As the days lengthen and Spring takes grip, red wine drinkers often find themselves shelving the heavy cabernet and shiraz that added warmth over winter in favour of lighter styles like gamay, chianti and pinot noir. At my place, any red with a degree of translucence takes priority as the mercury climbs and the humidity…
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Riesling is on the rise as versatility adds to her attraction. Move over Fonz, after years of being courted by sauvignon blanc, there’s a new cool kid in town and her name is Riesling! It seems that what started out as just a small group of friends and family lip-syncing the chorus, has become a…
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As the mercury climbs a cold glass of Sauvignon Blanc or Riesling usually becomes a Sunday afternoon staple, but a rise in the temperature doesn’t have to mean that the red varietals have to be banished to the back of the cellar. In fact, there are plenty of reds that are well suited to the…
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Sangiovese is the most commonly grown red grape in Italy and presently accounts for 250 000 acres of plantings and almost 10 % of all winemaking grapes planted in the country. It’s a versatile fruit that does best through the middle of the of the “boot” and in recent years it has been expanding its…
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The terms “Vielles Vignes” or “old vines” have become to the wine industry what buzzwords like “superfood”, “natural” and “organic” are to products on the supermarket shelves; terms that sound impressive to the consumers and get the cash registers ringing, but beyond enabling a price premium to be achieved, does it really make any discernible…
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When a close mate announced he was travelling to South America for Chilean Wine Week in Portillo for his 50th birthday, and extended an invitation to join him, it was like moths to a porch light – not just for me, but for 11 of us in total. After all, what better way to expand…
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A tree change may sound blissful, if not idyllic to those of us who become jaded by the traffic snarls of a peak hour commute or the hectic pace of 21st century business life but to former Sunshine Coast locals, Warren and Sue Smith, it was a dream that was to become a reality when…
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The Central Otago district in New Zealand’s south island is quickly developing a reputation as a world-class producer of Pinot Noir and aromatic whites, despite being the world’s most southern wine producing region. Once seen as a foolhardy foray in to cool climate viticulture, the area has been ranked by some well regarded wine writers…
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It may not be a style which is frequently vinted on its own, but Cabernet Franc is undoubtedly an enigmatic grape with a fascinating history. Thought to have originated in the Basque Country in the Western Pyrenees, Cabernet Franc has been proven through DNA analysis to be a parent of Cabernet Sauvignon. In the late…
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