Hi All,
Being a relative novice in the field of wino’ing I am after some advice in broad generalization terms of best regions/years/style for particular wine varieties.
Eg – Barossa 06 shiraz seems to be very favourable, however Margaret river ’06 shiraz not so. Coonawarra ‘04/’05 Cab Sav seemed to produce a few high quality wines etc. Do you have any other regions that on a whole produced great wines of a particular style in a particular year?
Cheers
Paul
Best Region/Year/Variety
Hi,
The wine auction site Langton's has an Australian vintage chart here. It will give you a broad idea, but these ratings are simplifications and often it depends on your wine preference. You can see for instance that Barossa Shiraz 2006 has a relatively low mark of 7/10.
Langton's also has a Vintage Report that goes into more detail about what was wrong with a vintage, although it's a bit coy on Barossa 06. If I remember correctly, the quick ripening meant some fruit was picked too ripe. At any rate, for my palate a lot of the 06 wines are a bit sweet and simple, but if you like your wines a bit sweeter you may not mind that. Jay Miller of the Wine Advocate rated the 06 Amon Ra 100 points I think, while I thought it was clearly inferior to the 04 and 05 and not worth the asking price.
The wine auction site Langton's has an Australian vintage chart here. It will give you a broad idea, but these ratings are simplifications and often it depends on your wine preference. You can see for instance that Barossa Shiraz 2006 has a relatively low mark of 7/10.
Langton's also has a Vintage Report that goes into more detail about what was wrong with a vintage, although it's a bit coy on Barossa 06. If I remember correctly, the quick ripening meant some fruit was picked too ripe. At any rate, for my palate a lot of the 06 wines are a bit sweet and simple, but if you like your wines a bit sweeter you may not mind that. Jay Miller of the Wine Advocate rated the 06 Amon Ra 100 points I think, while I thought it was clearly inferior to the 04 and 05 and not worth the asking price.
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cuttlefish
- Posts: 1014
- Joined: Thu Sep 22, 2005 1:46 pm
- Location: Sunbury
GaryW will come and ace this soon ... but if we talk great vintages ...
04 - Cabernet (Barossa, Coonawarra, Margaret River)
02 - Reds (Clare Valley)
05 - Riesling (Clare Valley, Eden Valley, Henty) -- also 02
00 - Shiraz (Hunter Valley)
98/04 - Shiraz (Great Western - Victoria)
90, 96 - Great reds across all of SA ...
The problem with vintage ratings is that they are so general. 04-06 in the Barossa appears less consistent than say 1996 but the top wines may be as good or better.
04 - Cabernet (Barossa, Coonawarra, Margaret River)
02 - Reds (Clare Valley)
05 - Riesling (Clare Valley, Eden Valley, Henty) -- also 02
00 - Shiraz (Hunter Valley)
98/04 - Shiraz (Great Western - Victoria)
90, 96 - Great reds across all of SA ...
The problem with vintage ratings is that they are so general. 04-06 in the Barossa appears less consistent than say 1996 but the top wines may be as good or better.
“There are no standards of taste in wine. Each mans own taste is the standard, and a majority vote cannot decide for him or in any slightest degree affect the supremacy of his own standard". Mark Twain.
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winetastic
- Posts: 889
- Joined: Mon Apr 03, 2006 9:51 pm
- Location: Sydney
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Daryl Douglas
- Posts: 1361
- Joined: Fri Sep 05, 2003 7:23 pm
- Location: Nth Qld
Paulo wrote:The '07 reds will be fantastic from the Margaret River region. I have tried some Cab's and Shiraz', which although very young were fruity,dense, inky wines and just screaming for some age.
The most recent reds from MR that I've tried are Voyager cab/merl 04 and Capel Vale cab 05 but have a couple of Cullen DM 04s that stretched my affordability index to the max - they're for much later. MR premiums are generally quite expensive but then so too these days, are many SA and Vic reds.
France 2005
2005 was a great year in France.
Shoot out and buy some 2005 Burgundy (VC's have Maison Champy Bourgogne on special at the moment, and it is good entry level), Bordeaux (Dan Murphy's has loads of this from $10 - more than I can afford, but the stuff around $16 is superb), and Cotes du Rhone, or Cotes du Ventoux (try the Paul Jaboulet Les Traverses).
You may have heard things about French wine (light, lacking flavour, tannic), well things are changing fast, and while they fortunately don't taste like a lot of Australian red wine (which I am struggling to find much excting about at the moment, with a few notable exceptions) they are quite generous in flavour.
Moreover they cellar well, so you can enjoy them for many years to come.
Shoot out and buy some 2005 Burgundy (VC's have Maison Champy Bourgogne on special at the moment, and it is good entry level), Bordeaux (Dan Murphy's has loads of this from $10 - more than I can afford, but the stuff around $16 is superb), and Cotes du Rhone, or Cotes du Ventoux (try the Paul Jaboulet Les Traverses).
You may have heard things about French wine (light, lacking flavour, tannic), well things are changing fast, and while they fortunately don't taste like a lot of Australian red wine (which I am struggling to find much excting about at the moment, with a few notable exceptions) they are quite generous in flavour.
Moreover they cellar well, so you can enjoy them for many years to come.