Firstly I have not been into my blogging recently. Well, the last 7 months to be more precise. This coincides with the age of my first daughter, who is also 7 months old. Funny how that happens… I do promise to be more active from now on though.

I was able to get down to the Algarve for a little break recently. Here I visited the Quinta dos Vales winery once again to try some of the latest wines. It was quite pleasant there with the temperature in the low 20’s (centigrade), which is very acceptable to me in mid November. Although it is pretty quite in the Algarve at this time of year, it is a good chance to get a cheap hotel room and see the towns as fishing villages rather than tourist resorts.

At Quinta dos Vales there is the option of accommodation. Here you can stay in a villa amongst the vines, which is a very relaxing option in the peak season in the region. You will feel a world away from the resorts and packed beaches and bars. During the off season it is also a wonderful experience. Especially at this time of the year as the leaves on the vines are painting the landscape red, orange, yellow and brown.

Then of course you are in a winery. You have the wines to try! I have written about some of the Quinta dos Vales wines before. What took my interest this time around was not a “top of the range” wine. I was very interested in one of their entry level white wines. The 2010 Marquês dos Vales Primeira Selecção – Blanc do Noir. This is an unusual white wine. It is made from the Castelão grape variety. For those not familiar with the varietal, it is a red grape. As most of you will know, when you crush the majority of red grapes the juice is clear, the red colour comes from the contact with the skins, known as maceration. The exceptions are; Alicante Bouschet, Carmina, Deckrot, Dunkelfelder, Gamy Teiturier , Grand Noir de la Calmette, Kolor, Petit Bouschet, Pinot Teiturire, Royal 1390, Rubired, Salvador, Saperavi, Siebouschet and Sulmer. These red (or black) varieties also have red flesh so provide red juice. The most well know white wine from red gapes is probably Pinot Noir, but there is the option of making a white wine from most red varietals.

For this wine, the results have been very good. With white flower, pear and peach on the noise and a crisp fuity palate and a tangy dry finish it pairs very well with a wide range of simple sea food dishes – or simply to enjoy on a warm evening of the balcony or terrace. If you visit the winery it will probably be the first wine you taste, but do not forget about it when you come to making a selection on what to buy. They are many great wines to taste after this one, but at under €7 per bottle it is well worth taking a couple away with you.

So if you are planning your holidays for next year at the moment, or are looking at escaping the freezing temperatures where you are right now, the Quinta dos Vales winery is a great place to stay or visit.

By Chris Metcalfe

There are exceptions to the rule in the Algarve. One of these wineries is Quinta dos Vales. I visited them earlier in the year to see and taste for myself. I must admit, I was not sure what to expect. I was a little worried at the sight of brightly coloured artworks strewn across the property. After I had a look around the very well designed grounds and some of the vineyards, I began to realize they were set up for some serious wine production. All this could have been undone if the wines were not up to scratch.

I was guided through the tasting by Aderito , the horticultural engineer at the winery. Although his title may seem unusual for someone to be hosting a wine tasting, I can assure you he knew his stuff. His main role at the winery is maintaining the vines for optimal grape production. This is a hard, time consuming job at any winery, but at Quinta dos Vales there is one vineyard that is particularly temperamental. The Grace Vineyard regularly tests the winery’s patience. The intense workload for low yields seems like a thankless task. Maybe in many wineries now days it would have been dug up and replaced. Tasting the wine however (and a few times since) I can assure you the time and effort is well worth it.

The wine that interested me the most was the Grace Vineyard 2010 Branco. A white wine made from Arinto, Siria and Malvasia Fina. This wine I tasted as a tank sample and it still had some time to go before it would be bottled. Even so, it was very interesting – in a good way. It has mango, lychee and passion fruit aromas and on the taste it starts light and then becomes more robust with great acidity, a touch of oak and a long finish. It is better to have this wine with an equally robust meal – pork, strong fish or chicken dishes I think would be best. It is an excellent wine on its own, but when you compare it to most other white wines made in the region it is really outstanding.

Quinta dos Vales is located just outside the small town of Estombar. If you are in the Algarve this summer go and visit them and try their wines for youself.

