Penfolds RWT Barossa Valley Shiraz 2002. About $AUD150. The RWT is black cherry in colour and near opaque. Nose of pepper and spices, cherry liqueur, aniseed and lightly charred French oak. The palate (this is way too young to drink now) is solid, dry and chewy with ‘cop this!’ tannins. The fruit as you might expect is enormous but is subdued at the moment by the untamed chewiness. The long finish has hints of raspberries and high-grade, slightly bitter, dark chocolate. This’ll all come together in a couple of years into a memorable blend that promises to cellar well for 20 and more years.

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Recently tasted
Prices in Australian dollars

Merum Semillon 2004. Around $26. Pemberton, Western Australia. Pale gold. Aromatic with lemon, dried pears and faint smoky oak. Fuller-bodied white with flavours of citrus and nuts, softly textured in the mouth it closes with a zingy finish.

Terra Felix Marsanne Roussanne 2004. Around $15. Central Victoria. Transparent lemon. Nose is a fruity, perfumed mix of stone fruits and floral notes. Velvety mouthfeel showing full flavours reminds me of chewing a just quite ripe peach. Delicious style at a nice price.

Haselgrove Adelaide Hills Reserve Viognier 2004. $25. Pale, hint of green. Nose reminded me of lemon butter – with an edge of spicy oak. Think of a fresh baked apricot Danish and you’ll get the picture. Crisp and vigorous to finish.

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EU: Chewing gum is food

Australia applauds WTO food-names ruling

Could DNA help the fight to keep bottle labels honest?

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‘What is it with cask wines? Are they any good?’ The question arose, yet again, at a recent wine course.

I replied that casks (foil or plastic bags of wine in a cardboard box) have their place – in the home – if not in the restaurant. I argued that cask wine is a useful standby in the kitchen, in the same sense as instant coffee, tea bags, and dried milk, and not only is cask wine handy as a cooking ingredient but also for a quick snort when you don’t have an open bottle handy.

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Notes from a tasting of Duckhorn wines presented by Margaret Duckhorn. They have obviously put a real whack of money into their operation and are sincere about quality. The use of various ‘duck’ names and logos is of an extent that even had me, an unrepentant punster, ‘quailing at some of the material she presented.

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Cape blends – Pinotage or not to Pinotage?

The wine industry in South Africa is absolutely free to make wine from whatever and wherever they want – that may be unique in the world, with all of the AOC, DOC and such regulation.

There is an ongoing discussion about something they call ‘Cape blends’, but rather typically, the South Africans can’t agree on just what a Cape blend is. Half of them insist that it must include Pinotage as a principal component and the other half say they will put in anything they please. These notes are from a seminar aimed at surveying this issue, tasting both sorts of wines.

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Notes from the Vancouver Wine Festival

Lunch with some of the winery principals – Ray Signorello, Christiano van Zeller of Quinta do Valle Dona Maria, Miguel Roquette of Quinta do Crasto, and Bill Spence, manager at Matua Valley in New Zealand. These lunches offer a wonderful opportunity to chat informally with knowledgeable wine people while tasting some of their wines with lunch.

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The finale to (my) Vancouver Wine Festival Experience was an excellent lunch at Le Gavroche. I sat with Pascal Apercé, the export director for Lurton.

With albacore tuna tartare, smoked salmon on a mini-blini, and honey mussel in a saffron sauce:

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The Vancouver International Wine Festival is a wonderful opportunity to meet the principals of many wineries and discuss the wine, how they are made, how they mature, and new directions for the wineries. I gritted my teeth, took 2 days off from the office, giving my secretary instructions to advise clients trying to find me that I was on a study session, and headed out to study for all I was worth. There are more than 500 wineries in South Africa today, and I was keen to add some new and interesting finds to my list of old stand-bys.

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Very pleasant briary nose, big sweet fruit on palate, backed more by acidity than tannin, long sweet finish. Great with rare rack of lamb.