Oh how times have changed in Oz.

[Phil Wilkins]

And perhaps the greatest Australian pictorial wine book ever - featuring mullets!

Surely this has got to be an old A4 - 518 page pre-1984 pictorial history of Oz wines. Just the most fascinating collection of early eighties (and before) photographs & text ever available on Australian wines.

Gawd all the ‘maps’ seem a little bare then compared too now but a real history is evoked as the ‘start of the Australian march’ to familiarity as we know it now.

The book is boringly called "The Great Australian Wine Book" & published in 1985. Compiled by Robert Mayne it features at least 1500 pre 1984 photographs of still surviving producers + the non survivors. Certainly a historical pictorial book now & most erm… ‘facts’ still hold true except... just…

A Top Dozen
"The important wine consumer is not the person who drinks only first growth Claret. ItÂ’s a person who keeps a cask in the fridge, enjoys a bottle of sparkling wine every now & then, in table wines, likes wines with a touch of sweetness and reds which are smooth and fruity and donÂ’t bite as they go down"

Summerwine - Kaiser Stuhl
Ben Ean Moselle – Lindemans
Kaiser Stuhl Rose
Seaview Cabernet Sauvignon
Mc Williams Cream Sherry
Houghton White Burgundy!!!!!! Still surviving as HWB & an Oz classic
Great Western Champagne
Parra Liqueur Port
JacobÂ’s Creek Claret
Coolabah Casks
Wolf Blass Rhine Riesling
Grange Hermitage – I’m not arguing here!!!!

Oh how times have changed.

[markg]

I have that book - its great, full of interesting stuff !!

[GraemeG]

Twenty years ago, and only 1½ wines on the list are correctly (ie. not generically) labelled. And one - the Seaview C/S - was probably a pretty good wine. Even the other - WB Rhine Riesling - was likely a decent wine as well. No quibbling with Grange, or Para. The Houghtons isn't a bad wine either. I'll wager the fruit going into Jacob's Creek was a damn sight better quality than sees the bottle nowadays, even if technology has marched on a bit.

But it's a bit hard to imagine any 'serious' published volume these days even devoting a page to cask wine, never mind odd brands like 'Summerwine' - if indeed any still exist. And yet I see 'Ben Ean Moselle' is still available, under screwcap these days. No mention of constituent grapes on the label. I guess all that Sultana has to go somewhere though.

It's funny with their long histories that there are no Wynns or other Penfolds wines on the list. They may have been seen as very 'specialist' back then...

cheers,
Graeme

[KMP]

Jeez, I 've had all those except for the Kaiser Stuhl's. Good 'ol Ben Ean Moselle - used to be adequate for a warm summer afternoon on Sydney Harbor. I seem to remember one of the wine mags giving it a good write up in the late '70s. Well at least it was cheap! And McWilliams Cream Sherry - do they still make that?

Mike

[Adair]

McWilliams Cream Sherry - do they still make that?

My granny is still drinking it!

Adair

[Muscat Mike]

Shame on you GG. WHo maketh the Grange??????????????????????????
MM.

[GraemeG]

Shame on you GG. WHo maketh the Grange??????????????????????????
MM.

I said 'other Penfolds'. By the mid 80s Penfolds had a pretty big range of reds doing the rounds - and I might have expected another wine on the list. Note the absence of Bin 389 f'instance. But, as I said, I'm guessing they were looking more for everyday-drinkers, hence the presence of cask wines on the list...

cheers,
Graeme