From the category archives:

Australia

Tempus Two 2011 Pinot Gris

5 January 2012
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Knowing Tempus Two‘s pedigree, I was really looking forward to trying the wines. Tempus Two was founded by Lisa McGuigan, part of the justly famous McGuigan clan of Australian winemakers. Lisa is the 4th generation of McGuigans to go into the winery business and although she at first shied away from it, working in the [...]

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Some Young Punks Monsters, Monsters Attack! 2010 Riesling

14 December 2011
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Gotta catch ‘em all, eh? By which I mean I’ve been gradually trying to work my way through the Punks’ canon and I’m pretty sure this is the first white wine I’ve come to. The unusually named Monsters, Monsters Attack! is a Riesling varietal harvested in the Clare Valley; a region with far-reaching heritage, by [...]

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2008 Virgilius by Yalumba

31 October 2011
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France is the home of Viognier, Condrieu being the most famous of the wines made from the grape. Viognier however, doesn’t just grow in the Rhone Valley. It has found a home in the Eden Valley in Australia and has been carefully cultivated by the winery of Yalumba. They planted Viognier 26 years ago and [...]

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Wolf Blass Pinot Noir Chardonnay Sparkling Brut 2008

9 September 2011
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Putting the ‘sham’ in Champagne, Wolf Blass is one of many, many winemakers worldwide defying the French AOC’s entitlement to the holy grail of sparkling wine grape combinations and giving it a go themselves. And why not? With a birth in the family in recent weeks we’ve been popping more corks than we normally have [...]

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2010 Bella Riva Pinot Grigio/Vermentino

1 September 2011
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The De Bortoli family emigrated to Australia in the 1920s from Northern Italy. The founders Vittorio and Giuseppina De Bortoli put down roots, so to speak, in the Riverina Valley in New South Wales and began the wine dynasty that is now De Bortoli Wines. Their son Deen was the true innovator and he expanded [...]

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Aussie Riesling – Increasingly Popular and Respected

14 July 2011
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Once upon a time, the Rhine Riesling was Australia‘s premier white wine grape. Then the Aussie wine makers discovered Chardonnay and there was a mass planting of vines for that white wine grape with the production of Riesling declining as a consequence. However, in recent times there has been resurgence in popularity for Riesling and [...]

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Tesco Finest Botrytis Semillon

31 May 2011
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Apart from spending a good deal of its time being mixed with Chardonnay for a reason I have yet to fully understand, Semillon is a big-business grape producing both dry and sweet wines, notably in both France and Australia. Perhaps its most renowned use – certainly in my experience – is as the prime suspect [...]

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Burra Brook 2009 Chardonnay

28 September 2010
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CHARDONNAY BURRA BROOK 2009 AUSTRALIA SCREW CAP 13.5% MIXED CASE £45 Chris Murphy’s favourites Marks & Spencer Chris Murphy has been sourcing wine for M&S for well over 20 years. In the mixed case there was a selection of Chris’s all-time favourite wines from around the world. On opening the bottle there was no immediate [...]

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Penfolds Koonunga Hill Chardonnay 2008

11 September 2010
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Are you an ABC person? That stands for Anything But Chardonnay, if you weren’t supping wine through the late eighties and mid nineties. For many of those who were, it seems Chardonnay has a pretty poor reputation. A versatile grape, it was once ubiquitous at dinner parties across the land as an easy drinking dry-white [...]

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Gapsted Victorian Alps Riesling 2008

3 September 2010
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Due to a unique combination of cultivated contrariness and effortless ignorance, the nuances of wine fashion have passed me by over the years (just as have the nuances of fashion as it affects any other arena of life). So the notion of Riesling being “back” is not one I can relate to: it’s always been a favourite [...]

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McGuigan Chardonnay 2009

25 July 2010
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Chardonnay is a very versatile greape. Its ubiquity tells of its comparative simplicity to grow and its unfortunate status as the 1990s wine of choice – favourite beverage of Bridget Jones and favourite name for the firstborn females of WAGs – has left it something of an unfashionable drink in this day and age. For [...]

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