This is a properly balanced Shiraz which does not taste very much like other Australian Shiraz wines (see the comment thread here for more on this idea). For sure it is quite big, but it has a real sense of harmony which charms me no end.

Shiraz By Farr 2006
Whilst this nose is clearly quite ripe it has a very attractive edge of greenness to it. The fruit is fresh and ripe rather than overblown and jammy, with great peppery spicy and earthy characters clearly present. This is a pretty complex nose and, despite its claimed 14.5% alcohol, I feel there is some restraint to it, it doesn’t burn or overwhelm. I’m pleased with this already, as are the neighbours for whom I popped this bottle. The palate has a really rather structured compliment of tannins, there is some serious firmness here, and a surprisingly attractive flash of totally integrated acidity running through it. That acidity also shows the hints of greenness that are present on the nose, the pepper character also makes it to the palate. The fruit is attractively ripe and accessible, but never too heavy, ponderous or soupy. These facets persist on the satisfyingly long finish, and their interplay and harmony make this wine seem really rather complex for a 14.5% wine. There is a lot to like in this wine. I’m sure you could age it successfully but I am not sure I can be bothered; it’s just so drinkable and pulsing with pleasure now.

We were supposed to be having a little vertical of Annie’s Lane Clare Valley Shiraz at Hawksmoor tonight. Somehow, our hosts managed to forget them when heading from horrible, horrible Woolwich to the City. Consequently, I popped into Uncorked and scored these two. One was quite delicious, the other just a woeful example of over-blown tedium.

Auxey-Duresses Premier Cru 2006, Comte Armand
Quite a pale colour. A lovely nose of fresh, ripe fruit. The fruit character is quite complex by itself, but together with its earthy richness and extremely subtle oak treatment this is a properly pleasing nose. Perhaps not as ripe and powerful as the 2005 flavour of this wine that I’ve had a couple of times recently, but sometimes we appreciate refinement rather than power. Now that is an attractive palate. Its rigorous tannic structure is backed up with lovely, attractive fruit and a fine backbone of acidity. Again, not as powerful, nor as tough, as the 2005, but this great drinking stuff. I really like the fruit/tannin interplay, plenty to keep you interested here. There is length and complexity to the palate as well, with fruity, earthy flavours persisting for a long time after you’ve swallowed. Whereas the 05 was really asking for a bit more time in the cellar, you can extract a lot of pleasure from this right now. And we did. For £25 this this high-quality bargain Burgundy, well worth every penny.

Clare Valley Cabernet Sauvignon ‘Blocks Road’ 2006, Kilikanoon
By arse, what an over-blown nose: heavy with dense, stewed, over-ripe fruit and a powerful alcohol burn. This smells like all that is dull and tedious about the Australian wine idiom: just because they want to harvest grapes that are ripe doesn’t mean they need to roast on the vines until they’ve been stewed to jamminess. I don’t really want to taste this, it just smells like it’ll over-whelm my delicate aesthetic sensibilities and leave me tired, shagged-out and generally bored. However, since I dropped eighteen fun tokens on this piece of over-rated rubbish I suppose some had better pass my lips. Yes, this is Cabernet soup mixed with slightly burnt jam. The tannins are over-ripe, there is no acidity to speak of and that fruit has just been cooked to buggery. I really feel offended by this wine. As Peter’s comments on another recent post suggest, this kind of Australian wine is perilously short of redeeming features: you just feel drinking it is far too much like hard work for little reward on the pleasure-front. Does anybody really enjoy these souped-up monsters? We are finding it really hard to finish this bottle even though we are heroes of the booze world who would normally require far more than two bottles of red to drink with our steaks. Clearly sub-interest; it is quite scandalous that people can sell dull, crap, monotonous wine like this for so much money. Dreadful filth. Many apologies to our hosts for supplying this bottle of tedious filth; next time remember to bring the wines you had planned!

The Elitist Review editorial team dropped by this annual trade tasting organised by Wine Australia, the venue being the rather swish Saatchi Gallery in Chelsea. We didn’t taste so many of the wines, partly because we had a lunch engagement to get to, but mostly because there were epic quantities of piss-boring, industrially produced wine aimed at the enjoyment-impoverished and the tight of wallet. So, what caught our attention?

There was clearly one stand-out producer who made wonderful, personality filled wines in a beautiful style that few other Australians can manage: Mac Forbes. I reported on one of their wines just over a week ago and it was a delight to try some more. His Riesling was really compelling with great acidity and lots of charming fruit; really tasty stuff. I liked the fact that the front label gives the amount of residual sugar in the wine (if only they’d do this in Alsace). The single vineyard Pinot Noir wines, especially the 2008s, were probably the best range of Australian Pinots I’ve tasted. I love their low alcohol and beguiling restraint. Lots of fruit, for sure, but these elegant little beauties were more about purity of expression rather than being fruit bombs that blow your head off at the first sniff. Clark Foyster Wines are the agent in the UK, so go to their website and order vast amounts of these lovely wines! Even the most expensive of the Pinot single vineyards, the Woori Yallock 2008, is undoubtedly worth every penny.

