My slightly offbeat and spiritual sister would say it is fate or destiny, but some of the best viticultural discoveries I’ve encountered were completely unintended and happened upon purely by chance. Big Sis would take a fatalistic view and claim it was karma at play but I personally prefer to see these happenings as chance,…
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Sardinian wine may hold the key to a long life Cannonau di Sardegna may be earning its’ fame as the “longevity grape from Sardinia”, but for all the touted health benefits it offers, it is a remarkably palatable drop. The “it’s good for you” spin, may be just the work of clever local marketers, but…
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Hahndorf Hill blend impresses They are a producer best known for their successful introduction of Gruner Veltliner to the Australian Wine Consumer and now the team at Hahndorf Hill are pioneering other Austrian styles like Blaufrankisch, Zweigelt and St Laurent and now, it seems, Trollinger as well. They may not be house hold names, but…
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The Yarra Valley is considered a cold climate – but is it really? As I poured a glass of the 2008 Coldstream Hills Pinot Noir to take the edge off last Sunday’s mustard crusted lamb racks (which, I admit, were worthy of a Master Chef elimination), I pondered the “cool climate” regionality claimed by the…
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They produce Grenache wines of complexity The Grenache varietal is thought to have originated in Spain, where the hot dry climate is ideal. PARADOXICAL it may be but, despite Australia being a “New World” wine producer, we are also home to some of the oldest Grenache vines in the world! While European vineyards suffered at…
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“I like to try everything” Niamh (“Neve”) Peren tells me. And these are not the words of an experimental millennial, but rather the open-minded views of the globe-trotting daughter of Adam and Kristin Peren, the folks behind the “Two Sisters” brand from Central Otago. Niamh has recently returned home to the family property at Gibbston…
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Trend, fad, passion or fetish, call it what you will, but the growing obsession with rosé as a style seems to have finally entrenched itself in foodie culture and it seems the craze is not confined to Australian shores. In the US, a 2014 industry report observed an annual increase in retail sales of rosé…
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By Australian standards, good French wine is undeniably expensive. While we consider the “best” Australian brands like Penfolds Grange to be ridiculously expensive (at prices approaching $800 a bottle for the current release), many French producers would consider the ask of our winemakers to be “entry level”. After all, the Premier Grand Cru French Wines…
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Another day in the French Riviera, and another opportunity for some serious viticultural research. Though, given that Rose from Provence is beginning to dominate the pink vin de table market, one hardly needs to travel the 16,000 kilometres to Cannes to sample wines from the region! Just take a look at the origin of the…
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It’s a wine that can be difficult to pronounce and challenging to find in local bottle shops, but the Spanish Red Rioja (pronounced Ree-Oh-hah) is an old world wine that you can buy even if you don’t have the bank balance of a real estate tycoon! In northern Spain on the banks of the Oja…
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