Down Under

Last week focused on Cabernet, with some harsh words directed at the cheaper-end of Australian producers. Not fair. This week takes a look at more Australian buys from between the £5 and £7 pound mark. Primarily Shiraz, that great Australia grape: peppery, bold, cocky even… well maybe not, but still very self-assured.

There is this rule of thumb in the wine trade, that blends tend to taste better. By using Shiraz as the backbone, winemakers may add Merlot, for elegance, or more Cabernet, for added rustic flavour. With this in mind, I headed to my local Costcutter corner grocery store to check the selection. More in a few paras…

Today, my friends, was a day of complete rejection, capping a week of almost daily, brutal kicks to the crotch. Last week began typically enough. The weather in England returned to gray, and not a moment to soon, all of the sunshine was beginning to make me angry. Yes, a nice steady drizzle is the type of summer that is all the rage in London these days.

I also went up for a rather humiliating casting -- as a spokesman for frozen meatballs, sold in Turkey. I don't speak Turkish, and, apparently I also can't fake eating, and tremendously enjoying, a frozen meatball. I also had a casting as the lead in indie Brit Flick '3366.' The director said that the part of my performance he enjoyed most was my choice of footwear. Baby blue crocs, baby. (He was noticeably wearing navy blue crocs, how gauche.)

In the mail I received a letter that was so thin, it may as well have had the word 'REJECTION' written in bold, right next to the 'air mail' stamp. It was from Banyan Productions, a Canadian outfit that provides a great deal of content to the Travel Channel. It was signed by Nicole Maxwell, in Development. I won't say much about what the letter said, except it that it probably took longer to type my address than the actual body of text.

I also pitched a Duero travel piece to the fantastic American Express-owned magazine, Travel + Leisure, only to find out they wrote a similar piece a few months ago. Also, I was told to lay off the wine-travel stories as one of my former freelance colleagues had landed that sweet and enviable position of Wine and Spirits Editor at the magazine. I guess I could write a travel piece on the best way to get to the bottom of a bottle.

That last line probably went a little too far.

Back to Australia.

This will be brief. After taking Monday and Tuesday off from the sauce, I returned with a renewed vigor. Ready to tackle the average Ozzie vin de table. I started with, and these are all 2004, a Shiraz Merlot blend… I'm reluctant to name names here. But it's a big producer (aren't they all from down under?) Initially it tasted a bit rusty, unpleasant, but after an hour or so, it became decent enough to drink. The alcohol levels in these wine seem almost purposefully jacked-up, as if a nice buzz will make you forget your worries as well as the lazy winemaking. The bottle was left unfinished.

Then it was a Shiraz-Viogner. Not a typical blend, but still remarkable similar to the previous evening. Again, not finished. It also burned my throat. What are they thinking? That stuff hurts, man. I then tasted another blend, the next night. I'm getting in too deep with this. Over my head… Speaking of heads, the next night, I drank a Yalumba. You see, for me, a true wine should give the drinker a ironic feeling. A contradiction where the wine washes away the stress of the day, and relaxes, whilst still enabling the drinker to feel invigorated and alive. No, this wine… this wine… just made me feel WEIRD. The next day, my head hurt.

I capped the Australia tour with a Rosemount 100 percent Shiraz. Frankly, I shuttered when I took it off the shelf. Maybe it was feeling the eyes of the shopkeeper on my back as if to say 'you sure have been drinking a lot this week.' But, mainly it was the label. The label was shouting 'I've been designed to grab your attention, and hold it, so you don't care if I'm any good on the inside.' Luckily, by mid-week, I was decanting the wines and letting it sit for an hour before trying. This burned off the alcohol and brought out the tell-tale spiciness of the Shiraz. Spiciness? What kind of description is that? What kinds of spices? Fresh marjoram? Year-old garam masala? Some one should develop an electronic nose or something to sort this out. How about it science?

Electronic Wine Nose


Funny thing, my wife refused to take part in this mad experiment and asked again for a decent glass of white. I was in the middle of a red wine tasting. RED wine dammit. In a moment of brief introspection, I remembered the piece I was currently working on for Wine Spectator magazine, where white wine may be as good as reds, in terms of cardiovascular health. How salubrious.

At any rate, I wasn't about to spend my vast wine knowledge on someone who rarely gives me wads of cold, hard cash, so I just grabbed a cold bottle of Chilean Sauvignon Blanc from Concha y Toro. Screw cap (which is superior to cork when it comes to a 'drink now' status.) It was lovely, crisp, almost the color of water.

Three nights later she gave me the same request, even though she still had a glass left in the old bottle. I'm sure it would've been fine. But, I went into the store and grabbed another bottle, same shelf, same place… same COLOR. Only when I got it home did I notice it was the Chardonnay. But the label looks exactly the same! And how can a Chardonnay not retain any of it's straw-like hue? It was a decent wine, but c'mon guys. Give us more credit than that. Surely, when people buy wine, they don't just grab any familiar bottle and don't care if it's a Chardonnay, a Sauvignon, an Albarino, a Viogner…

Or do they?