An old favourite producer, Moss Wood, also had some good wines on show. These were only enhanced by being served by the owner’s quite lovely daughter; she was a charmer, alright. The Semillon seemed a good, weighty example with a really pleasing backbone of acidity; it’ll age surprisingly well for a inexpensive wine. Their Chardonnay was reasonably fat, but with its good acidity it never seemed over-blown or heavy, this was definitely a classy Chardonnay which was still recognisably Australian. I have a bit of a soft-spot for Moss Wood Cabernet and the 2006 vintage was a really top example of the wine. We are told the ripening time for the grapes was longer than any in Moss Wood’s previous history and this, we are informed, is why the wine has such a depth of complexity. I think ‘depth of complexity’ might be over-selling it a tad, but I liked the impressive tannic structure that seemed balanced with the ripe fruit and quite unusually high acid levels.

Old favourites continued to provide the quality kit. The mighty and oft recommended Tim Adams had some new wines on show which I had not tasted before. His Riesling Reserve 2008 was a delicate entity of purity and exquisite attractiveness. Not very alcoholic, but its refinement… oh its refinement… A 2009 Pinot Gris was also on offer which had a pleasing opulent fruitiness, but thanks to its great acidity it seemed totally balanced and extremely drinkable. A top wine for the price. It appears the Cabernet I used to recommend to anyone who wanted a bargain but quality wine has become Cabernet Malbec, we tasted the 2006 vintage. It is still a winner, maybe a bit more rigorous than previous vintages with a good interplay between big tannins, fine acid and piles of fruit when you drink it. We have tried The Fergus, Clare Valley Shiraz and The Aberfeldy so many times we didn’t re-try them, instead we moved on to a new red wine for us: Tempranillo Reserve. This demonstrated that even brilliant winemakers cannot do everything right: it was utterly, horribly disgusting.

A few more Rieslings sucked us in. Mesh Eden Valley Riesling 2007 was fresh and focussed as ever; a really affordable Riesling that is an enlivening, vigorous pleasure to drink. Then we tried Jeffrey Grosset’s two 2009 Clare Valley vineyard-designated Rieslings, Springvale and Polish Hill. As usual, these were piercing, riveting wines that screamed with frightening acid-levels and exploded with vivacious citrus fruit. Perhaps it was because these wines were being served at such a young age that they seemed fruitier than normal, the citrus fruit was very primary. They seemed the best two examples of these wines I have tried.

I shall pass over the mundane and simply pedestrian wines we sampled, and there were too many, and move onto spewing invective about the actively nasty filth we mistakenly tried. Some of the most repulsive white wines I have ever been misfortunate enough not to have avoided tasting came from Leeuwin Estate. When sniffing the Art Series Riesling 2008 I just about managed to empty my mind of the over-whelming revulsion long enough to wonder whether making insecticide really was an art. It smelled like the Platonic ideal of fly spray. What fruit was there was really confected and this, together with the pronounced Raid characters, just wanted to make me cry and wail asking what terrible crime I had committed to have to stomach such an abominable wine. I don’t actually know what insecticide tastes like, but I’d wager Art Series Riesling is pretty close to the most vigorously toxic kind. The Prelude Chardonnay was a melange of confected fruit and clumsy oak; no balance, harmony or charm, too much like sucking a charred plank coated with foam-banana sweets. Vile. Then came the ‘ooh fancy!’ Art Series Chardonnay 2007, retailing for an impressive £47 a bottle. For this princely sum you’d get a boringly overblown Chardonnay with an expensive but awkward and inept oak treatment that just smacks you on the nose and palate with its aggressive, unhinged character. The palate had no redeeming features, being too oaky with strangely contrived fruit flavours and no hint of length or complexity. What a pile of horribleness for so much money.

Finally I want to roundly abuse a particular style of Pinot that some people in hot climates make. My examples of this style are made in the supposedly cool climate region of the Mornington Peninsula by the producer Ten Minutes by Tractor. We tried their 2008 ‘10x’ Pinot Noir which is a blend of grapes from their three vineyards and two 2007 single vineyard Pinot Noirs. They were such travesties of the noble Pinot grape that Ten Minutes should be first up against the wall when the aesthetic revolution comes. All these three wines were really hot and alcoholic, seeming quite unbalanced because of this. But, because the poor Pinot had been left to bake in the sun for too long the only characters that remained were utterly ghastly HP Sauce and Bovril-like qualities. These can often be found in Pinot Noir that has been left to roast on the vine far too long and Ten Minutes by Tractor had clearly got their technique of ruining Pinot down to a fine art. If you can imagine, oh I am not sure I want to, a mix of one third Bovril, one third HP Sauce and one third vodka then you would have the perfect recipe for overblown Pinot that would be terribly, shamefully close to these offerings. I hated them.

Still, the good wines were good and I don’t  have to try the bad ones any more today. Many thanks to the UK arm of Wine Australia for organising this event.

I’ve occasionally been asked how I got into wine. This is a bit of a difficult question to answer as I started so young I am not really sure what was the initial spark.

My parents were not at all interested in wine, there was not much wine consumed in the home environment. I didn’t get my love for wine from them.

I’m told that my mother got a free copy of The World Atlas of Wine from a book club when I was about five or six. Apparently, even at that tender age I would pour over this for hours, reading about all the wine regions and different producers. Why I found this so fascinating I cannot recall.

