Best NZ/AUS Chardonnay & Pinot Noir Offline - Fri 13 Oct

[TiggerK]

Hey everyone,

All this talk of Chardonnay and Pinot Noir is making me thirsty! Late Oct/early Nov is busy for me, so hot on the heels of the Wendouree offline next week, I'm going to see what interest we get for this date and theme.

When : Friday 13th October 6.30pm

Where : MissyK - Shop 1 / 160 Flinders St, Paddington/Surry Hills - [url]https://www.missyk.com.au/[/url]

What :Higher End Chardonnay and Pinot Noir from NZ or Australia - Bring wines you think will be the favourites in a blind tasting format. I want to stick to vintages from 2010-2016 for Chardonnay and 2006-2016 for Pinot to ensure we get a mix of age and youth without too much bias towards very mature bottles. We could even go younger across the board, but I love a bit of age so don't want to sacrifice goodness!

Format : Bring 2 wines per person, ideally one Chard, one Pinot but 2 of either is OK, just say so beforehand. If people only want to bring one bottle, that is OK too, just make it a good one to be fair on others. 3 bottles per couple is also just fine. (Before anyone gets preachy about too many bottles, past events have proven that most people bring at least 2 bottles each anyway, so this is hardly OTT). We will have plenty of spittoons, food and water.

Wines will be shown double blind. Please mask your wines when bringing them and for the Chard, ideally bring it cool/cold. I'll pour each wine into a decanter and number them clearly (and accurately !) before serving. Wines will be served in groups of 3.

We'll do a group vote on 1st and 2nd choice per flight, reveal, chat and move on.

Bring : Your Wines (masked), 3 Glasses and ideally cash for the restaurant bill.

Who: Event is now full. Taking reserves in case of any dropouts.

If people could please PM me ASAP with the wines you want to bring (or email/txt if you know my details). This will ensure we get a good representation across the 'favourites' list as per the other thread. We're not limiting it to those wines of course, but that is a group of forum favourites we would like to cover for the most part. If someone has already nominated your wine I'll contact you asking for alternative options or if you really want/need I can ask the other person if they wouldn't mind choosing something else.

Attendees
Tim - wines known
CamW - wines known
Deejay81 & Lauren - wines known
Dingozegan - wines known
catchandrelease - wines known
bobthebuilder - wines known
Croquet King - wines known
Nineredpens - wines known
rooman - Pinot known
Jim L - ?????
odyssey - wines known

pc79? - unlikely to make it (but a spot is available if you can make it last minute).



MissyK on the map...
[img]http://www.grapemates.org/files/TimMiscStuff/MissyKMap.JPG[/img]

[camw]

Pencil me in please Tim.

[deejay81]

Sounds fun!

Please put down Lauren and myself!!

The date works well too!

[dingozegan]

Sounds good! Keen to join.

[TiggerK]

Cooll, half full already!

I've updated the first post with a few extra thoughts on vintages and asking people to let me know the wines via PM. Having the same wine twice would indeed be interesting but I'll wait and see what people want to bring before chopping and changing. We want to get a good range across the best examples.

I'll know the wines but will ask someone to mix up my glasses so I"m still doing it single blind.

Strictly speaking I suppose we'd keep the vintage range really narrow, but given different styles, vintage conditions, ability to age and each persons willingness to bring wines that are showing well, I felt 2010+ for Chardonnay and 2006+ for Pinot would ensure a good mix while not skewing too much towards older wines. Open to discussion!

[catchnrelease]

Please put me down. I should be able to make it down for this one. Knock on wood.

Will bring one of each.

[rooman]

ok, I am in.

[rooman]

If we could try and get a good split on the wines between NZ and Aus that would be extra interesting. There are a number of the kiwi wines that many of us have never had a chance to try, especially the Kumeu River and Neudorf.

[Bobthebuilder]

in please!

[Croquet King]

If there's space I'm in.

[rooman]

My wine friend who came to the riesling evening would like to also come. Tim can you pls put Jim L down for one

[rooman]

Separately has anyone noticed we are doing this on Black Friday, Friday 13. For those who are superstitious it's not a great omen especially for wines under cork.

[TiggerK]

It's OK Mark, I'll be avoiding ladders, black cats, footpath cracks and will touch wood (cork) before opening each wine so I reckon we'll be OK......

All good so far people, we have one spot left, then reserves.

Please note I want to focus on comparing the best chardonnays and Pinots across both countries, not your favourite best bang for buck Chardy. Unless you really think it will equal the best. I'm not saying it has to be expensive to be good, just saying we can drink $25 Chards or Pinots anytime we want, this is a chance to try the best examples across both countries next to each other.

