Latest News
7th May 2010
Kiwis firing blanc in a vintage wine price fight
Brisbane Courier Mail
THE avalanche of New Zealand sauvignon blanc swamping Australian bottle shops is set to continue.
Despite a glut in the market, the 2010 vintage looks to be only slightly smaller than last year's. It could spell bad times ahead for the suffering Australian wine industry, but it's good news for sauv blanc lovers who can pick up the imported wine for as little as $5 a bottle.
It is, by far, the bestseller. It was not that long ago that you couldn't get a New Zealand sauv blanc for less than $12, but with a rationalisation of price points due to demand and oversupply, people now expect to get a decent one for less than that," he said.
"There's been a new benchmark in the industry as everyone races to the bottom, with a lot of decent sauv blanc around to choose from."
Mr Gorman said 80 per cent of white wine sales in his store were sauvignon blanc, mostly from NZ. "You just can't overstate the dominance of the Kiwi sauv blanc in the market," he said.
But Master of Wine and winemaker Peter Scudamore-Smith said it was a case of getting what you pay for.
"Some of these wines are very dumbed down," he said.
"Once you get to under $10 a bottle they usually have very little character."
December 09
Smart Farmer
The coming Queensland 2010 vintage will be one to remember for those who make it to harvest grapes. Along the way, vineyards have been racked by frost ( ontwo different occasions, a week apart in the Granite Belt), drought ( the Bjelke-Petersen Dam in the South Burnett is still at six percent) and hail ( Granite Belt and Darling Downs, where several vineyards will not pick a berry).
So let's review some wines from previous years...
26th January 2010
No need to wine about mark-ups
Brisbane News
Paying near shelf price for a glass of wine at a decent restaurant sounds like fantasy, but a sample survey of Brisbane restaurants suggests there is truth to the contrary.
From white tablecloths in the CBD to respected suburban kitchens, there are wine bargains to be had among the hefty mark-ups - as long as you're clever about choice of venue and grape.
Master of wine Peter Scudamore-Smith of wine consultancy Uncorked and Cultivated said there were several reasons some restaurants recorded higher mark-ups than others due to higher operating costs.
"[Some restaurants have] higher rents and overheads, more chefs producing more complex and interesting dishes, higher quality ingredients, are organic, et cetera," he said.
"At the top end, its servicing the cash used to hold wines in correct storage for a year or two, rather than just current vintages."
December 09
Grapevine
Ten Minutes with Peter Scudamore Smith– by Editor
Excerpt from "Grapevine" - Publication of the Wine Guild of Australia, Qld Inc.
Master of Wine Peter Scudamore-Smith has agreed to share some thoughts with us on wine in this edition of the Grapevine.
In 1991 Peter was the second ever Australian to become a master of wine, an esteemed authority in the wine industry that involves a week-long exam on all aspects of the industry including trading, making and writing.
His first wine show as judge was in 1974 at the inaugural Granite Belt wine show and twenty five years later I was lucky to assist him this year as one of the Stewards for judging panel A at the 2009 Royal Queensland Wine Show.
What do you look for in a good wine?
A positive flavour and a flavour that is memorable. An hour after tasting you should remember what you drank.
Can you give me some tips on tasting wine
Do not read the label. Look at it, smell it then taste it. Move it around in your mouth until it becomes coated. The most enjoyable part of drinking a wine is enjoying the texture. It is a tactile thing like chewing on an aged beef. It is that lovely after flavour.
What is the best wine you have ever tasted?
It was definitely the oldest wine I have tasted, a 1794 Madeira. It was made before Marie Antoinette lost her head.
Does price suggest quality?
I believe yes. Wine that costs more than $20 for a bottle has inherent difference to wine that costs $10 per bottle.
What new developments in the wine industry excite you at the moment?
People are starting to explore new varieties and many countries are seeing a more food friendly focus. Places such as Spain, Italy and Portugal are more acclimatised to food. By introducing wines that sit at around 12 to 15 percent alcohol, they are easier to drink. There are many wines with high alcohol levels and enormous power. Two or three glasses
and you feel sick. These gutsy, blokey, heavy reds will not go anywhere though. There will always be a demand for them.
Your experience in Double Pruning is well known, what is the process, what are you trying to achieve?