I do recall the next step in the genesis of my love for wine very clearly. Just before my ninth birthday my mother and step-father visited Alsace. They did not taste many wines, but brought back a bottle of Riesling Cuvee Frederic Emile 1979 from Trimbach. I’d read about this wine and producer so I asked if I could try some to see what it was like. I was given a small glassful and as I sniffed and tasted it galvanised me with its lively, exciting set of flavours. I am quite sure my appreciation of it was not terribly sophisticated at the age of eight, but I remember saying to my mother as I tasted it, “Wow, wine really can be good. This one tastes of so many things*”. I love Alsace Riesling to this day.

After this deeply compelling experience I tried to get my mother to buy more wines and let me try them. At that point she was yet to develop her appreciation for wine so joined the unspeakable Sunday Times Wine Club and ordered the filth they sell without realising these were dreadful wines. None of these had such a profound effect on me as the CFE 79.

I was extremely fortunate to be close friends with a boy at school, Daniel Cadbury (are you out there, Daniel?) whose parents loved wine, and in 1985 they had a family holiday in the Bergerac/Monbazillac area of France. They went to a few tastings and some of the wines we tried were pretty good; I was chuffed to score myself a bottle of 83 Chateau de Monbazillac.

The most amazing part of the holiday was when we took a day trip to Sauternes and Barsac to try the 83s and 84s. We visited La Tour Blanche, Climens, d’Arche and (quite incredible that, as a family group, we blagged our way in here) Chateau Gillette. The differences between the producers and vintages were clear when I tasted so many in one day. Once again, I was moved by the power of quality wine.

Sadly, then it was back to the dross from the Sunday Times Wine Club (with the occasional bottle of good stuff from the Cadburys) until I looked old enough to buy my own wine (it is handy being a tall person at times). That is when things really took off. I read more, purchased widely and tasted with great pleasure. My local wine merchants, Oddbins and Bottoms Up, still had a lot of interesting wines in those days and I would frequently buy something well-reviewed to drink with my school teachers. I didn’t view my fellow students as being enlightened enough to merit having any these precious drops of nectar; I wanted to talk about wine and other teenagers just knew nothing about it. I soon became aware that the teachers didn’t know that much either, but at least they were articulate.

Sometimes the discoveries were quite serendipitous. I went to the Australian Wine Centre (just off The Strand in those days) for the  first time when I was seventeen (with my mother’s credit card) to buy some St. Hallett Old Block Shiraz; I’d read a lot about it and thought it worth trying. I went to pay for my few bottles and the frankly enormous Australian fellow behind the counter said, “You don’t want to buy those, you want some of this.” He pulled out a bottle of Tim Adams Aberfeldy Shiraz, pulled the cork and poured me a slug. I tasted it and said, “I’ll take four bottles. Does this Tim Adams chap make anything else good?” He grinned and said, “Yeah, I think I do.” The man himself was visiting England and doing a stint in the shop. We chatted about wine as we drank most of the bottle of Aberfeldy and I was so impressed by both the charming Mr Adams and his wines I knew I would be sold on them for as long as he continued to make wine. I was right, I still drink and enjoy Tim Adams wines and recommend them to anyone who wants keenly-priced, quality Australian wine. I met Mr Adams at the London Wine Trade Fair a few years back (he is still extremely tall) and related the anecdote, he remembered!

Then I went to Oxford University and started tasting more wine than I ever thought I would. I was a member of the Oxford Wine Circle, a winning captain of the blind tasting team**, turned up to the merchants’ tastings when they tried to sell wines to the colleges and had weekly tastings with a select few people in evenings which will forever be burnt in my memory as the ‘casa Schleiss tastings’. Not all the wines I tried were the very finest, but a surprisingly large number were considering we were poor students. My chum Mr T and I once went through all of our notes for the past year and were both surprised and pleased to realise we had tasted over three thousand different wines. Good going, but a shame it included a lot of dull, cheap Clarets aimed at the conservative college buyers. This epic wine experience taught me well; I know that Burgundy is best, but good Riesling, Sherry, Champagne and others can also deliver the goods. I even liked the very flashest Clarets we tried, and some of them were incredibly flash, but soon learned they were too expensive for my tastes.

I do not try as many wines these days and largely limit myself to wine styles and producers I enjoy. I confess to being pleased I no longer have to regularly put New Zealand Sauvignon Blanc in blind tastings to try and teach people to recognise it. That being said, my knowledge of wine is still broad and I get a lot of pleasure out of blind tasting. A few years ago I was working for an unmentionably filthy wine merchant (I lasted almost two months before the inevitable ‘going totally insane and trying to kill myself’-experience which has characterised all my 9-to-5 jobs since developing paranoid schizophrenia; this was the longest I managed to hold down a regular job since 1999) who paid for their employees to take the Wine and Spirit Education Trust Advanced Certificate exam. I skimmed the course text book, finished the exam in quarter of the time allowed and passed it with a distinction.

So that, dear reader, is the story of my early years with wine. As I said, I cannot pin down the initial spark that made me want to learn about wine, but I am slightly amused that I have  been compelled by properly fine wine from the age of eight onwards.

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*I’ve had CFE 79 on many occasions since becoming more deeply educated about wine and wine tasting, and I was clearly right with my first assessment, it always has tasted of a lot of things.

**I’m told I was a very demanding blind tasting instructor. When someone (who shall remain nameless) said that a rather large Australian Shiraz was Beaujolais I laughed so much I fell off my chair. I don’t suppose that was terribly supportive or encouraging.

