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Go To Section: On Tasting
Tasting the Latest Noon Wines
Friday, 5th February, 2010 - David Farmer

Drew Noon

November, 14th found me at the Noon Wines cellar door in McLaren Vale to taste the new releases. Drew Noon returned to the family vineyard in 1996 and since then has built a great reputation and following for his signature, big style of wines, some of which can be over 16% alcohol. The 2008 vintage was very difficult due the heat and the shiraz suffered. This is what I learned. more...

Go To Section: What We Drank Last Night
A Very Strong Line - Up but I Had Doubts
Friday, 5th February, 2010 - David Farmer

What could be better than a glass of Heggies Eden Valley Reserve Chardonnay 2005 (14.0%), and as it turned out it came up trumps. From of course the Heggies vineyard, site I block and from the chardonnay clones Bernard 76, 95, and 96 with the winemaker being Peter Gambetta. Now this is a delicious wine with lots of interesting mid palate tastes and each glass was a joy to drink. It was matched against the Penfolds Yattarna Chardonnay 2006 (13%) which most judges would rank higher than the Heggies as it was much tighter and leaner with greater length. Why then did we stop drinking it at the half way point? On the day it just seemed there were better things to do - like drink the Heggies. You know, tasting and drinking wines is all rather easy. Do you want it in your mouth and is it giving pleasure - that's all there is.. more...


MORE DRINKS FROM OTHER NIGHTS
A Steady as She Goes Range
Thursday, 29th January, 2010
Oh What a Night - We Could Do No Wrong
Sunday, 10th January, 2010
Oh What Fun We Had
Monday, 14th December, 2009

Go To Section: WHat the Market Says
Champagnes - the New Leaders at Harrods
Friday, 5th February, 2010 - David Farmer

First stop in London was to Harrods to view the recently renovated wine store to see if I could pinch any ideas. Innovative and neat, particularly the lighting and I will pass my thoughts on to a few retail clients. It was later, while viewing the Champagne selection that I realised the world of wine is shifting again. Most consumers and I include those with lots of money have great trouble in really deciding how good the contents are. Thus how the brand package looks has become very important in the last few decades. more...


Two Co-Branded Yalumba Wines
Wednesday, 27th January, 2010 - David Farmer

A reader purchased these two Yalumba wines at a garage sale in Canberra. By all accounts they drank quite well. They are part of an early experiment I did in co-branding back in the mid 1970's. Co-branding is using a company's brand on a product, made exclusively for a particular retailer. In this way you can control the selling price as no competitor has that label. It is very common in retailing and in the wine business its use waxes and wanes with competitive pressures and market conditions. more...


Go To Section: General Wine Comments
The English Press is Very Quiet About the 2010 Michelin
Thursday, 29th January, 2010 - David Farmer

Takeshi Kaga

From a land that produced Elizabeth David and Jane Grigson and more recently Gordon Ramsay, Heston Blumenthal and that self promoting machine, Jamie Oliver you would expect the food scene to be very healthy. Thus I must say I was surprised when opening the new Michelin Great Britain and Ireland for 2010 to find that this is still not showing up in the results. more...

Vinderella and The Benevolent
Thursday, 29th January, 2010 - David Farmer

The Benevolent is a UK Drinks industry charity which began in 1886. Grants are made to the needy who have worked in the drinks business. I was invited to a fund raising pantomime titled Vinderella which turned out to be most amusing. This ran for four performances and the night I went was well supported by the wine, spirit and beer groups including retailers and their buyers, wholesalers and importers, trade publications, journalists, indeed anyone who makes a wage from this large business. more...


Go To Section: The Australian Wine Industry
They Have Got To Be Joking
Tuesday, 19th January, 2010 - Richard Farmer

The weekend stories about changes to alcohol taxation are bound to turn out to be silly season nonsense. For a start they would result in a reduction in the price of alcopops. After the controversy of the past year, that is just not on for the Labor government. A second reason is that it would devastate the bulk wine industry at a time when grape growers are in great distress. The idea of taxing forms of alcohol on the basis of their alcohol content might be logical but it is not politically sensible.


Go To Section: Annals Of Marketing
Keeping Supply Lower Than Demand
Wednesday, 13th January, 2010 - David Farmer

Jean-Claude Biver

If marketing is the art of selling products at higher prices than they are intrinsically worth then one of the keys is to keep supply lower than demand. Selling luxury Swiss watches is an example. From the Economist, November 12th, 2009, Salesman of the Irrational; tells the story of Jean-Claude Biver, a master of supply and demand. more...

Go To Section: Wine Books
Ten Company Histories and Biographies of Our Wine Pioneers  - *(see note for details)

Review by David Farmer

In the wine business 50 years is too short for reflection while one hundred years spans several generations and covers a wide variety of trading conditions. Companies that are still family owned and trading after 100 years are the rare survivors and it was at this point that most of them commissioned a company history. Many great contributors to the Australian wine history, and to single out one, Alexander Kelly's Tintara, did not survive for long and we know little about them. more...


Go To Section: Odds & Sods
A Whet Whistle Catches the Fishes
Monday, 4th January, 2009 - 'JV' Canberra

Extreme Fisho 'JV'

In September 2009, Glug pledged a modest, liquid sponsorship to customer JV of Canberra. Jon was heading north to seek a bounty in the northern waters of Australia. The trip sounds like a roaring success. JV was kind enough to send us this missive upon his return. Fishers read on with joy. more...

