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Peter Wagner |
Not having received personal
threats from any of you, I dare to do it again for this issue of The
Physiologist. As I mentioned before, locating specific wines can be
difficult. The internet and your local wine shop are good sources for
finding wines that don’t appear on the supermarket shelf. Here we go:
White wines:
Several terrific New Zealand Sauvignon Blancs are reaching the USA in
significant volume and are all well-worth trying to find. Those of special
note are:
a) Villa Maria 2005 private bin ($10-13). Great value, bursting with
gooseberry, herbal, grassy fruit, solid structure and mouth feel, and good
but not mouth puckering acidity. Clean, very good length. Outstanding.
b) Saint Clair 2004 (2005 should soon be here) ($12-15). Almost as good as
Villa Maria, same style, same comments but just 3+ rather than 4+ on all
fronts.
c) Babich 2004 or 2005 ($9-12) same level as Saint Clair, and again with all
the juicy herbal lime/passion fruit/gooseberry fruit and acid that makes the
NZ SB’s so desirable.
Remember, drink young and cool, not cold (the wine should be young and cool,
you do not have to be). I promise to move to other white varietals next
time.
Red wines:
Just as I dream of NZ SB’s, I dream of Australian Shiraz’s. The same grape
as Syrah in France, in Oz they make this their specialty in red wines. The
very best are unaffordable but there is a whole bag full of delicious Shiraz
at $10-20 available now. They may not be easy to find in quantity, but if
you do you will be happy if you like big, juicy, fruit-driven (usually
blackberry) reds that have very evident but balanced (usually American) oak
flavors of dill and vanilla, and generally soft tannins for the strong
fruit. Look for current vintages of Penfolds Kalimna bin 128 ($15-20);
Penfolds bin 389 Shiraz/Cabernet blend ($20-25), Step Road 2003 ($14-16);
Pirramimma 2001 or so ($16-20); Peter Lehman any vintage ($15-20). In fact,
you will likely not go wrong with any Australian Shiraz in this price range.
They will vary in detail and perhaps in “bigness,” but they are almost
always well-made and easy to drink. So try any you can find and judge for
yourself. By the way, if you can afford the unaffordable, you can try
Penfolds Grange, Henschke Hill of Grace, Elderton Command, Leasingham
Classic Clare, Lindemans Limestone Ridge. These Shiraz are listed in
decreasing order of price from about $300 to about $40 a bottle, and are
very hard to find.
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