Grape vines are a perennial climbing plant; in controlled culture they grow through spring and summer, are harvested in autumn before senescing with leaf drop followed by dormancy. Annual pruning over winter is the norm with hard mature canes being
removed by cutting, either to leave spurs or canes of that season’s growth which produce a crop the following season.
Double or summer pruning is exactly that-the vine is pruned as it is growing where green shoots, and any fruit is removed by pruning. That action forces the vines to re-shoot on the buds that remain and grow again during the summer months in their usual manner. This summer pruning activity has effectively forced the vine to set its crop later in the season with the net result being a retarded harvest date. The timing of summer pruning is late November-early December each year .Albert River vineyard recently summer pruned in late November 2009)
What success has there been for winemakers?
Summer pruning has been an experimental technique practised on shiraz vines by Queensland producers sited in warm climates since 2003-with varying levels of success but with increasing popularity of the wines due to a flavour shift. The normal harvest period of February-March where fruit character is stewed prune and jam is postponed
until April-May where the fruit character changes to blueberry, raspberry and fruit spice.
Recent developments/ awards?
To date the most well performed brands have been Clovely DP Shiraz (Queensland Wine Awards winner of best shiraz-2005) and since then many high prizes with subsequent vintages; www.clovely.com.au and Jimbour Ludwig Leichhardt Reserve (2007 took gold in San Francisco International in June 2009)
The Australian - 8th Aug 09
To succeed against adversity
FORMER detective and crown prosecutor Greg Stokes believes his journey to wine industry innovator and entrepreneur is due to his hereditary family motto: "To succeed against adversity!"
It goes some way to explain the tenacity and perseverance needed to break down barriers in a sector steeped in centuries of traditions.
Stokes is founder of Barokes Wines; he is also the co-inventor behind a globally patented packaging system that enables the delivery of wine in a can.
Like the cask in the 1970s, Stokes' world-first patented system of producing and packaging wine in a sealed can is opening new markets for wine geographically and demographically.
"Many a time did I have to fall back on the motto of my UK forebears to get this venture across the line," he says. "You can imagine how mortified people were when I first conceived the idea of wine in a can."
The qualities of gritty determination so prevalent among successful entrepreneurs has seen Barokes not only build a business, but successfully defend two international legal challenges to patents by well-resourced global packaging companies. "As a former prosecutor; I know my way around a courtroom."
Conceived in 1996 by Stokes after a glass bottle of wine accidentally fell into a spa bath, Barokes Wines has grown into a multi-million-dollar business with strong global exports.
Stokes says his belief was unshakable. "My business partner and I both mortgaged ourselves to the hilt to fund the can development. Five years of research led to the patented Vinsafe system which avoids wine spoilage from oxidation," he says.
"To take on this level of risk only comes from passion."
Dec 21 2008
Meet our newest wine baron - Brisbane Courier Mail
Queensland has a new wine baron and is about to get a new French grape variety which is fashionable in Languedoc and in California.
Korean property developer and motel owner, Joseph Kim, has bought picturesque Albert River Winery at Mt Tamborine.
And he has engaged Master-of-Wine Peter Scudamore-Smith who will introduce petit menseng, an obscure white variety from southwest France.
Very little of it is grown in Australia.
Petit manseng from Victoria's King Valley was described recently by wine writer James Halliday as having the flavour of lemon tart and a twist of lime.
Scudamore-Smith said he believed petit manseng was well suited to the sub-tropical hinterland.
" Petit manseng has loads of personality", he said. "It has a bit more attitude than the standard semillon, and not as aggressively rasping as sauvignon blanc.
It has taken five years to decide that this is a variety suitable in this environment."
He has already grafted 300 cabernet sauvignon vines with petit manseng and will graft another 1000 vines in the new year.
" We will have our first little crop in 2010, and a more serious crop in 2011. "he said.
" In time I will convert all the cabernet over".
It is a back to the future assignment for Scudamore-Smith who made wine for Albert River when the vineyard was in the hands of the Bladin family.
Scudamore-Smith said Kim has moved quickly to order extensive renovations - of buildings and vines. Then he flew to Seoul to set up an export trade.
Before he left, Kim directed Scudamore-Smith to look at ways to expand the vineyard.
Verandahs will be widened on the main house, a stable would become a gift shop, and a row of tourist cabins built overlooking the vines. And a rotunda will be built for weddings.