Rather than making a thick, sweet liqueur Muscat with this Barossa fruit, Two Hands have made a light, sweet, fizzy wine. Given the miniscule amounts of pleasure I have got out of liqueur Muscats this seems like a good thing to do with your fruit. I think good Italian Moscatos of this style can be some of the most joyful wines you can drink.

‘Brilliant Disguise’ Moscato Bianco 2008, Two Hands
There is plenty of good floral Muscat fruit on the nose. Fresh and fruity. However, there is a worrying insecticide character as well which is not so attractive. And that is pretty much it for the nose, it does not ask too many questions of you. The palate also has more than a hint of some toxic chemical about it, and it is a tiny bit heavy, but I’m impressed by the acidity. Growing Muscat in a place like the Barossa must be a challenge; you do not want the flavours to get too extreme because of the heat. I think Barossa heat has made this just step over to the wrong side of ripe, hence fly spray. However, whilst this is not as lewdly pleasurable as the best Italian Moscatos it is a passable facsimile and worth trying to see another interpretation of the genre.

Hawksmoor’s wonderful red meat provided an excellent foil for solid Syrah and Grenache last night as we dined to celebrate the birthday of our chum James and also my birthday. I shared a 1.2kg prime rib of beef and it was totally brilliant meat. Really amazing, so much flavour and such a wonderful texture.

The last wine is what I purchased with the money from the Google click-through adverts so many thanks to all who clicked on them.

Manzanilla La Gitana, Hidalgo
Do I even really need to write a tasting note for this? Surely everyone has drank so much of this wine its flavour profile is etched on all our minds. Surely when there is a test match on in the middle of summer and the mood is with us it is La Gitana which refreshes us? I’ll be brief to refresh your memories. A crisp, nutty nose with a pleasing delicacy. The palate is very dry and fresh with a slight salty tang. This is the Platonic ideal of Manzanilla, good Manzanilla at that.

Cornas ‘Granite 30’ 2007, Vincent Paris
A very fruity nose with lots of prunes and plums. We have decided 2007 Rhones are fruity and this seems to confirm that. It has a definite rustic streak to the nose as well, a sort of meaty, leafy, leatheriness. Smells like pretty type Cornas if you ask me. There is lots of fruit on the palate too, and it has a crunchy, chewy texture which makes this quite a nice mouthful. Decent Cornas structure, alright. It is perhaps not the longest or most complex of palates, but is a good example of the appellation and provides a reasonable amount of pleasure.

Hermitage 1996, J. L. Chave
A very suave, sophisticated nose of polished fruit and rich earth. It is quite powerful, though, ‘manly’ as we are lead to believe. I’m getting a lot of enjoyment out of smelling this, it is certainly mature but still very lively. Ah, now that is a bit sad, it suffers a tad from 1996 syndrome, which is to say it is just a bit too acidic. Sure, the fruit is scrummy and it is undoubtedly a masculine presence in your mouth as we would hope for from Hermitage, but ultimately the harmony just isn’t quite there. Bums.

Cornas ‘Domaine de Rochepertuis’ 1999 en magnum, Jean Lionnet
Oh lovely, lots of scrummy bramble fruits on the nose. It is earthy, but not really dirty, and the hint of rusticity is seriously cleaned up to the point of being being more than presentable in proper company. This is a complex, compelling nose, it is certainly Cornas but very smart Cornas. The palate seems smart too, every tannin is polished, every piece of fruit blemish-free and the acidity completely harmonious. There is a bit of mature softness to this, but it’ll keep. A really lovely magnum of Cornas, I loved it.

We had pot roast lamb with Dan and ‘Non Stinky’ Jeff last night, they brought this around to drink after dinner. Shame we didn’t have any cheese to go with it.

Old Block Shiraz 2005, St. Hallett
This is so dark in colour it looks black; that is some ripe fruit and serious extraction that has gone to make a wine this dark. Yes, the plummy fruit is very ripe on the nose, with more than a suggestion of jamminess. The booze factor is pretty impressive too, you can tell a couple of bottles of this would really get you finished – wet the bed drunk. But I am merely having a couple of glasses so I can deal with such booze levels. OK, this is the nose of a fighting wine, it is not so complex, but there is something here which makes it worth a bit of attention. It is a fun nose. The palate has more plum jam fruit, massive and massively ripe tannins and an alcoholic warmth. This is a mouth-filling palate of large scale. Once again, this isn’t so complex but it is a fun, fruit bomb of a wine which seems a good drink on a cold autumn night.

I really like Moss Wood wines when they are young. Last summer I had a 1999 Cabernet and ageing hadn’t done much for it, so I wasn’t expecting to be wowed by the 2000. I was right.

Semillon 2000, Moss Wood
A very toasty, buttery nose; if you didn’t know better you’d say it was oaked. It has some lanolin character as well which we are told is supposed to help us blind taste old Semillon. There is a hint of alcoholic warmth to the nose, but when the nose has such scale this doesn’t seem so bad. The palate is weighty with a mouth-filling roundness. I’d say it just about has enough acidity, but it does seem a tad on the blowsy side. There is a lot of ripe lemon fruit here. The finish is a bit hot and short, and there is really not too much in the way of complexity. However, for the very little money this cost me  I think it is not such a bad drink. The 9 year ageing experiment was interesting enough as well.

