Sydney Riesling Tasting

[bacchaebabe]

Firstly thanks to Tim and Michelle for their hospitality and of course to everyone there on the night for all the wines and the food. Fantastic as always.

Tasting was on Monday 25th January 2010

98 Pol Roger
No real notes as we enjoyed this rather than tasted it but it was lovely and fresh and not too yeasty. I really like this marquee in the vintage version

Flight 1

86 Petaluma Riesling
Beautiful nose. Dark yellow but not as dark as the 95. Honey, slight lanolin and wax. Very rich. Slightly nutte and oily. Stunning. 95

90 Petaluma Riesling – Best of flight and WOTN
Very light yellow for age. Honeysuckle and a little lime still. Very long and lovely. Notes of marmalade. 96

95 Petaluma Riesling
Deep cheddar yellow colour. Oxidised. Burnt caramel wax. Made the mistake of tasting this when I knew damn well it was wrong. It wasn’t better on tasting. NR

97 Petaluma Riesling
Light yellow with hints of colour. Very fresh. Almost pineapple and honey with the honey developing over time. This seemed to be heading the same way as the other two wines. Still a little tart and limey. Feel confident to leave until 2017. 94

Flight 2

99 Pikes Riesling
Quite dark. Bordering on oxidised. Caramel notes with some honey. Drink up. 86

09 Pikes Riesling
Very light. Sav blanc like but not quite so big. Grassy, with lime, florals and minerals. Clean finish. Would be very good with seafood. Nice length. 90

99 Grosset Polish Hill Riesling
Medium Yellow. Beautiful rich honey nose. Really lovely and sweet but also a bit waxy. On the palate didn’t quite deliver the promises of the nose. Tasting a bit oxidised too so will look to drink up these. May have been a bad example but I’ll check another bottle soon I think to make sure. 89

09 Grosset Polish Hill Riesling
Very pale almost clear colour. Pineapple and guava. Very clean and fresh and linear with good acid. Very enjoyable drink. Just lovely. 92

95 Leo Buring Eden Valley Leonay – Wine of the flight
Medium yellow colour. Toasty and almost burnt. Touch of wax too but all coming together to form a very nice picture of aged Riesling. 94

99 Leo Buring Eden Valley Riesling
Light yellow. Very good colour for age which really seems to be an good indicator tonight. Very young tasting. Elements of wax coming through but still as young as. A bit of spiciness too. This was very good and to me showed enormous potential. 93

Flight 3

This whole flight was very pale in colour with almost nothing between them in this regard

03 Mesh Riesling
Matchstick, mild kero and spicy strong acid. Surprisingly developed but still quite OK. 90

08 Mesh Riesling
Limey citrus. Tasting very young and very good. I liked this a lot. Good acid but not overbearing in any way. Just lovely. 93

04 Castlerock Riesling
From Porongurup in the Great Southern region of WA. Slightly sweeter than the SA version but not sweet as such. Some orange on the nose.A little matchstick, a little less acid and some spice. 91

05 Grosset Watervale Riesling – Wine of the Flight
Limey nose. Very dry on palate. A bit harsh at the moment but has the acid to last. Opened up a bit nicely but probably not in a drinking window right now. 92

05 Peter Lehmann Eden Valley Riesling
Waxy kero with slight lime. Mid range in life too but quite enjoyably drinkable at this stage. Ended with a slightly bitter finish though. 91

09 Helm Murumbateman Riesling
Very young on nose. Sweeter floral and almost gwertz-like with some lychees. Jumps out of the glass as a food friendly style. Got a bit sweeter as it warmed up. 91

Flight 4

08 Mac Forbes RS37 Riesling
Very, very pale white colour. Strathbogie Ranges. 9.5% Sweeter nose than all previous although least sweet of this flight. Very clean and linear with plenty of acid. Very good actually. 92

09 Frogmore Creek FGR
Tasmania. 40 grs and 9.5%.Bubbles in the glass. Rose and subtle mango. Sweeter again with good acid. Some green apples. I really like both these wines. 92

07 Willi Schaefer Mosel Graacher Himmelreich Riesling Kabinet
8% More intense and richer on the nose – just stunning infact. More unctuous and more depth and even silky. Delicious. 93

71 Arnold Brosch Niersteiner Butes Domtal Auslese
Quite a dark yellow. A bit cardboard on nose. Corked and hard to see past that unfortunately. Some orange marmalade underneath. Not quite as bad as one could expect on palate but very subdued. NR

07 Reinhold Haart Piesport Goldtropfchen Auslese – Wine of the flight
8% Pale yellow. Gorgeous rich honey and toffee nose. Marmelade and citrus on palate. Really lovely this wine. 93

07 Schloss Lieser Brauneberger Juffer Sonnenuht Riesling Spatlese
8% Mosel. Almost clear. Bit more spice. Clenaer and fresher but still on the off dry sweeter style. Some ginger and matchstick sulphur. A bit leaner. 92

22 rieslings and 1 champagne and then these cognacs – because we really needed it

Hennesy XO Cognac
Chocolate, vanilla, sweet malty notes with some orange. Huge bang of alcohol when you taste it. Searing really and a bit much for me.