It will be the end of a successful year for Scudamore-Smith, who won a gold, two silvers and a string of bronze medals recently at The Courier Mail Queensland wine awards.
He is especially proud of the Ludwig Leichhardt 2007 Reserve Shiraz he made for Jimbour Wines. All the fruit came from vines from Jimbour on the Darling Downs, owned by David Russell QC, and his family.
" It's a subtle wine that can easily be missed at shows, so I was happy to get a silver," he said.
Aug 08
Plate Developers - The Foodies who have changed the way we eat - Brisbane Courier Mail - Good Life Magazine
Peter Scudamore-Smith and Andrew Corrigan
Scudamore-Smith and Corrigan are Queensland's only Masters of Wine.
Scudamore-Smith acts a consultant to the wine industry, advising on the process from vine to bottle, He's been particularly involved in wine-making for the emerging Queensland wineries.
Penfolds Grange Sale - a rare opportunity
Purchase a complete set of vintages 1980-1990, 11 consecutive vintages for $9000, packaged in owner-designed wooden boxes.
This is a limited offer and will not be available indefinitely, especially when the stocks of 1986 and 1990 start to tighten.
About the owner.
Brisbane-born Larry Eisentrager lives in Hong Kong as the Group CEO of Vitasoy, an international food conglomerate with Asian, US and some Australian investments. Larry commenced buying a case of Grange (then twelve bottles, not six) from 1980 every year onwards.
Larry says "Those were the years when you collected Grange and could still afford to drink Hill of Grace!" The wines have remained in careful storage since purchase although Larry has drunk portions of each vintage casually since. "Originally I was planning to resettle in Brisbane, build my house with a cellar etc but that has not eventuated. I did come back to Brisbane to work in early 2000 but I am now living in Hong Kong again. I would now prefer to give other people a chance to enjoy the wines rather than accept the hassle of shipping wine here with the attendant storage issues. I can vouch for the wines being stored well and this was further vindicated when many were assessed by Penfolds winemakers at their regular clinics, and not opened simply because the ullages were so high".
Assessment of the cellar by Peter Scudamore-Smith in August 2007.
"I opened a bottle of Larry's Grange 1981 to assess its state of maturity, and also its drinkability.
As 1981 is one of the more mature vintages in the sets from my previous tastings and past literature, this is a good indicator of the probity of this cellar and contents.
The 1981 bottle passed glowingly, cork in outstanding condition, still complete when extracted, no taint.
"Mature magenta colours, nose of sweet cigars and honeywood, beef broth and aged jam, the palate is mature but holding, lots of sweet anise and licorice, chunky shiraz juice and drying tannins expected of such a well matured wine. Drink now to 2015."
The ullages on all the vintages offered are into the neck and no lower, so they are in excellent condition from cork quality-as shown in this pictorial. Cellarage-for the entire time since purchase stored in an insulated environment, 18-20 degrees C underground in Brisbane
To view the selection of Penfolds Grange Sale currently on offer , please visit the Chalk & Cheese website here
Grange Clinics: wines over ten years and showing minor ullage have been taken to clinics over the years. Twenty-four bottles have been submitted; six from 1980, 1981, 1982 and 1983. None of the 1980 were opened as they were considered to be in very sound condition. Three bottles from 1981 were opened, checked, topped and re-corked, then confirmed with the Penfolds clinic seal. Likewise the six bottles from 1982 and 1983 were similarly opened and authenticated.
About Grange
From humble beginnings in the 1950s, Grange has maintained its place as Australia's most prestigious red wine over four decades. Today, it is a wine of international renown, with each vintage eagerly awaited by collectors both in Australia and overseas.
An Australian icon, Grange represents a tradition in winemaking that is totally uncompromising. Grange has bypassed the fads and trends of modern winemaking in the sense that it has maintained an integrity of style and remained true to its origins in the mind of Max Schubert. PENFOLDS Grange is the quality standard against which all other Australian red wines are judged. To share a mature Grange, 15 to 20 years old, in fine condition, is one of the great wine experiences.
PENFOLDS Grange is a wine of extraordinary dimension and power. Richly textured, intensely concentrated and packed with fruit sweetness, these wines, regardless of vintage, require medium to long-term cellaring. They develop into immensely complex, beguiling wines that seduce the senses.