Cabernet Sauvignon 2000, Moss Wood
A crème de cassis nose, and bloody alcoholic crème de cassis at that; the blackcurrant and booze action here is just bonkers. It is very cedar woody as well. But you’d never guess this as the awful stuff Claret as the alcohol quotient is far too high. This doesn’t really worry me as I expect blood and guts from Australian wines, but what does worry me is how little real fun value there seems to be on the nose. Sure, there is plenty of fruit, wood and alcohol, but it just all seems a tad flat; when it slaps your nasal passages around it does so in a half-hearted sort of way. The palate has plenty of fruit, wood and alcohol as well, but it lacks the all-important acidity so just seems a bit soupy with those super-ripe tannins. The alcohol burn on the finish is a little distracting, too. When I purchased this I thought it was good time Cabernet Sauvignon, with nine years of age it just seems to have lost its vivacious spark. The ageing experiment was not a success with this.

Yes, yes, it is more of those podcasts; me speaking drivel as it occurs to me. I feel audio notes are quite good to get one’s raw opinion of a wine, but the little bit of extra reflection that goes with writing way well help.

The Fergus 2006, Tim Adams
Click the bottle to play the podcast

The Fergus 2005, Tim Adams
Click here to play.

I've never had a Gary Farr white wine before. This is slightly Burgundian.

Chardonnay 2006, By Farr
A fresh, bright nose of lemon fruit. There is some weight here. It is not the most complex of noses. The palate has a reasonable degree of weight and is passably tits out. It has very good acidity and the oak treatment feels pretty sophisticated. It seems more complex on the palate than on the nose. Has some length. Pretty good, but not as good as his Pinot and Syrah.

I got a bottle of this for my mother's birthday. I hope she likes it as much as I do.

Pinot Noir "Sangreal" 2003, By Farr
This is highly perfumed, fruity, luscious Pinot. There is a rich earthiness to it as well, which is great. There is a degree of soft maturity to the fruity, but it is still quite vigorous. I am surprised by the level of acidity on the palate, but this is still really dominated by fleshy fruit. Perhaps the palate is a bit lacking complexity, but this is a lovely drink. Will be good with goose.

Good as Tim Adams' Aberfeldy Shiraz is, I think this is my favourite wine from him. I've aged earlier vintages for 10+ years and been impressed by the result. It is also a bundle of laughs to drink when young. It is a Grenache, Cabernet Franc, Cabernet Sauvignon and Merlot blend.

The Fergus 2005, Tim Adams
Lovely, plummy fruit on the nose, with some spicy, peppery aromas. It is powerful and heady, but with a reasonably degree of harmony for a wine of this scale. When you smell this wine you cannot help but smile; lovely stuff, I tell you. The palate has ripe, with smooth tannins and lots of christmas cake fruit. It does have an impressive degress of complexity for a wine of this alcohol-level, it is not baked-free of character. At this stage in the evening this has the correct degree of power to keep me inetersted. Yummy, yummy.

I like Tim Adams' wines very much. They are good and he doesn't charge the earth for them; this cost less than a tenner.

Clare Valley Shiraz 2005, Tim Adams
A very overt, fruity nose. It is loud, but not over-blown. There is a relatively sophisticated wood treatment showing on the nose, it is really quite pleasing. The palate is big and powerful, but taut like a weight-lifter. The tannins are very ripe and give this wine a great structure, which shows off its fruit very well. For a tenner this has a very pleasing degree of complexity. OK, it is a tad on the booze-tastic side, but it doesn't lack balance and it is great fun.

The basic By Farr Pinot was most impressive, this prestige cuvee is a step ahead.

Pinot Noir "Sangreal" 2006 By Farr
Lovely, sophisticated fruit on the nose. It has a degree of stemminess, but this just adds to its complexity. And it really is quite complex. Good concentration of aromas on the nose, it smells a lot. Of good things, I hasten to add. The palate is very smooth and silky, with nice, ripe tannins, fresh acidity and truly delicious fruit. This is very attractive and complex, in its first, fun, fleshy stage of development so is tits-out for the boys to drink now. However, if you really can be bothered I feel you could come back to it in, say, seven years and be pleasantly surprised. I don't think Australian Pinot Noir gets any better than this.

I was in Lancashire last weekend for a wedding to two lovely friends of mine. We paid a visit to the amusingly named town of Clitheroe to go to the excellent wine merchant D. Byrne. It was filled with an embarrassment of riches which were generally very reasonably priced. My chum Jeremy Seysses saw this wine on the shelf and told me I should buy it as it had rave reviews from some American journalists. It was only £13 so I thought why not? When I had paid I noticed it was 16.5% alcohol and so I challenged Jeremy, who I know to be a lover of beautiful wines, on why he had recommended lighter-fuel for me try. He came clean and said he knew I would hate it, but he likes to read my torrents of invective about horrible wines. He had knowingly got me to buy despicable wine. Thanks, Jeremy, thanks a bunch. So do I hate it? Read on...

