six nations tasting -

pyrmont wharf, sydney
Tasted Thursday, October 3, 2013 by chatters with 718 views

Introduction

Second year of this fantastic tasting - thanks Yuko! This year, though, the Americans are here - by which, of course, I mean the United States - some would argue that the Americas (in the form of Chile and Argentina) had been here right from the start but let's not quibble about semantics. This is a very good tasting but does need to be taken with a small pinch of salt. A lot of the producers here are not seen on these shores and, because the vast majority of producers we do see are fairly large, corporate, mass producers, it is easy to fall into the trap of thinking that these wines here are truly representative of the nation in question from a boutique winery perspective which of course, in some cases, they are simply not. This year the wines were arranged by country rather than by varietal consequently there was a lot of dancing from table to table. Of course, as per last year, as the evening goes on the wines do run out so I did not manage to get to taste everything I wanted to but this is a small price to pay. My plan of attack on this occasion was to do chardonnay, pinot noir, 85%+ Cabernet sauvignon (which is the rule for these countries to declare the wine as straight Cab Sav) and Bordeaux blends with a Cab Sav dominance. After that I just tried whatever other wines interested me - in this case a couple of whites and a few other reds.

The usual qualifier applies - this was very much an elbows at dawn tasting and there were not may flat surfaces to take notes on consequently my notes are restricted to the aromas - most dominant first - and a short note on mouthfeel where possible

Flight 1 - Chardonnay (18 Notes)

Australia is a country mile ahead of everything eles here, the Saffa Hamilton Russell was very good though and, with only four US wines present, it is hard to make a completely fair comment on the state of the States...historically they've been a bit blowsy and overblown (which I don't have a problem with) but I hear rumours of austerity...

Flight 2 - Other whites (2 Notes)

I just wanted to try the Yalumba as I've never had it and the Clonakilla seemed to be a good baseline based on my previous tastings of it.

Time was pressing so I had to pass up on everything else unfortunately...

Flight 3 - Pinot Noir (21 Notes)

The usual mixed bag. I thought that the US stuff was probably the best of the bunch but there is so much variability of wine making technique, growing region, viticultural practice and clone selection (to name just a few aspects) that it is very hard to pull a common thread from any of these wines. Also, I was remiss in my kiwi tasting - just couldn't get to them!

Flight 4 - Cabernet Sauvignon (16 Notes)

last year, for me, the Saffas stood up tall….this year less so with the honours shared between the US and Australia with some truly lovely wines.

Flight 5 - Bordeaux blends (13 Notes)

There was not much left at this stage of the proceedings but grabbed what I could...I tried to stick to those that were at least majority Cabernet Sauvignon to get some parity with the above bracket but there are a smattering of others here.

Flight 6 - Other reds (12 Notes)

Whilst I was wandering around I tried a few things that seemed to appeal - no specific plan of attack...couple of merlots, cab francs, zins, the only tannat, other bits and pieces

Closing

Lovely tasting, really, really good...I would have happily spent the whole night here but had dinner plans afterwards. Too many high points to mention. Biggest disappointment was the poor showing of the Saffa Cab and Cab blends.

I'd rank this as one of my favourite tastings - despite all of the elbows, tarty birds with too much perfume, middle aged fat blokes who insist in standing right next to the tables with the wine, general shouty atmosphere and inaccuracy with spit buckets as the evening progresses. Roll on next year!

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