By Chris Metcalfe

Vines Alsace

One highlight wasn’t the comparison between the two styles but the comparison between the King Valley samples and some European ones. The 2009 Del Zotto was compared to a 2008 from the Alto Adige region in the Tyrol and Libertine matched them with a soufflé. Initially I was disappointed as both wines were served too cold and you had to let them drop to room temperature before the real taste came through. Then there wasn’t much difference between the two. Both were steely and long on the palate. I was biased and preferred the Victorian variety.

The Prentice pinot gris was compared to one from Alsace. Both were from the 2009 vintage and the chef matched them with a chicken farci. I thought the food was a better match for them and the smoothness of the gris complemented the taste of the chicken. I couldn’t see much difference in these two wines either.

The two grape varieties are both splendid styles and ideally suited to the cool climate of the King Valley. Other examples I’ve tasted from warmer climes weren’t as pristine and the gris were rather overblown. I am a fan of the Del Zotto wines and would have voted for their wines if pressed. I also liked the modesty of Michael Del Zotto, the winemaker. His description of the grigio wasn’t complicated by wine speak.

Vines King Valley

By Michael Metcalfe

Further up the road is Lilliput Winery, about eight kilometres from Rutherglen. Typically it is a small winery in a small settlement. The German winemakers their claim their wines are biodiverse. I expected a reisling and a gewürztraminer but got neither… But they did do a shiraz and a cabernet that were very rich and fruity and I didn’t get a headache from either.

Even further up the road is Larks Hill. As with Lilliput, we chanced upon this winery located a few kilometers north of Bungerong on the road from Queanbeyan to Batman’s Bay. It is certified bio-dynamic and they stick to the gospel of Steiner with mulching, planting at the full moon, building stone monument, sacrificing virgins, the lot. The don’t do a gewürztraminer, but they do the first gruner viltliner in Australia. The story goes that importing the vines into Australia is prohibited, but a man from Tasmania had some and gave them to Larks Hill as he was getting on in years and wanted the vines to have a good home. The winemaker from Larks Hill flew to Tassie, got the seedlings and flew back with them first class. The wine is great going by the second vintage, the 2010. It is reisling like but not as austere and is quite fruit driven. Their pinot and shiraz were superb – rich and intense, long and savoury – real food wines. We had a bottle of the shiraz with steak and it was an excellent fit.

The cost of preservative free wines is minimal. As you get into the rarified and certified organic, the prices skyrocket. But it’s worth it and we willingly support the effort.

By Michael Metcalfe

I have seen people out in the vineyards collecting grapes before. Apart from my admiration for these people’s endurance during the hot September (March in Australia usually) days, it isn’t that interesting to look at really. What excited me about this particular opportunity was the use of a harvesting machine that would be picking during the night. This I had not seen before and would make for a great spectacle from the tasting come dinning room.

After lunch in Evora and a quick tasting at the nearby João Portugal Ramos, it was time to check into a hotel and then head up to Qunita da Esperança. On arriving the sun was just starting to set, so the light over the vineyard was magical. Our host hurried up to us as we were poking around the vines to announce the harvesting machine had broken down earlier in the day. We would however, go ahead with dinner and tasting regardless. Due to the machine being broken it freed up the time of the resident enologist, Joana Silva Lopes. She was very kind to give us her time to discuss the wines. When she heard that my father and I were from Australia, she was very excited because she had just returned from a few months observing and working with the wine makers at Best’s winery in Western Victoria. A winery my father visits quite often. So we bored the other guests with tales of Australian wines for a while…

The use of new world wine making techniques combined with the centuries of traditional wine making along with the native grapes are the big features of Portuguese wines. It gives them an individual stamp on their wines that very few other countries can offer. This combined with their great value makes them appealing to me as a consumer, and very interesting to talk about as a writer.

So with glass in hand and sun disappearing on behind the hills it was time to taste. The white to start with was the Terras de Estremoz. A fresh, citrusy wine; great with light seafood or fish meals. Then the reds. With some nice marketing the next two reds were named Prodigo and Enjeitado. Meaning good son and bad son. It is a very interesting way to get to know the different types of red wines from Portugal. The Prodigo is a lighter, more delicate wine; whereas the Enjeitado is a bigger angrier wine, that could do with a lay down for a couple of years. They do represent two very distinct tastes of Portuguese reds and well worth trying them out for yourself if you can find them.