Shiraz "The Boxer" 2006, Mollydooker
By arse, I've smelled less confected jam than this. This smells of alcohol, wood and jammy fruit; it is depressingly simple and horrifically overblown. Smelling this for more than a couple of seconds burns my nose. There is nothing even remotely attractive about its aromas. No. Oh no. Really, no. For fuck's sake, the palate is truly horrible. Sweet, flabby, painfully alcoholic; how can people like shit like this? It is vile filth. OK, if you want monster-get-pissed-fast, soupy, unbalanced, sweet mouthwash, this will do. If you think wine should have redeeming qualities like elegance, style and, let us be honest, drinkability, you'll find this as offensive as I am as I try to choke back enough to write this tasting note.

Which leaves us wondering what sort of wine journalism recommends this kind of crap. I am reminded of how I used to chose girlfriends whilst at university. Tall or short, beautiful or ugly, clever or stupid, it didn't matter to me as long as they had big tits. That was all that mattered - huge bouncers. Of course, this is a terrible way of viewing women, just as viewing over-ripe monstrosities like this as the pinnacle of wine-making is a shameful view of wine. Complexity, style and balance are to be applauded, and simple, booze-tastic, beasts are to be pilloried. I am disgusted to think that someone could recommend something as shamefully crap as this.

We are told there is a dash of Viognier in this. It is seriously good.

Shiraz By Farr 2003, Gary Farr
The nose of this is completely compelling: rich, dark fruit and earth. It has an array of spicy, complex and subtle aromas, this is one of the most beguiling noses of a Syrah wine I have had since last night. This may be a 14% wine but it is not at all overblown or heavy, the fruit is quite lovely. The palate has a sophisticated tannic structure with completely lovely fruit, rich earthy complexity, quite brilliant acidity and a stylish, hedonistic finish which leaves you wondering why on Earth anyone would bother ageing this for much longer as it provides so much pleasure now. This is seriously good, I really don't think I've had a better bottle of Australian Shiraz than this, and I don't think you will either. Forget all of those Grange, Old Block and Hill of Grace horrors and have a bottle which provides even more visceral pleasure and a damned-sight more intellectual pleasure.

I recommended this at the end of last month; I was right.

Pinot Noir by Farr 2004, Gary Farr
A lovely nose of bright red fruit and, if you can believe it from an Australian wine, it is really earthy. You can tell he largely ferments with whole clusters, too; you can smell the stems. There is some real complexity about the nose of this wine, which is really good as it cost nineteen quid. The best compliment I can give this wine is that it smells a bit like Domaine Dujac from a ripe, charming vintage. But even though it is ripe this is no bruiser, it is a perfectly balanced 13.5% and there is not a hint of jamminess to the fruit. The palate has plenty of fresh red fruit, good acidity and a slightly prickly tannic structure. This tastes a bit like Burgundy that it going through its awkward, middle-aged stage. But it is quite delicious and easy to enjoy, reasonably complex too. I think this wine will last until it is ten and, dare I say it, improve along the way. This is a top bottle for the price and I would be very interested in trying the By Farr prestige cuvee Pinot Noir known as Sangreal. Pleasingly that is not that much more expensive than this; Gary Farr makes damned-good wines and you have to be gladdened that he doesn't charge the Earth for them.

Just to note, the partner says this is very New World. He is wrong. There is plenty of fruit, sure, but there is more than that. There is earthiness, stemminess and a notable degree of complexity. This is a bottle of proper Pinot and I should not be surprised it comes from Australia because I am well aware that Gary Farr is a talented, experienced winemaker who doesn't arse around letting his grapes stew in the heat then bleach any remaining character out of them in the winery.

It is true. I like some of the Chardonnays and Semillons, but Riesling is where it is at and Grosset is the address to go to in Australia.

Riesling "Polish Hill" 2006, Grosset
A very pure, direct nose of lime fruit, with a rich gravelly undercurrent. This smells like it'll hurt my stomach, but pain can be good. It is a stellar bundle of intensity on the nose. Yes, the palate is very acidic, but the fruit is lovely as is its minerality. This is really shows quite a lot of complex for such a tightly-wound ball of brilliance. Ouch... ow... ow... it does hurt my stomach a lot, but I will be drinking more of this because this is a bottle of really top bunny Riesling. I bet it'll age a treat as well. A bargain at a shade under fifteen sheets.

Well, it only cost seven quid, what can you expect?

Riesling Clare Vallet 2006, Tim Adams
Quite fruity, quite acidic, quite simple. Slips down reasonably well, though. Its refreshment value is all that brings this above sub-interest, it is frighteningly one-dimensional.

This is one of Australia's best wines, it is also a complete bargain at roughly fifteen sheets a bottle. Opened to have with oysters: Colchester No. 2's are the way forward.

Riesling "Polish Hill" 2006, Grosset
A lovely, fresh nose of squeezed limes and stoniness. This smells very lively and reasonably complex. It is not too alcoholic or over-ripe, which is very pleasing. The palate is very dry, but has weight from the fruit and style from the minerality. This is direct and fizzing with acidity, but fruity enough to carry it off with class. This is complex and stylish enough to go beyond almost being a fine wine to actually being fine. It'll age really well too, but I think it'll shut down in a year until it is about seven or eight. A fine dry Riesling by anyone's standards.

Tomorrow we drink a hilariously fine dry Riesling, Clos St. Hune 1997. I await its pleasures with considerable interest and only a slight amount of drooling.

