Cantine Menhir ‘Il Mardorlo’ Negroamaro 2014 $16.95 ★★★½ Sniffing this wine for the first time is like walking into a delicatessen where every available piece of ceiling space has a hunk of drying meat or salami hanging from it. Rich, meaty and spicy, this superb-value sip is sourced from the Salento region in Puglia, Italy, … Read More
Author: Yvonne
Luna Argenta Appassimento Negroamaro Primitivo 2013
Luna Argenta Appassimento Negroamaro Primitivo 2013 $24 ★★★★ The ‘Appassimento’ style is made from grapes that are partially dried or ‘raisining on the vine’ That dessicating fruit produces a rich, spicy-sweet spectrum of flavours and textures that are incredibly approachable and dangerously easy to enjoy. It’s a Puglia-grown blend of Negroamaro and Primitivo, otherwise known … Read More
Burn Cottage Moonlight Race Central Otago Pinot Noir 2014
Burn Cottage Moonlight Race Central Otago Pinot Noir 2014 $45 ★★★★ Way back in the early years of European settlement of Central Otago, hundreds of water races were built to direct water from the mountains down to the prospectors, and this pinot is named after one which still flows through the property. Unlike its brooding, … Read More
Black Barn Unoaked Chardonnay 2014
Black Barn Unoaked Chardonnay 2014 $22 ★★★★ I have a thing about the word ‘unoaked’. It sort of implies that there’s something ‘un’ about the wine, that something’s missing or been taken away – and that couldn’t be further from the truth here. Packed to the cap with roast peach, pineapple and tangy citrus, winemaker … Read More
Lawson’s Dry Hills Reserve Pinot Noir 2013
Lawson’s Dry Hills Reserve Pinot Noir 2013 $28 ★★★★★ Marcus Wright and Becs Wiffen are like the Torvill and Dean of New Zealand winemaking teams, and the emotion involved in drinking this wine they’ve created is like watching those athletes ice-skate their Bolero routine at the 1984 Olympics all over again. That sense of something … Read More
Two Hands Gnarly Dudes Barossa Shiraz 2013
Two Hands Gnarly Dudes Barossa Shiraz 2013 $38 ★★★★½ There’s something oddly comforting about drinking a wine from a bottle that has a picture of a grapevine so old and gnarly it looks like Treebeard the Ent from Lord of the Rings on the label. Dark, inky-magenta coloured and bursting with dusty leather, eucalypt, ultra-ripe … Read More
Zeppelin ‘Big Bertha’ Barossa Shiraz 2014
Zeppelin ‘Big Bertha’ Barossa Shiraz 2014 $24 ★★★★ Saturated magenta colour and oozing sweet cherry and berry aromas, gentle spices and a palate soaked with fruit, vanilla, pepper and hints of dark chocolate. This is a cracker of a wine that’s smooth, velvety and dangerously easy to drink. For stockists contact Red & White Cellar … Read More
Mojo Barossa Valley Shiraz 2013
Mojo Barossa Valley Shiraz 2013 $24 ★★★★ I love that the label says that the storybookish, fantasy forest creatures artwork was done by GhostPatrol “whilst listening to K Frimpong and his Cubano Fiestas”. This is a very pretty wine inside also. Delicious aromas of dusty spices, leather and cocoa lead to sweet plum and berry-soaked … Read More
Rogue Society Goldi Locks
Rogue Society Goldi Locks $124 Seriously if you’re a gin lover of any significance then you’ll need to beg, steal, borrow or at least sell the soul of your first born to get yourself a bottle of this, the second offering from New Zealand’s own Rogue Society. According to the Rogue team, there are four … Read More
Karikari Estate Calypso Chardonnay 2013
Karikari Estate Calypso Chardonnay 2013 $29 ★★★★ This little cracker from the far north is a new favourite because it hit the right cinnamon, struck match and smoke notes needed to cloak the underlying roast pineapple and peach flavours on the palate. It’s robust enough to nicely pair with anything resembling a roast chook or … Read More