Each year there is a very large wine show in Sydney. The Royal Sydney Wine show...or at least that's what I call it. Over 1000 different wines from all over Australia...Most of the iconic wines are not there but there were a few....
I also attended a Red Wine Tutorial where they review the judging criteria, etc. It started late, ended late and overall we didn't have much time but we got to try some Tempranillo, Sangiovese and Nebbiolo as these were the "up and coming" wine varietals in Australia. My experience in Australia so far as been...The Tempranillo has been ok. Most of them bad..Some good. The Sangiovese has been mostly bad. Nebbiolo has been decent.
The first was a 2009 Tempus Two Copper Tempranillo. Typical of what I've seen in Australia...way over-rippened fruit...A strong nose of raisins isn't really a good thing. Balance seems off...I've tried a different vintage before from here and I wasn't impressed. I wasn't impressed now either...
20010 running with the Bulls Tempranillo...Nice nose of red fruits...Pretty good wine. I think it's missing a bit of acid that I'd associate with Tempranillo...I'm missing that..It has some oak but not as much as I'd think it should have (weird huh?). I don't know how much aging potential this one has but it's very drinkable right now. It actually received a gold medal in it's class and based on how it tastes now, it probably deserved a good score compared to the others I also tried.
2009 Serafino Sangiovese. Again, not a memorable wine. Poor effort in my opinion.
2009 Grove Estate Nebbiolo. The person teaching the class wanted people to experience this as if it were a very new type of wine. I don't really consider that the case but this was definitely the youngest wine from Nebbiolo that I've tried. I love Nebbiolo, especially from Barolo...but in Barolo you won't see anything released in less than 3 years and all of the Nebbiolo I've had to date has been at least 3 years old so this one was definitely my first really young Neb. They say Nebbiolo is very VERY tannic which, to that point, I hadn't really felt was the case for me. Sure it was tannic but not as much as people would say. THIS WINE though, was VERY TANNIC. The most I think I've ever had in fact. I have to believe this is because of the age in which case I have to wonder why they bother to release it so young. With certain types of food you might be able to drink this but it's really close to undrinkable at this point. Decent wine though. Nice smokiness and red fruits on the nose. Had that nice medium bodied feel I enjoy from this grape...but yeah, tannins and tannins and tannins.
A few highlights from the rest of the tasting....
2002 Blue Pyrenees Rose Brut. I'm not an Australian Sparkling fan..in fact, for the most part I think most of the Sparklers I've had have been pretty bad. This one though might change my mind. Very nice balance and had that very nice biscuit flavor you'll get from good Sparkling wines....This one actually got a Silver Medal...
1999 Tyrrell's Vat 1. My first chance to taste this one. I love the 1998. This one is right there with it. This vintage is actually supposed to be better but the 1998 has developed a bit better so far but while I think the 1998 is not going to get any better, the 1999 still has some of that brighter acid that I think will carry this along for at least another 5+ years. Great Semillon. The best one for the day.
Some other Semillon I thought were great. 2005 Peter Lehmann Margaret Semillon. Normally a Hunter fan but this was pretty good.. 2005/2006 Meerea Park Alexander Munro Semillon. Always a fan. Love stuff from the Braemore vineyard. 2007 Thomas Braemore. I'm a big fan of his Braemore Semillon. This one has already started to develop that great aged Semillon mouth feel and taste as well as the nose. Actually really surprised by this one and curious to see what it'll be like later on. It was, at this point, significantly better than the 2006.
I don't really know if any of the reds really stuck out in my mind. There were plenty of really good reds there but nothing I was overly excited about or hadn't had before. It doesn't help when you're rushing through a bunch of them.
2007 Meerea Park Hell Hole is tasting quite good. Better than what I had a year earlier, looks to be developing nicely.
2009 Thomas Sweetwater and Kiss were both good. The Kiss Shiraz is still very young.
Brokenwood Wade Block was a nice change in that it was one of the few fruit bombs I actually had there.
There were a few others like Cape Mentelle Shiraz, Eileen Hardy..that were good but I, for whatever reason, had higher expectations. I don't know why though because the Eileen Hardy I had before was the same..
Biggest disappointment for me on the day was Collector. Marked Tree Red has received so many good reviews, scores, etc. It was good but disappointing. It wasn't anything special although it was very drinkable now and for $25 (if you can still get it), it's not bad. Maybe this was a bit oxidized? I dunno... Collector Reserve was actually pretty good...I shouldn't really call that a disappointment. Probably one of the better reds on the day but I guess I had really high expectations, I'm not really sure.
I came away even more convinced I want more Aged Riesling and Semillon...The problem is I have nobody to drink it with....