What with throwing up upteen times during the day and being uncontrollably insane when I am not medicated to buggery, I haven't really felt much like drinking. However, I pursuaded the partner that he should buy some of this as, along with Bannockburn Shiraz, it is undoubtedly one of my favourite Australian wines. It is more unashamedly Australian than a lot of his wines.

Shiraz "The Aberfeldy" Clare Valley 2004, Tim Adams
A rich, heady nose of ripe fruit, grilled meat, oak and (let us be honest) alcohol. It smells really complex which I have to say I find surprising in a wine so gratutioutsly Australian. Again I am surprising to find myself thinking 'delicious'. The palate is very smooth and silky, but there is one serious whack of tannin there. The tannins are very ripe and integrated. This is a seriously grown up wine, I'm going to have to stop drinking after my two tastes or I'll be violently ill. But this is not a quality comment on the wine, which is excellent. What a bargain for serious-quality Shiraz.

Since I last had this in November, I've come to the opinion that this is my favourite affordable Cabernet based wine. It has rigour and structure yet it is actually nice to drink. I admit some may find it a bit heroic, but we all need a bit of wildness in our lives from time to time.

Cabernet Sauvignon 2003, Moss Wood
This wine is black. A lovely, expressive nose of perfectly ripe blackcurrants; I wish Ribena smelled as good as this. There is some cedar wood and I think the expensive oak treatment this gets shows its pedigree on the nose. I'd be amiss if I didn't say, "Hell's bells this is quite alcoholic!" The nose is bold and authoritatively announces it will give you a good time when you taste it. So I'll taste it. Lovely fruit is there framed in a fine tannic structure. It has reasonable acidity too; this is not one of those soupy horrors. Mmmm... yeah, lovely structure. There is a reasonable degree of complexity about the interplay of fruit, tannin and wood which makes this worth a premium price. Good finish too, although I wonder if the wood stands out a bit on the finish. OK, maybe it does, but this is one svelte sexy charmer of a Cabernet which packs a high-calibre handgun inside its silk smoking jacket.

I took this to my cellar in France on release and dragged it back on my way to the bin. It isn't bad at all.

Semillon 2000, Moss Wood
This smells amazingly oaky, but it has seen no new oak at all. It has some waxy, lanoline character as well. Not much in the way of fruit, it has to be said, but it still smells quite pleasing. The palate is big but not at all flabby. There is a bit of lemony fruit here, and it tastes vanilla-y as well. This is really quite nice, despite it not being a terribly conventional wine. Good result from the experiment.

Hell'ś bells. What the hell is this beast in my glass? Made by the old Cape Mentelle winemaker.

3 Amigos Shiraz, Grenache, Mourvedre 2005, McHenry Hohnen Vintners

This is a booze-tastic horror of christmas pudding fruit and alcoholic craziness. It has a very fruity nose, a very soapy, soupy, fruity palate. Of all of the hideous, dull, wallpapery, boring powerhouse wines I've had, this is perhaps the most hideous, dull, wallpapery and boring.

This is a blend of Cabernet Sauvignon and Cabernet Franc from the Clare Valley. One of the things I like about Tim Adams' wines I like is that he charges very reasonable prices yet the wines are some of the best in Australia. They are also not over-blown, and this I like a lot.

Cabernet 2001, Tim Adams
A nose of ripe blackcurrants, not stewed or jammy, there is a nice seasoning of oak to it as well. It is not complex, but it smells like a pleasing drink. The palate has soft, ripe fruit and good acidity with a reasonable, but not aggressive, tannic structure. It is not drying, the fruit is charming, it is cheap, what more could a growing lad ask for at this price?

This is one of the very few Cabernet-based wines I buy with any regularity. It is usually quite fun, in a big sort of way, and people have assured me it ages to something quite lovely. I've got another bottle in my cellar so we'll see about that.

Cabernet Sauvignon 2003, Moss Wood
The nose has a very powerful blackcurrant and cedar-wood aroma. It also seems pretty oaky and the high alcohol level really stands out. This smells like Claret++. The palate is certainly large-scale, bold and even heroic, but the tannic structure is really quite refined. The alcohol stands out a bit on the finish, as does the oak, but the fruit persists too and there is plenty of it. This may be big, but it is not a beast and I think it has reasonable balance for a wine of this size. I don't really feel confident predicting how this will age, but the finely-grained tannins, reasonable acidity and good fruit levels suggest it should hang around at the very least. Given how much I am non-plussed by Cabernet and dislike high-alcohol wines in general, I am surprised to admit I really quite like this.

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PS. Is it me or does the Moss Wood Cabernet label look quite a lot like the Pichon-Lalande label?

Bannockburn are one of my favourite Australian producers. The winemaker, Gary Farr, has worked many vintages at Domaine Dujac in Burgundy and with Alain Graillot in Crozes-Hermitage. These influences show themselves strongly in his wines. The top Pinot Noir he makes, called Serré, when served blind to Jeremy Seysses of Dujac was Burgundian enough to make him think it was one of his wines; I was highly amused to have foxed him.

Shiraz 2002, Bannockburn
The nose is quite like a very ripe Crozes-Hermitage, it has the same cheap cologne character. It also has some beetroot tones and plenty of ripe, dark fruit. The palate is quite big and ripe, but it has a nice tannic structure and very good acidity. The fruit persists on the finish along with a slightly green, herbal note. It is certainly complex and interesting, not just another over-ripe fruit-bomb. If I was served this blind I could easily be fooled into thinking it was Rhône Syrah. This could well be my favourite Australian Shiraz, it has a harmony, balance and style that most Australian wines lack.

