by Asian and particularly, Chinese, buyers the future value seems assured.

The enthusiasm and appetite for Grange is pleasing to see, but it begs the obvious question, should we rush out and buy up while we can? Well, if you ask me, there’s not much point in buying up the recently released vintages as there are plenty of them on the market and recent history shows that in the first few years following release of a vintage, you can buy Grange on the secondary market for less than the original retail price.

If you’re interested in collecting, my tip would be to identify the best vintages that will cost a bit more to buy, as the demand for these is likely to be much higher in the future.

Personally, I’d be looking for the 1971, 1986, 1990 and 1998 releases. But beware, if you don’t have the right cellaring conditions, your investment could go pear-shaped faster than a Queensland Deputy Premier’s investment in real estate!

The current release of Grange is the 2015 edition and was launched with a $900 asking price. That doesn’t sound like great value to me, but beauty is in the eye of the beholder, and there are sure to be plenty of international admirers!

The Orange district is located about 250 kms to the west of Sydney and is centred around an ancient volcano, Mount Canobolas. And the region can genuinely claim to be a “cool climate” region as the vineyards are generally planted at around 600 metres above sea level making them some of the highest vineyards in Australia. And the topography of the region is dramatic, with areas of undulation punctuated by steep limestone escarpments and the torrents of the snakelike Belabula River. The Orange region really took off through the 1980s with a proliferation of plantings through that period and as the vines matured, as did the local industry. Cellar door outlets became commonplace and so too did B&Bs and eating houses – oenological tourism flourished. These days, the area has 1,500 hectares of vineyards spread across 80 different wineries and the success of the district is widely celebrated in October each year at the Orange Wine Festival.

While there are any number of terrific wineries in the region, one of my favourites is located on the southern slopes of Mount Canabolas near Panuara, about 35 kilometres to the south of the Orange township. With 220 hectares under vines, Angullong is the largest producer in the region and sits between 580 and 620 metres above sea level. While the winemaking team do make a cabernet and a shiraz, it’s their range of whites that most excites my palate. Their 2019 Angullong Pinot Grigio ($22) scored 96 points and was recently awarded the Trophy for the Best Pinot Gris/Grigio of the Show at the 2019 Australian Highland Wine Show and in doing so, underscored the irony of a troublesome vintage resulting in wines of exceptional quality; despite a low yield.

I do enjoy a good pinot grigio but it was the sister wine, the Angullong Sauvignon Blanc 2019 which most impressed my taste buds despite scoring slightly lower at 95 points at the same Highland Wine Show. It’s a lively and fresh style showing passionfruit and guava on the nose and some tangy pineapple and zesty lemon rind through the middle. The finish is nicely balanced by gentle acids and shows hints of grapefruit and citrus as it crosses the back palate. It’s a perfect choice for a Sunday afternoon tipple on the deck, but would equally acquit itself well served with Chinese Spicy Garlic Prawns. I’m salivating just thinking about it!

As the mercury climbs, most of us look for a refreshing style of white with solid fruit and a zippy finish; and the Angullong savvie certainly fits that bill, and at around $20 a bottle, is pretty good value as well.

The Clare is undoubtedly amongst the most picturesque of Australian wine districts with meandering creeks lined by eucalypts and punctuated by rows of green leafy trellises. Ranging from Auburn in the south to Stanley Flat to the north, the landscape may be similar throughout, but the soil type certainly isn’t. Depending on the part of the Valley you’re in, the soils can range from red terra rossa topsoil in Watervale, to slate and shale in Polish River and rich alluvial soils in the north where irrigation is rarely required. The variations in the terra firma mean that despite the climate being similar across the area, there can be subregional nuances in wines of the same varietal.

Unlike the shiraz from regions like the Barossa or McLaren Vale, those from the Clare rarely struggle with over-ripeness or excessive jaminess. The cooler nights enable the local winemakers to produce shiraz of medium body and an undeniable elegance. I’ve long been a fan of those produced from the Skillogalee Valley to the western edge of the Clare where the loamy soils with layers of quartz introduce an earthiness to the middle and a flintiness on the finish. But if a fleshy shiraz with pizzazz and balance is your thing, it’s hard not to also admire the Taylors Estate label shiraz.

The Taylors (Estate label) shiraz has long been one of the country’s best-selling wines, both domestically and abroad. The 2018 vintage has recently been released and is showing the quality you’d expect from an exceptional season. The 2018 vintage started off cooler than normal and was dry, frost-free, and without any of the heat waves that can be damaging to outcomes in the winery.

On the nose there is a hint of liquorice and forest floor. Swirl the glass and take a second whiff and the sweetness and spice of the American oak exposure is immediately apparent and soon followed by ripe plums, blackcurrants and a hint of chocolate through the middle. There’s a delightful texture on the palate and a delicate balance between fruit and tannin as the cassis and mint characters appear on the finish. What really makes the Taylors shiraz stand out is that despite the fruit being plump and ripe, the red berries don’t overwhelm the spice, acid and tannin that make for a classically Clare shiraz.

Approachable yet cellar-worthy, fruit forward though restrained, the 2018 vintage of the Taylors Estate label shiraz continues to set the benchmark for red wines at the $20 price point.

The blend benefits from the best attributes of each of the different varietals and is also capable of ageing gracefully, making it a wine of many dimensions.