Remy Martin XO
Fruity, more orange in colour. Also alcoholic and burning on the finish and on my tongue! I find these quite difficult to drink Are they better with water? Can’t see myself getting into these although it might be more reasonable in colder weather.

[Softie]

Tim and Michelle,

It can't be said too much, thank you so much for your hospitality. We all had a wow of a night.

I go away having learnt heaps about how Rieslings age and a plans to accumulate a good cellar collection. I wish to single out Kris and Lisa for bringing six bottles - most of the precious aged variety. Kris, I feel so fortunate to have enjoyed your wine knowledge and your company; long may they both continue to be enjoyed.

Congrats to everyone for once more confirming the high participation and great spirits of our tasting (and fine food) group.

I strongly encourage others near North Shore and Inner West Sydney to join in. Please PM me if you'd like to chat and get the details.

Regards,

John

[Gavin Trott]

Sounds great

Loving those really good 2007 German Kabinet Rieslings, great style, great vintage and terrific wines!

Wish I'd been there! (where's that 'I'm jealous' smilie?)

That'll do!

.

[dave vino]

Yep had a ball as usual.

We broke every rule we'd made the previous dinner (to bring less food and to bring less wine) but I think everyone like me, is just happy to share our wines with appreciative, like-minded people.

I actually preferred the non-blind tasting we did this time as it was a lot quicker and we could concentrate on the wines and compare how certain ones age.

Tim and Michelle were wonderful hosts and had a great entertaining area for 14 people. And Gavin made a great dessert which suited the sweeter rieslings we were tasting at the time.

Next month (April-ish) is
CLASSIC AUSTRALIAN LABELS (ICON MAKERS - WHITE OR RED ANY VINTAGE)
So I expect to see plenty of *cough* Grange, Wendouree, Rockford, HoG, Giaconda *cough*

[monghead]

Arghhh, missed another one...

Would love to turn up to the next one guys...

Monghead.

[WineAroundOz]

Dang! As a bit of a newbie to this forum, how do you get to know about these nights?!

[griff]

Dang! As a bit of a newbie to this forum, how do you get to know about these nights?!

Live in Sydney

cheers

Carl

p.s. is it time for another Perth offline?

[WineAroundOz]

Dang! As a bit of a newbie to this forum, how do you get to know about these nights?!

Live in Sydney

cheers

Carl

p.s. is it time for another Perth offline?

yeah I do MOST the time, just not this month. When's the next one?

[Softie]

Tim and others in Sydney,

We have set up a Yahoo group ("email hub") for our Sydney tasting group (Inner West and North Shore) and that medium is used in the main to set and organise our fantastic nights. We've become quite active and successful in enjoying good wine and good company.

Please PM me (Tim and others) with an email address and I will ask administrator Alex to authorise that account and send you the invite to login and join our group communications system.

We are getting to the limits of numbers effectively handled in one tasting (~14 often), but larger numbers could enable a second group in a particular area or give us scale when we all start to miss the occasional night.

A proposal (see Dave above) is that the next night is in April - Icon wines. By past experience several will not wish to wait that long. We'll wait and see what consensus arises.

Warm regards,
John

[Alex F]

April!

What happened to Feb or March?!

[dave vino]

Well a few people said on the night that they were out of action for the next month or so for various reasons. Anyway the January one was closer to Feb so it will be nearly March for the next one and someone else mentioned maybe another dinner at Atelier...so I figured with that it might well be heading towards April-ish if that's the case.

[RedVelvet]

Another fantastic evening with great wines, food and company. As usual it was fantastic to see you all again. The Rieslings were fantastic especially the 86 and 90 petaluma's seriously great Rieslings. Also a special mention to make sure some of that 09 Grosset Polish Hill goes into my Cellar..... very very good and i have no doubt will be great in years to come. The Leo Burings were also fantastic and to me showed just how similar they can be even in differing vintages.

I have for some time been trying more and more German Rieslings both young, old and very very old and they just keep me coming back. For me this trend will continue, the Germans on the night were fantastic young wines.

Looking forward to the next tasting.