Posts Tagged ‘botrytis semillon’

Wine three-for-one

Sunday, 25 July, 2010

De Bortoli "Sacred Hill" 2009 Traminer RieslingGramp's 2006 Botrytis SemillonDisaster Bay Hot Chili WineA triple wine post this time. Although purists would not regard the first offering as a “wine” – it’s made not from grapes, but from hot chilli peppers. That’s right, 100% chilli juice, pressed and fermented into a liqueur style drink, by Disaster Bay Chillies. I found this in a wine shop in Katoomba and the owner let me have a taste – wowee. It’s sweet and delicious, developing into a hot red chilli flavour that last and lasts and lasts. You don’t want a lot at once, but you do want more later on. I instantly bought a bottle and took it to a games night with some friends to share it around. Their opinion was mixed, with some not enjoying it, and others really liking it. I’m in the latter camp. The bottle says it lasts for months in the fridge, which is a good thing, because you don’t want more than half a shot glass at a time. But when it runs out, I’ll be buying another somewhere.

Next cab off the rank is Gramp’s botrytis semillon dessert wine. We’ve actually run out of sweet wines in our modest “cellar” (a box in the garage), so wanted to pick up something to go with cheese and crackers. This boasted some medals and wasn’t expensive, so we plumped for it. It’s thick and syrupy, and very sweet, without that hint of acidity to balance it out. The flavour is what I’ve begun to think of as typical for botrytis wines, of orange marmalade, but again without any of the subtle nuances of other flavours in there to give it complexity. M. didn’t like it much, but I thought it was passable with the cheese.

Today’s final offering is De Bortoli “Sacred Hill” 2009 Traminer Riseling, a blend of gewürztraminer and riesling to make a semi-sweet and spicy style of white wine. We found this in a bottle shop for a paltry $8.99 and I figured, “What the heck?” We had this over two nights, first with fish, then with Indian curries. I thought it was fine with both, showing the pickly spiciness of the previous gewürztraminer we tried. M. didn’t like it as much, stating it lacked the lemony citric notes that balanced the Stonecroft, and was a shade sweeter. True, it was as she described, but frankly I was hard pressed to notice the difference myself from memory. I think I’d need a side-by-side tasting to tell them apart. At any rate, I enjoyed this, and for the price I wouldn’t be shy of picking up more of this one.

Southern Highland Wines 2008 Botrytis Semillon

Sunday, 9 May, 2010

Southern Highlands Wines 2008 Botrytis Semillon
Another dessert wine. A few weeks ago we went on a day trip down to Berrima, a historic town on the old highway south from Sydney to Canberra and Melbourne. I remember having to drive through it on the way to Canberra many years ago and it was a nice place to stop for a morning tea of scones and cream. It’s since been bypassed and has reverted to a sleepy little village, but retains many charming features and has the usual sort of mix of antiques, crafts, art galleries, restaurants, and cafes to attract travellers and day-trippers.

As we discovered on this recent trip, it also has a wine shop, specialising in wines local to the southern highlands region of New South Wales. I hadn’t even realised that this was a wine growing region! They cover a scattered area ranging from about Bowral through to Canberra. Being highlands, they are high altitude, cool climate wineries, very different from the classic Australian hot and dry climate wine regions. I don’t know much about them, but presumably they grow stuff like sauvignon blanc and pinot noir. I’ll have to look into them a bit more closely over time.

Anyway, being a sucker for dessert wines, I picked up this bottle of Southern Highland Wines 2008 Botrytis Semillon. It’s very interesting to compare it to the other botrytised wines we’ve had recently. My wife really didn’t like this one as much, whereas I didn’t see much difference at first. It has an orangey aroma and taste, leading into the slight bitterness of marmalade. I quite liked it.

But a second glass brought out the differences. The previous couple of sweet wines we’ve drunk had a tingly prickle of fermentation on the tongue, whereas this one has none whatsoever. It’s a beautiful golden yellow colour, and thick and syrupy and sweet. Really not as much of that balancing marmaladey bitterness. And… simple for that. Not as complex and full of interesting flavours as the Tamburlaine Botrytis Chardonnay, nor particularly the McLeish Estate Jessica’s Botrytis Semillon.

I still like it – I have a real thing for these sweet dessert wines. But I like those other two more.