And it’s also widely available thanks to the enormous size of the Bordeaux region – it covers an area of 120,000 hectares under vines and includes about 10,000 different wines made by about 7,500 different producers from about 60 different appellations (sub-regions).

Stylistically there can be significant variation in features and taste depending on the origin of the wine as those from the “left bank” are primarily made on a cabernet sauvignon grape while those from the “right bank” and based on merlot.

Sadly, you won’t be able to scrape the loose change out of the ashtray to buy a good Bordeaux red as you don’t get much for less than $50 a bottle.

If you want to experience the better blends from the more prestigious producers, you can expect to spend over $1,000 a bottle! So if like me, you’re a disciple of the style but don’t want to spend a king’s ransom in pursuit of oenological happiness, it might be worthwhile looking to local regions who are making red blends from the same grapes.

I’ve really enjoyed some Bordeaux style blends from the Yarra Valley in Victoria, but I recently stumbled across one from the Orange region in New South Wales which is a pretty good example of the classic blend.

The Patina Wines “Jezza” 2016 is made by winemaker, Gerald Naef, using a blend of 75% merlot, 17% cabernet franc, 7% cabernet and 1% pete verdot. The “Jezza” was first made in 2003 and is only made in exceptional vintages. Being based on merlot, it reminds more of a right bank blend but without the chalkiness or dustiness that we sometimes see on the finish of the real deal. According to the winemaker, he looks for “flavour, colour, freshness and good tannin structure” in selecting the grapes to use in Patina’s flagship red.

The 2016 vintage enjoyed near perfect conditions, so the fact that the Jezza was thoroughly enjoyable shouldn’t be a surprise.

On the nose, there were hints of cedar, cassis and fragrant violets, but once on the palate characters of hazelnut and blueberry emerge and meld with savoury nuances of roasted capsicum and saddle leather.

It’s a fruit-driven wine with plenty of ripeness and energy through the middle and a complexity that evolves as the flavours unfurl through an ever so slightly tannic and spicy conclusion. It’s still not what you’d call a budget-friendly wine at the $65 price point, but much better value than buying something with the terms “first growth” or “grand cru” on the label!

The Patina version of the Bordeaux icon wine is just about the best wine I’ve tasted from the Orange region – and I’m a big fan or their sauvignon blanc and chardonnay, so that’s saying something!

It’s a furphy of the ilk of the other famous dinner party quote that, “It’s the sulphites in red wine that give me a headache”. And I accept that everyone has an opinion on these unimportant matters and that research and data can be secured to support almost any proposition, but the weight of scientific opinion almost universally debunks these urban myths.

Sure, organic wines may be “healthier” wines than those not so certified, and sulphites, in general, might cause headaches to a small number of allergy sufferers, but if the sulphites in red wine give you a mild headache then, in theory, eating dried fruit like apricots should give you a migraine of gargantuan proportion. It’s not that well known, but there are more sulphites in a packet of dried fruit than a few bottles of Penfolds finest red!

And contrary to popular belief, it takes more than just using pesticide-free grapes to be classified as an organic wine. To earn that moniker, a certification from the Australian authority requires that the entire process from planting to cultivation and harvesting to vinification be undertaken in accordance with strict rules and requirements.

For producers, the process of becoming fully certified typically takes about three years and a whole lot of heartache along the way. Not only do primary producers have to write a substantial plan to evidence their organic farming protocols, but their property must be tested and audited in the process. The organic farmer will have to do away with pesticides and chemicals and utilise natural means to create “healthy” soils and to manage pest and disease. It means that organic vignerons will have to eschew the use of any synthetic compounds in fertilisers, and during winemaking, preservatives can’t be added.

It’s true that the reduced use of preservatives is a key distinguishing feature of organic wine, the allowable tolerance is much lower than conventional wines – rather than having around 300 parts per million (ppm), an organic wine may only have a maximum of 100 ppm for red wines and 150 ppm for whites, rosés and sparkling wine. But I remain to be convinced that the lower preservatives will prevent a hangover – and I can make that statement based on personal experience! Drink enough wine of any type and you’ll not feel particularly “chipper” the following day!

But credit where it’s due, some Australian winemakers are doing great work with organic farming, and at the end of the day, it isn’t meaning higher prices in the bottle shop. I recently tried the organic range from Pig in the House; an organic winegrower from the Canowindra in New South Wales.

Winemaker, Jason O’Dea, has won any number of awards for his wines, including Organic Wine of the Year at the 2017 Melbourne Royal Wine Show for his 2016 shiraz.

Working vineyards that were planted back in 1996, Jason has crafted a lovely Pig in the House Rose 2019 which is made predominantly of sangiovese but with a lashing of shiraz which he says was to “complement the flavour profile”. Personally, I wasn’t expecting such lively fruit given the very pale salmon colour in the glass. Cherries, red fruits and a luxurious mouthfeel are the hallmarks of this youthful pink wine. There are some gentle acids and a spiciness on the finish that will have you licking your lips and quickly reaching for the glass to take the next sip.

No longer does the term “organic” imply “forgive me for being alternate” or “B-grade, but better for you”. And if price matters, I reckon that the Pig in the House Rose 2019 is also pretty good value at less than $25 a bottle!