Content about Australian wine

March 10, 2013

Fine Tuning

A conundrum: Estates are always upgrading techniques and facilities. So why do so many older vintages taste delicious?

Great wine estates, and wine estates striving to be great, often give much contemplation and spend huge amounts of money making incremental changes they believe will make their wines even better or at least not let them fall behind their competitors.

March 3, 2013

Biltmore's Bi-Coastal Wines

North Carolina estate has it both ways, growing grapes locally and also buying them on the West Coast.

One of the most-interesting wineries in the United States is located in the Great Smoky Mountains near Asheville, North Carolina. You have probably heard about it but may not have tasted its wines unless you happened to have visited the property, which tens of thousands of people do annually.

February 24, 2013

Cloudy Bay Forage

A journey in the wilds becomes part search for food, part vision quest.

In recent years, Cloudy Bay – the winery that about 25 vintages ago introduced American consumers to Marlborough Sauvignon Blanc– has each February held a small event called “Forage.” True to its name, Forage is about collecting foods – wild and cultivated, animal and vegetable and mineral – that have as their habitat the Marlborough region at the northern tip of New Zealand’s South Islan

February 14, 2013

Blind Revelations

A no-peek tasting confirms Cape Mentelle makes a really good Cabernet - and that wine writers are experts in what we like and don't.

Although I prefer seeing the bottle label when I’m my writing tasting notes, blind tastings can be fun for what they tell us about wine regions and categories as well as what they tell us about ourselves as wine writers and critics.

December 6, 2012

Page Turners for Wine Lovers

Three holiday gift books that both amateur and advanced drinkers will savor.

People in the wine business who know Kevin Zraly understand that he likes to ask questions and then answer them. He’s just that kind of guy. And that process really works out well if you want to learn about wine, whether you’re a neophyte or have memorized all the crus of Burgundy.

March 22, 2012

Why this whole "balance" issue is a crock

Why this whole "balance" issue is a crock: At first, when word started getting around about a year or two ago, it was easy to dismiss: the notion that wines over 14% alcohol, or else picked “overripe,” are somehow inferior...

March 3, 2012

Look at old-world wines through new-world eyes.

Today’s emerging wine consumers do not follow yesterday’s guidelines or taste preferences.

Recently I was moderating a wine-and-food seminar when the topic turned to how many wine drinkers are bucking well-established trends of buying “old-world” wines and embracing extremely low-cost “new-world” wines.

May 19, 2011

Distant Beauty:

Australian wine country doesn’t begin and end in Barossa or even in the surrounding state of South Australia.