Category: Eden Valley

A fun night recently with some of my wine drinking associates where we celebrated the birthyear (and in one case the conception year) of the people attending with wines from that vintage. The years we were celebrating were 1963, 1968, 1977, 1979, 1980, 1981 and 1984. None of the years are especially legendary or classic, […]

I went to a hastily arranged dinner at Sakana-Ya in Crows Nest following the Torbreck tasting at North Sydney Cellars that I wrote about here. The quality of the dishes was good and there was some interesting food that I haven’t tried previously (Fried Eel being an example). The service was attentive and polite. Take […]

A recent dinner with some friends in Canberra, including the very best red wine I have been lucky enough to taste. I know I have been talking about a fair few international wines recently which is a deviation from the theme of the site, but I hope to get back to more Australian content shortly […]

To balance the night of French legends that I spoke of in the last post – it was decided that we should come together again in early April to have a dinner that would be a tribute to some great Australian wines. We gathered at Restaurant Atelier at Glebe – another restaurant with an excellent […]

The Nepalese Kitchen is a busy restaurant in Surry Hills. The food and spicing wasn’t ideal for wine matching, but I thought it had good flavour and there were lots of vegetarian options. Plus, at $121AUD for 6 people, the value was excellent. The downsides were that we were shifted from place to place, initially […]

All wines were tasted blind at dinner with some friends from the Winestar Forum with the exception of my bottles which were the Bindi, Sorrenberg and the Elk Cove. Bollinger R.D 1988 – (Champagne, France): Disgorged May 2000. Tarnished gold in colour. Toast, walnut, yeasty dough, pears and slightly oxidative nose. Palate is intense but […]

Last month Australia’s largest wine company Southcorp (now part of Fosters and even bigger) put on its annual road-show to showcase its wines across major capital cities. In Sydney, this was held at the completely refurbished Hilton hotel that was reopened in July. As often happens at these public events it didn’t take long to […]

A number of people I know were interested in tasting the Chris Ringland Shiraz, formerly known as “Three Rivers” before he was forced to change the name. This wine is a super small production Shiraz from the Barossa Valley and made by Chris Ringland of Rockford fame. Ever since Mr Robert Parker took a liking […]

Once again a merry band of men and women from the Winestar Forum met up in order to enjoy some food and wine. The Restaurant: I quite liked the restaurant; my entree of Balmain Bug Raviolo was excellent and was perfect for the white wines. Wasn’t quite as impressed with the main of Char-grilled Sirloin […]