I've recommended this in the past, it is a real bargain. Quality dry Riesling for around an Ayrton (Ayrton Senna, tenner).

Mesh Eden Valley Riesling 2005, Grosset/Hill Smith
It has a pure nose of lime fruit. It even displays a degree of minerality: jolly good! Not overly heavy or over-ripe. The palate is linear and direct, with very good fruit and nice length. It is not terribly complex, but it is refreshing and stylish. At this price you cannot go wrong.

I have many memories of drinking this wine is the past; I've even had some old bottles that I have thought are quite good. It has always been a large-scale wine, but this vintage is just too heroic.

Cabernet Sauvignon 2000, Cape Mentelle
A very hot, ripe, alcoholic nose (it is 15%) with stewed, jammy fruit. There is some French oak character there as well. This just smells a bit fiery. The palate has reasonable structure, plenty of fruit, and a hot alcoholic burn on the finish that seems a bit too much like hard work. I suppose there is a degree of complexity to it, but any refinement has been baked out of it. Since I am not the biggest fan of Cabernet, nor over-ripe wines, I don't suppose this is really the wine for me.

Fourteen quid well spent on this. It has some real character.

Local Growers Semillon 2002, Rockford
There is a honeyed, waxy character to the nose. It also has good lemony fruit. This smells quite characterful. The palate is finely balanced with some Semillon weight and a good backbone of acidity. This is pretty good for the price. Best of the Australian set so far.

The two Australian wines I had planned to have with dinner bored the tits off me.

Chardonnay 2003, Cullen
Soft melon fruit on the nose, some wood too. It smells quite dull; I've had so many similar wines in the past. The palate has fruit, acidity and oak, but is frighteningly boring. I am not impressed.

'Joseph' Nebbiolo 2002, Primo Estate
Oh no, I am not really sure I can be bothered. Yeah, there is cherry fruit and there is a hint of bitterness, but it is just another ripe Australian wine, really. I think it is well made, with plenty of fruit and tannin, but it is just wall-paper in the realm of fine wines.  

I first tried this at the London wine and spirit trade fair. I thought it seemed a nice enough drink. It is an adequate, but slightly dull, aperitif.

Riesling 2004, Plantagenet
This has but hints of fly-spray on the nose, a common problem, I find, with Australian Riesling. It is obviously ripe, but has some pure grapefruit notes on the nose. It is quite weighty on the palate, with good, but not excessive acidity. It is a perfectly nice drink, but doesn't really engage me.

I used to travel from Oxford to London just to buy Rockford's Basket Press Shiraz. If only I hadn't wasted my time and money ageing them. This wine is a bit more junior in Rockford's range than the Shiraz. It is 56% Cabernet Sauvignon, 44% Shiraz.

Barossa Valley Rod and Spur 2002, Rockford Wines
A very Porty, stewed nose of blackcurrants, blueberries and leather. It is really quite hot and alcoholic. The palate is really dense and heavy, quite tannic too. There is plenty of over ripe fruit on the palate, and alcohol sweetness, but it is all a bit one-dimensional. I suppose there is a degree of severity to the tannins, but the lack of acidity and over-ripe fruit suggest this is not for ageing. It is certainly well made, and a reasonable drink, shame it is quite dull.

Considering this wine is 14.5% I surprise myself that I like it. Moss Wood used to make both a wooded and an unwooded Semillon. They recently decided that unwooded was best and now make only that.

Semillon 2001, Moss Wood
The nose suggests this is a good fighting wine. Lots of alcohol sweetness, ripe lemony fruit and rich lanolin flavours are there. There is also a strong note of green fruit; gooseberries and kiwi fruit. The palate is big and bold, but surprisingly balanced. Lots of green fruit, powerful acidity and rich, round lanolin flavours are there. This is balanced and quite fun, even though it is strong enough to render the neighbour and me in a state where we'll be fished out of the Thames and carried home.

I'm around at the neighbours place and a bottle of Grosset Polish Hill 2004 has been cracked. This is really excellent Riesling: fresh, lively, balanced, complex, really lovely stuff. At fifteen quid a bottle from the Wine Soc it is a bargain. It'll age for ten or so years as well, if you have the facilities.

Ranked as Australia's best Riesling, this is a bargain.

Polish Hill Riesling 2004, Grosset
Intense ripe lime fruit nose. Crivens, there is also some minerality there. Lovely. The palate is very dry and fresh. Good acidity, nice lime fruit and it is extremely well balanced. There are stony flavours on the palate as well. This is excellent.

A bottle of wine from a producer that has rarely compelled me. I like their Riesling and their Cabernet. They are most famous for their chardonnay, which I find has the same problems as this.

Leeuwin Estate Art Series Shiraz 2001
Quite a ripe, alcoholic, chocolaty nose. The palate is fiercely acidic, along with being quite heavy and ponderous. This is one of those wines that 'strives for balance', but ends up being out of balance and lacking any real niceness. The harsh acidity hides the essential ripeness of the wine and ends up making it taste rather thin. Poor show, Mr Leeuwin.