Australian Wine Dinner at Bistro Ortolan
A few of us got together last night with some Norwegians who wanted to look at a few local wines while in town. In attendance was: myself, Gen, Mark, Fred, Cam, Christo, Riannan and the Norwegian crowd.
Rothbury Estate semillon 1979 Amazing freshness on the nose, a very good bottle. Grapefruit, hints of sesame seed, mandarine. The palate is a little short but well balanced. A great experience!
Lindemans Hunter White Burgundy 1974 More oxidised than the above with sherry-like character to the nose, hints of ginger and orange peel. Still, good to have tried it.
Tahbilk Marsanne 1976 Typical aged marsanne: oxidative, lots of ginger and a woodiness. Quite alcoholic on the palate — it’s a different wine now — and with a strange phenolic quality which marsanne alone seems to have. Interesting.
Leeuwin Estate Art Series Chardonnay 2001 Ripe, pure peach, lemon, grape fruit and nectarine framed by oak — more judicious than other recent releases. Less pleasant on the palate and but settle down over 10 years.
Kooyong “Meres” Vineyard 2003 I had a better bottle the other day, this seemed more obviously New World. Generally well accepted by the table, the Norwegians seemed quite impressed, ripe but restrained fruit, none of this reductive unfiltered stupidity, long and well balanced on the palate. Lack of fruit complexity but that’s the young vines (I assume). A step up for Kooyong, IMHO.
McWilliams Maurice O’Shea 1991 VA problems, very unpleasant. What a shame, looked like a nice wine underneath.
Rockford Basket Press 1987 Fading and probably past its best, unfortunately. Soft earthy tones, touch of brett, flavours of straw/hay which I associate with this wine year after year. A typical savoury quality. Others liked it better.
Orlando St. Hugo 1996 Could be a barrel sample! Rich Cab typical of the time and region. How long before this looks mature? At least 10 years I think! Pretty remarkable when you consider that it was a fairly unpretentious wine when made.
Voyager Estate Cab/Merlot 2002 I liked this when I opened it at 4pm. Typical MR, lots of clay and gravel, lots of tannin. At the dinner, it started to look fairly green with capsicum and vegetal notes. A lot of the wines on the table were riper than this wine so it looked poor in comparison but I think this wine will always have a green streak which will not go away — despite the ability for the wine to go 20 years. I’ve got two more bottles, I’ll forget about them for… ever?
Following this we opened some fruit bombs — we wouldn’t be doing justice to Australian wine if we just showed wines like the above, would we?
d’Arenberg “Dead Arm” 2001 Very ripe, extracted nose with a hint of funk. Jubes, sweet oak, red skins. Approachable on the palate but you weren’t begging for a second glass.
Elderton Command Shiraz 1998 Very ripe, beginning to mature. Pretty good on the palate.
Goldolphin 2005 Ripe nose but with underlying complexity. Hard going on the palate.
Amon Ra 2005 Typical Amon Ra on the nose, what everyone has already said. Amazing purity, mind blowing really. Palate tastes, like Mark said, like wine with a vodka depth charge! Really hard to drink.
Wild Duck Creek Fortified 2005 As previous notes, excellent purity on the nose. Except for the creamy/milky character, you’d mistake it for the Amon Ra!
Bullers Calliope Rare Muscat How is that this wine, at 18.0% alc. is much easier to drink than the fruit bombs which have less alcohol. I’m confused. Enough on that. This is an amazing wine. Pure and yet complex. Raisin, coffee, chocolate, lots of cloves. Maybe I should drink this all the time? Seemless on the palate, sweet but not cloying. You feel it sliding down your throat, it’s progress through your body. So very very good. Special thanks to Bert for rushing up a bottle for me.
Wines of the night for me were the Rothbury and the Muscat. That said, a lot of really enjoyable wine.
The food was of a high quality but expensive, I thought. The service was surprisingly churlish. I was told to open my own bottles (first time!) and when one of the Norwegian attendees dared ask for his wine to be decanted it was simply up ended with all sediment poured into the decanter! It would be better with a small crowd, no more than 4.