Then it was inside for some food. Tradition Alentejano soup was to start, served with the Quinta da Esperança red. The wine by itself didn’t really stand up to the Enjeitado, but with the food it went down quite well. Next up was pork and potatoes, what else are you going to have in this part of the world? It was very good and a few servings later, along with another glass of red, it was almost time to loosen one’s belt a notch or two… Thankfully, the highlight of evening was opened. The 2003 Encostras de Estremoz Reserva. I have had this wine a few times before, but I was interested in what my dad made of it. He found it, along with most of the wines we tried in Portugal, difficult to compare. Well it only makes sense given the majority of wines we had were blends of grape varieties he had never heard of before. Despite the lack of a yard-stick to measure the wine against, he agreed it was good. That was all I got out of him, as he went in search of a re-fill…

Despite the lack of entertainment from a large motor vehicle going up and down the vines, it was a very enjoyable evening. The wine, as it was always going to be, was the highlight of the evening, followed very closely by the explanations given by Joana and the food. I hope they do it again next year, if you are in the neighborhood then look out for it. Even without a harvester it is a fabulous evening!

A cellar door some fifteen minutes walk from the busy centre of Melbourne? Sounds very implausible, but it can only happen in North Melbourne and can only feature Keith Brien and his Silverwings wines.

You know the cellar door is open if the barrel is on the footpath. From the outside it looks just like any other three storey dwelling that has been architecturally designed from an old factory in the middle of an old industrial area.

Keith gave up flying with Ansett when they disbanded in the 19980s and set up a winery in Lancefield in the Macedon region. The wines were superb and the old mansion, Cleveland, was lovingly restored. I can still vividly remember tasting a chardonnay there before the ABC campaign began and it was mind blowingly French in style. It was a 1991 with intense butterscotch flavours, something I’ve been trying to find in chardonnays ever since with very limited success. Experts told me that’s what Chablis should taste like, not the overoaked varieties that scandalised winemaking in Australia for two decades.

As Lancefield is very prone to frost, Cabernet in particular was hard to ripen. Another stand out from the Cleveland days was the Minus 5, a cab-merlot blend, getting it’s name because it was usually picked at that temperature. Keith saved the last vintage, a 1998, as a reserve as he thought it the best he’d produced. You can buy this at $25 a bottle at cellar door but there’s a catch. When he started drinking some a few months ago, he discovered that there was one bottle in each dozen with cork taint. He can’t guarantee you will get twelve to the dozen that are potable.

But you can pick up stunning bargains from now until August. There are some sparkling wines. The Macedon vignerons decide to call their sparklings Macedon to ward off the French “Champagne nazis”. Keith has a Brut Rose for $27 and a 1993 vintage XO Brut with added cognac for $50. Unfortunately, the 1998 Brut sold out on the first day of his winter tasting when I bought the last case at $29 a bottle. The full list of wines to sell before the next pallets of wine come in are listed on the website www.silverwingswines.com.

Some of the wines made for the American market, a Riesling sourced from the Margaret river and a Grenache, Shiraz, Mouvedre blend are absolute steals. The Silverwings flagship wine is a Shiraz-Mouvedre from the Goulburn valley, made from the fruit from old vines planted in the 1950s. The 2008 will be released shortly and will be last of the blend as Keith moves on again to another winery on the slopes of Mount Macedon – not quite full circle.

Coming up soon, after a mandatory trip back to France, Keith will host a tasting where he will rerelease the 1999 Cleveland Pinot Noir pitted against some Burgundies. The 1999 was another wine with a story. I tasted a barrel sample at the winery and was literally blown away. It was huge. Not a timid watery Pinot but a monster with so much alcohol I had to sit down for an hour after the taste. It was a limited release in dozen lots to valued customers as there was precious little produced because of the drought conditions and bird strike. Keith says it is drinking beautifully now, so it might be time to take the cork out of one of the untouched dozen. I am a bit afraid it might still bite me although the label says 14% alcohol, I’m sure it is much bigger than that.

By Michael Metcalfe

They build castles on top of hills you know… Up there with a view to the very tempting Atlantic Ocean on one side and the plains of the Alentejo in the distance on the other, the sun was beating down on the sandstones making it like an oven. The wind was hot and dry too, so the oven was fan forced… Never the less with glass in hand I set about discovering the wines of a few new producers in this region. I saw some familiar faces, many familiar brands, but I was happy to find a few new producers I had not sampled before.

