Always a pleasure to check in on older Sem and this Meerea Park Alexander Munro Aged Release Semillon 2011 is in a good place. Gentle, rounded and toasty, the flattering palate …
Not all wines can be great. Plenty are just ok drinks. And some are just bad. Here then is a selection of wines that almost made it to a pass mark …
From Daniel and Jenni Payne's Dirt Candy label; part of the new wave of Hunter wine, complete with a suite of pet nats and such. This is an outlier too …
Fun fact: Shiraz makes up over 25% of all winegrapes crushed in Australia, and South Australia has the largest vineyard area with 76,292ha (Wine Australia figures 19/20). But what I want …
Australian Chardonnay is in the midst of a purple patch, with quality - and value - as good as it has ever been, as this collection of the 16 best …
Aged Hunter Semillon from the Eather family. This Meerea Park Aged Release Alexander Munro Semillon 2014 has a core of quite ripe and forward fruit - a chunkier Sem for …
As the name suggests, these are the Top 20 Shiraz of August 2020. There was more Shiraz this month, there always is. But these are the wines I want to …
Very well priced Hunter Semillon from Meerea Park. Again. This Meerea Park Hell Hole Semillon 2019 comes off the Lochleven Vineyard in Pokolbin and is very much built in a …
Not all wines can be great. Plenty are just ok drinks. And some are just bad. Here then is a selection of wines that almost made it over the past few …
Dalwood Estate is the longest running commercial vineyard in Australia, with a history that dates back to 1828 when it was first established by George Wyndham. But for years now Dalwood …
It's always a surprise to see generosity in taut, early picked Hunter Valley Semillon. It shouldn't be that way. The best wines are often ferociously acidic drinks for later. The …
Chalk this Gundog Estate The Chase Semillon 2019 as another winner. I can't keep up with how big Gundog's d'Arenberg-esque sized range is now (let alone all the Canberra and …
Hunter Valley Semillon, but in a Riesling bottle. Blasphemous, maybe, but do you really care? Will it stop you from buying this Meerea Park Terracotta Semillon 2015? My take - I …
Hunter Valley Pinot Noir - aka the missing component that has helped make some of the most famous Australian wines of all, the Maurice O'Shea era Mount Pleasant reds. As a …
Following closely on the Top 20 Chardonnay comes the Top 20 Shiraz of February 2020. For this lineup I dug deeper into the sample pile, searching - perhaps blindly - for …
Meerea Park seemed lost in the wilderness for a bit there, with inconsistent wines a signal of internal challenges. The Eather boys have righted the ship with these '18 vintage …
Here are 24 tasty white and pink wines for your immediate drinking pleasure. Wines that, to my tastes at least, are in the prime of their lives and should be consumed …
Why stop at just 10 great Shiraz for the month? Here is the follow on list of the best 11-34 Shiraz to pass the desk in October 2019. Terre à Terre …
As it says on the tin, here are ten of the best Shiraz to pass the tasting bench this October. A special note to the breadth of Hunter Shiraz from …
Not all wines can be great. Plenty are just ok drinks. And some are just bad. Here’s a selection of wines that almost made it in October 2019. I like plenty …
At 18, I started working in a small suburban bottleshop, largely to buy cheap beer. It was my first year of university, slogging through physics and chemistry, so a liquor shop seemed like fun. Needless to say, I discovered wine, and my life evolved with a unique dual focus - wine and environment.
Twenty years later and I spend my days wearing many (wine) hats, mostly as a writer, presenter and marketer.
I now judge at wine shows around the world, sit on the Australian Wine List of the Year awards panel and was once a Wine Journalism Young Gun (but baby that was years ago).
Currently, I write features for a variety of publications including National Liquor News, Gourmet Traveller WINE and the RAS, plus I'm a former Lifestyle FOOD channel wine expert.
In 2019 and 2020 I was voted in the Top 30 Best Wine Critics in The World, and in my spare time, I'm a sucker for punishment and run trail ultra marathons, much to the delight of my long-suffering family. Read more about me here or get in touch to book your next wine event with me here