The Auswine Forum

NOBLEROTTERSSYDNEY - CANBERRA - Glass Brasserie, Sydney (5/02/2025) Glenn makes a trip around his local neighbourhood and brings a case of Canberra wine for us to work through to kick off 2025. Still wines were served in pairs. 2022 Lake George Winery Blanc de Blanc - Australia, New South Wales, So...

Never lunched at Chromy, though it looks very pleasant. Esp if you want to sit outside in the garden. Don't think the food is bargain-priced, though!

WINERIES TAMAR & VIC JAN 25 - Tamar, Glenrowan (13/01/2025-20/01/2025) A few random wineries picked up on travels around the Pipers Brook region of Tasmania, plus one Victorian on the way home. There are at least 36 wineries open for tastings in Pipers Brooks if you followed a ~170km loop drive...

Actually, Seppeltsfield was interesting in one sense. I was taking notes on my little printed template as usual. This prompted a bit more interaction with the server, who was less than month into the job. After prompting, I confessed to earning the WSET III certificate years ago, and she had just do...

ADELAIDE AREA WINERIES DEC 2024 - Cellar Doors (26/12/2024-31/12/2024) This was mainly a family trip so wine-related matters were secondary. Even when we did visit it was pretty cursory normally and I didn’t usually interact with the staff as much as I normally might, nor did I seek out anything ot...

Finally flying down to Adelaide next Monday to see my brother for a week, about 6 years after he moved there! My first time there in 24 years! Not fully organised yet, but I thought of getting through a 98 Wendouree Shiraz, 99 Quintet, 02 RWT shiraz, 04 Yeringberg cab blend as things that are due to...

Be lovely to know the prices - or the retail ones at least.
This is always where the whole Burgundy train comes off the rails, at least in my experience!

NOBLEROTTERSSYDNEY - WYNNS CABERNET VERTICAL: 06-15 - Glass Brasserie, Sydney (6/11/2024) Back in 2003 Stephen put on a dozen-bottle vertical of the Wynns Cabernet (actually labelled ‘Black Label’ since about 2009?) covering 1986 and 1990-2000. This is a later iteration, served blind, with only ten...

Wretched, awful news.

Nice notes. I'd certainly have bet against both Vat 9s being drinkable at that age (brett, etc) yet not surprised about the St Peters'.

Only ever been to Cafe Sydney on company coin.
Never been to Aria!

2015 Bleasdale Cabernet Sauvignon The Iron Duke - Australia, South Australia, Fleurieu, Langhorne Creek (31/07/2024) {screwcap, 14.5%} Showing some age in the hue. Evolving nose of stewed blackberry, soy, raisin, balsamic. Medium full weight, warm, with flavours tracking the aromas. Mild tannins, s...

NOBLEROTTERSSYDNEY - EXHUMING RELICS - Glass Brasserie, Sydney (7/08/2024) “Bring your oldest wine to share” was the theme. That meant back-ups! Perhaps surprisingly, nothing was undrinkable, although one or two bottles turned out to be for emergency use only. Otherwise the overall standard was ama...

NOBLEROTTERSSYDNEY - WINE I LIKE - Glass Brasserie, Sydney (3/07/2024) Change of theme to a blind tasting of ‘favourite’ wines, more-or-less. Pretty much a free-for-all, at least that’s how I took it. Five absentees, two guests, and yet there seemed to be plenty of wine. 2012 G. H. Mumm & Cie C...

Thought it was a pretty crap vintage, wasn't it? Or was that just Hunter? I tasted the same year of both the SV and Hilltops back in Jan at the winery and wasn't really impressed with either.

2019 Jean-Pierre Moueix Bordeaux - France, Bordeaux (30/06/2024) {diam, 14%} A touch thin at first, but a bit of air in the glass did wonders for this. Dry, crunchy, soft currant fruit, dilute but not unripe. Medium weight. Soft dusty tannins, lowish acidity. It's all a bit short but not unbalanced...

