Friday March 6th from 5:00 – 9:00

Australia makes its share of mass produced everyday drinking wines.   The country is the fourth largest exporter of wine and many of these wines you might see in gas stations and grocery stores.  Many producers get grapes shipped to them from long distances and make their wines as a blend from several different vineyards.  These vineyards are often quite distinct.

This is not the case with all Australian wines.  Increasingly, wineries are to keep a sense of place, or geography when selecting their juice.  Australia is broken into different wine regions.  Most of the grapes are grown in the southeast part of the island which has a Mediterranean type climate.  The other major wine producing area is in the southwest with less than 5% of the output, but not lacking in quality.
The most popular grapes grown are Chardonnay, Shiraz (know as Syrah to the rest of the world), and Cabernet Sauvignon.  Australia does not have any native grapes, so they have transplanted vines from other parts of the world.  Many of the bottles have screw caps instead of corks; a convention that is more popular in Australia than in other wine producing countries.

If you are not familiar with Australian wines, then you are really missing out.  From the juicy Cabs of the Margaret River in the southwest where you can find colorful birds and kangaroos to the cooler climate Shiraz and Chardonnay of the Yarra Valley.  Today, we are really able to find good quality and value from Australia.

For our tasting on Friday March 6th at the wine shop, we will feature four wines from Australia.  The first is an interesting sparkling wine made with Pinot Noir and Chardonnay, the traditional grapes of Champagne (but at a fraction of the cost).  The second is a lighter, food-friendly style of Shiraz from the Barossa region. It will be followed by Shiraz from the McLaren Vale.  We will finish the tasting with a wine from one of our favorite Aussie producers – d’Arenberg.

Stop by the shop anytime between 5:00 and 9:00 to taste and learn about the wines we have picked from Australia.  We hope you can.