Oh What a Lovely Bubble
Saturday, 2nd January, 2009 - David Farmer

Recent research tells us that a well made bottle of French champagne when opened will release around one billion tiny bubbles of carbon dioxide. Pondering this made me realise that should all of that gas go up as one large bubble it would be 50 kilometres in diameter. Now in any day there would be on average about 800,000 to 850,000 bottles of French champagne opened globally which combined pops out as a truly big bubble, much bigger than earth.


The cellar book of the Earl of Bristol covers the period 1703-1725; what was the first Premier Cru Bordeaux stocked in the cellar?

Chateau Lafitte
Chateau Haut Brion
Chateaux Margaux
Chateaux Cheval Blanc
Chateaux Latour



A regular update of wines we've found interesting and a few we'd rather forget more...




The Australian Wine Industry

The Twenty Golden Years of Kaiser Stuhl

Sunday, 9th September, 2007

Thoughts on the Industry’s 'Directions to 2025', Part 1

Thursday, 16th August, 2007

The Graveyard of Australian Brands

Thursday, 9th November, 2006

The Boundary of Coonawarra, Part II

Monday, 19th June, 2006

Oh Coonawarra - Why Did You Do This to Yourself?

Wednesday, 24th May, 2006


What the Market Says

Wine Prices, Point Scores and Retailing

Thursday, 2nd August, 2007

Ah! To Make a Wine with Aspirational Status

Tuesday, 28th November, 2006

The Unusual Marketing at Brown Bros

Tuesday, 7th November, 2006

What Comes After Barossa Pearl and Ben Ean?

Monday, 18th September, 2006

The Price Fighting Varietals and the Spiralling Price Vortex

Sunday, 24th July, 2005


General Comments

Bo a Perfect 10 Out of 10

Thursday, 6th December, 2007

An Update on the Unfathomable Idea - Terroir

Wednesday, 3rd October, 2007

A Look at Langtons Classification from 1991 to 2005

Monday, 17th October, 2005

About Oak Barrels and A.P.Johns

Tuesday, 13th September, 2005


On Tasting

Confessions of Wine Deceit, Other Deceptions and Fooling Yourself

Monday, 29th January, 2007

Wine Labels, Ranking, Ratings, Experts and Wine Prices

Friday, 27th October, 2006

Geology Cannot be Found In Wine

Thursday, 18th September, 2006

Terroir - Can It Possible Shine Through the Background Noise

Tuesday, 4th July, 2006

Sharp Differences of Opinion Over Mount Mary

Monday, 14th November, 2005

Going To Your Second Wine Tasting

Saturday, 11th December, 2004

What You Bring to Your First Wine Tasting

Saturday, 4th December, 2004


Odds & Sods

Irish Trout and Other Monsters

Friday, 2nd June, 2006



LATEST ARTICLES
Tasting the Latest Noon Wines

Friday, 5th February, 2010

A Very Strong Line - Up but I Had Doubts

Friday, 5th February, 2010

A Steady as She Goes Range

Thursday, 29th January, 2010

The English Press is Very Quiet About the 2010 Michelin

Thursday, 29th January, 2010

Vinderella and The Benevolent

Thursday, 29th January, 2010

Two Co-Branded Yalumba Wines

Wednesday, 27th January, 2010

They Have Got To Be Joking

Tuesday, 19th January, 2010

Keeping Supply Lower Than Demand

Wednesday, 13th January, 2010

Ten Company Histories and Biographies of Our Wine Pioneers

Oh What a Night - We Could Do No Wrong

Sunday, 10th January, 2010

Fosters - What is There to be Optimistic About

Thursday, 7th January, 2010

The Barossa Wine Show Public Tasting 19th September
Part 3 of the Barossa Tastings

Monday, 4th January, 2010

A Whet Whistle Catches the Fishes

Monday, 4th January, 2009

Questions from the 160th Anniversary at Yalumba

Saturday, 2nd January, 2010

Oh What a Lovely Bubble

Saturday, 2nd January, 2009

Oh What Fun We Had

Monday, 14th December, 2009

What You Need to Know About Ice Ages

Thursday, 10th December, 2009

Martinborough Just Loves Te Muna

Thursday, 3rd December, 2009

Wild Yeasts, Riccadonna, Marlborough and Fosters

Wednesday, 2nd December, 2009

Six Different Varieties Leads to Much Enjoyment

Tuesday, 1st December, 2009


WINE QUOTES
Tasting and Judging Wines is Not So Simple After all
Attributed to: Anon
Source: The Australian, December, 31st, 2004
Contributed by: Anon

Can the ordinary person taste or appreciate the difference between Australian sparkling wine and French Champagne? A blind tasting showed good champagne is wasted on the wine buffs working at The Australian's Adelaide bureau. The four participants were mortified to discover they unanimously picked Omni N V, at $10 a bottle, as expensive French champagne, or their favourite.

By contrast Bollinger Special Cuvee ($85) was variously rubbished as "flat, sour..like schoolies' week, "Passion Pop" and "bland". Australia's premium, award winning sparkling wine Arras Chardonnay Pinot ($49) was derided as "tastes like mouthwash" by one, "rude smelling, cheap and nasty" by another with one hack favourably toasting it as "pungent and strong tasting but quite liked it".



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