Will confirm the venue on the weekend, just waiting for the booking details to be sorted out and availability confirmation.

PM me your wines! Give an extra option or two if you can so I can fine tune the lineup to get a good spread of the favourite examples. I'm using the other 'Crushing!' thread as a guideline based on feedback from various forumites, so hoping most examples are in that thread somewhere.

Cheers
Tim

[Ozzie W]

Separately has anyone noticed we are doing this on Black Friday, Friday 13. For those who are superstitious it's not a great omen especially for wines under cork.

You've got it all wrong. Everything to do with wine is based on the lunar calendar, not the Gregorian calendar. Fri 13 October is a fruit day which means it's a very auspicious day to drink wine. You picked a great date for the offline. You're lucky you didn't pick a root day.

[TiggerK]

Thanks for that Ozzie, as long as it's a fruit day then all the wines will taste great. Another disaster averted! Phew, we're back on track, touch wood.

[VINH NGUYEN]

Ill take the last spot Tim

[TiggerK]

Vinh! Long time no hear mate. OK done.

[VINH NGUYEN]

Vinh! Long time no hear mate. OK done.

Most of the offlines have been during the week so i havent been able to make many of them, also i tried a 2013 mayford chardy the last time i was at an offline and it was a revelation! So hoping to try some few new chardys see if there are any in the mayford style.

[9redpens]

Ill bench please. !!!

[rooman]

It would be great if we could get a decent split between kiwi chardonnays and Australian ones. We have seen plenty of LEAS and Vat 47 at recent offlines but no Kumeu River or Neudorf. Hopefully someone in Sydney has these in their cellars.

[pc79]

Hi tim, if there are still spots available I may be keen. Wife's approval pending

[TiggerK]

Have to go on the reserves for now Paul but there are often dropouts...

Yes heard you the first time Mark, but we're at the mercy of what people offer. You know I'm good for a Kiwi or two though!! We'll definitely have a Kumeu, but I've got no Neudorf left.

[rooman]

Have to go on the reserves for now Paul but there are often dropouts...

Yes heard you the first time Mark, but we're at the mercy of what people offer. You know I'm good for a Kiwi or two though!! We'll definitely have a Kumeu, but I've got no Neudorf left.

Must be getting very old, seems I’m repeating myself.

Which KR do you have?

[TiggerK]

Got some of each from a few diff vintages, not sure what I'll bring yet, Prob should have made it just Chardonnay only!! But I thought nice to have white and red over a night. We can always do another event another time.... same thing, different bottles.

[Polymer]

I love that we've graduated to 2 wines per person .

[rooman]

I love that we've graduated to 2 wines per person .

Or one very good example.

[rooman]

Got some of each from a few diff vintages, not sure what I'll bring yet, Prob should have made it just Chardonnay only!! But I thought nice to have white and red over a night. We can always do another event another time.... same thing, different bottles.

I think you got the format correct. A whole evening of just chardonnay might be a bit much.

[pc79]

Have to go on the reserves for now Paul but there are often dropouts...

Yes heard you the first time Mark, but we're at the mercy of what people offer. You know I'm good for a Kiwi or two though!! We'll definitely have a Kumeu, but I've got no Neudorf left.

I'll sit behind my man Dan on the bench.

[TiggerK]

Venue is confirmed and booked. MissyK - Dumplings and pan-asian cuisine. Map on the first post. [url]https://www.missyk.com.au/[/url]

We have confirmed a booking of their 'private room' and our food co-ordinator bobtheorderer will take care of the menu as he's a regular. Will try to keep the chilli level to a minimum.

Expect plenty of dumplings! And I suspect a few misc seafood plates, pork plates and of course some duck pancakes for the Pinots.

Not close to trains but should be no issue with an uber/taxi, bus or even an (uphill) walk from Central/CBD. I suspect parking will be difficult for anyone driving and spitting though.

For those that haven't yet please let me know your chosen wines via PM as soon as you know them. No hurry as still 3 weeks away, but hoping to know them all by the week prior.

Cheers
Tim

[rooman]

For information purposes only, there is an in-store tasting of the Bass Phillip wines this Tuesday at Five Ways in Sydney. (Gavin I trust you don't mind me sharing this info in the context of the discussion above).

I see the Reserve is now going for $750 per bottle whilst the Premium is $250 per bottle.

It is also interesting to see Five Ways rates the top three Pinots in the country as Bass Phillips, By Farr and Bindi.