Even with the valiant attempts of the very friendly people representing their wineries, the red wines were just too warm to be enjoyed fully. The whites however were extremely refreshing! I have written a lot on the red wines from Portugal. They are so interesting and varied here that I will not get sick of them any time soon. However, in the heat of the day, I am rarely going to be looking at a big rich meal to go with a red wine. Fortunately, Portugal’s wine producers are tuned in to this need and are producing some very interesting and, as always, great value white wines too.

I tried a few from Cooperativa De Pegoes, Xavier Santana, Bacalhoa, Cooperativa de Palmela. Each using similar grapes, apart from Bacalhoa who were making a very interesting Semillon-Alvarinho . The main grape varieties for white wine production in this region are Arinto, which is usually used to blend with other white grapes to give the wine some extra lemony acid to the wines. Fernão Pires, which has a more floral character. The other white grape is Antão Vaz. This produces a finer, smoother and a subtler wine, so blending it with the other grapes makes sense, however it also makes a great single varietal wine.

This week’s Wine Experience of the Week is the Herdade da Comporta 2009 Antão Vaz. Herdade da Comporta is a part of the Setubal Peninsular region, although it is situated on the other side of the Sado River from Setubal… The old term for the region was Terras do Sado, which makes a lot more sense for this winery, but I am not sure if we need other region developed just for this winery. The wine itself has a very pale color with aromas of lemon peel and pineapple. Tasting the wine give you a delicate flavor of tropical fruit and lemon, but ends with some light acid and dryness, which is fantastic on a hot day. It goes well with seafood, fish or even a light salad. Alternatively, you could just sip it by the beach on its own. You need to be careful with it though, despite the light pallet, it does pack in 14% alcohol. At around €8 it is fabulous value for quite an elegant and very tasty wine.

If you have not tried Portuguese white wines before, this varietal would be a good place to start. It is different to your traditional white varietals, but not so different it will distract you from the pleasure of experiencing it. Then if you like it, you may want to venture toward some other whites from Portugal!

Unusually, I selected a white wine for this occasion. Unusual because I usually prefer big red wines, but also because I do not often keep white wines for too long. The fresh zinginess you get from young white wines is often what you are after when you reach for one. Therefore, a lot of white wines do not lend themselves to being aged. There are many exceptions though. Before you go and cellar that Chardonnay that has been in the fridge for the last 2 weeks, there are some things you should do before laying down white wines:

• Always ask. If you are at the winery they will probably volunteer information about it being a “drink now” wine or if it will benefit from some time in a cellar. If it is at the wine shop, get their opinion. If it is for drinking right away they will tell you.
• Failing that, look on the internet. If a review suggests it could do with some more age, then go for it.
• Buy more than 1 bottle. This way you can open one of them after a couple of years, just to make sure it is getting better with age.
• If you are still not sure after all that, then try one of the bottles you have bought. If you think it could do with some added depth and richness, then go ahead and keep one for the future.

For this Wine Experience of the Week, I have the Hugel & Fils 2000 Traditional Riesling. I was lucky enough to be given the advice that it could be kept for a few years at the winery. The old vines in the Alsace region can lend themselves to making white wines that can age well. This vintage was only released by Hugel in 2007, so they took care of most of the aging. Despite the age, the wine was still fresh when tasting it at the winery; with floral, fruity and slight aniseed aromas and a great depth in the drinking.

Tasting the wine recently the aromas had developed to be sweeter, almost honey sweetness along with white flower, peach and aniseed that had been retained. The colour seemed to have deepened to be more golden. Tasting the wine you get a fruity start, with some slight nutty depth to it. To finish it is dry with some good acid. You can enjoy this wine with fish, light pork or even veal with a light sauce. I had it with chicken, with some delicate Thai flavors and it went down very well. At around €25 to €30, looking at prices on the internet, it is pretty good value for the quality you are getting. If you have not tried wines from Alsace before, this would be a great place to start.

The wine probably wouldn’t benefit from much more aging however, so if you have one sitting around, find a good reason to open it and enjoy! If you have had an experience with a white wine you have kept for aging, please share a comment. It is always nice to hear other experiences.