...and in terms of units of measurement, I was always amused by a wine forum signature which defined the 'millihelen' : The amount of beauty required to launch a single ship. That was me, for a while, somewhere! On Grange: cellaring trumps winemaking, winemaking trumps vintage. Vintage is core, but...

2017 Wynns Coonawarra Estate Cabernet Sauvignon Black Label - Australia, South Australia, Limestone Coast, Coonawarra (25/05/2024) {screwcap, 13.4%} Mild, hardly-developing leafy-but-ripe mainstream cabernet. Little different to my last note in Jan-23. Ticks all the boxes but doesn't really excite ...

NOBLEROTTERSSYDNEY - AARON'S HUNTER SHIRAZ - Glass Brasserie, Sydney (5/06/2024) So Aaron digs into the cellar to line up some long-pedigree Hunter wines for a combined horizontal/vertical (a matrix?) tasting with dinner. Some history, then, for context. Mount Pleasant’s Old Paddock & Old Hill ...

NOBLEROTTERSSYDNEY - SANGIOVESE & TEMPRANILLO - Glass Brasserie, Sydney (1/05/2024) Sangiovese & Tempranillo - odd sort of a theme; I’m not sure in what way these two grapes are related, except they might be regarded as the premier grapes of Italy & Spain respectively. Unless, of course...

NOBLEROTTERSSYDNEY - BORDEAUX NIGHT - Glass Brasserie, Sydney (7/02/2024) Bordeaux night. New Year, new venue, same old crowd, more-or-less! All the Bordeaux in this country seems to be either under $50 and pretty unremarkable, or over $500 and sometimes remarkable. Such a big hole in the mid-palat...

WINERY VISIT: CENTENNIAL & CHERRY TREE HILL - Southern Highlands, NS (1/03/2024) Centennial Vineyards A decade plus since my last visit and the Tuscan-style complex here seems unchanged. Except, all the reds bar pinot have gone from the vineyard; soil, weather not suitable. Big mistake, then. S...

CLONAKILLA WINERY - Canberra (26/01/2024) In the ‘new’ cellar door set-up since the last visit, although I discover that it was opened in 2016, so that’s how time flies when you become an old codger. On a public holiday the place was nearly deserted; all wines for sale also on tasting, with no tast...

[url=https://www.cellartracker.com/event.asp?iEvent=53719] CAMPBELLS CELLAR DOOR - Rutherglen (25/01/2024) [/url] A drop-in visit rather too near to closing time for this long-time Rutherglen stalwart to taste all the wines on offer (25 table wines plus ten fortifieds!). The corresponding benefit of...

COAL VALLEY WINERIES - Coal Valley, Tasmania (13/01/2024) Pooley Wines Cellar Door is busier than ever, although it’s largely the restaurant that’s flooding the place with people. $15 buys you a tasting of 5 basic wines, then you can taste single vineyard bottlings for $10 a pair. Beyond that, $10 ...

Been a bit slack about posting dinner notes here for a while, so catching up now! NOBLEROTTERSSYDNEY - MARG RIVER & GREAT SOUTHERN - Fix, St James, Sydney (6/12/2023) Another Margaret River night – following on from 2005, 2008, 2011, 2017, 2021. The theme was meant to compare MR to Great Souther...

I'm a sucker for a grape I've never had before, I gotta say! Often it only confirms why a grape might be obscure, but often you think 'this isn't bad at all', almost to the point of wondering whether the 'noble' grapes are truly better, or just benefiting from a historic accident. That said, there's...

Does anyone else have the problem of not being able to proceed to the target URL when clicking on links such as the one above? Yes. It's been a problem here for a couple of years. The http part of the URL for some reason does not get included in the hyperlink. I generally copy the whole URL into th...

Anyone read Andrew Caillard's mega-book (3 volumes) on the history of the Oz wine industry?
Since nothing ever seemed to come of that tour Andrew Jefford did all those years ago...
Anyway, anyone seen it? Browsed it?

Oh dear. Very low level in the bottle = leaky cork = likely to be oxidised and undrinkable.
Couple that with no name or pedigree (ie. it's not Grange!) and a very average vintage in 1974 and you've got nothing of value.
Sorry.