Degustation Interpretations

I recently had the pleasure of experiencing two wine & food degustation dinners hosted by winemakers.  The first dinner was a degustation in the true sense of the word.  Waiting staff brought out plates of food for all to share and poured the wine or wines that were matched by the winemaker and chef.  It was very well done and, yep, worked perfectly.  If you get the opportunity, go along to one.  The other not so degustational (if that is a word) but excellent nonetheless.  There were bottles of different varieties of wines placed on the table (and plenty of them I might add) and then plates of food were brought out periodically for everybody to share.  On this occasion, the winemaker encouraged us to try different wines with the different types of food to get an idea of how flavours worked, or didn't work, together.  I am not sure you would call this a degustation but the experience was interesting and educational.  Rather than be told (for want of a better word) which wine to have with our food, we were able to work it out ourselves and/or, get other "non-winey" people's opinions.  This type of scenario is also much easier to do at home and can be fun, and interesting, at the same time.  'Til next time and remember to live simply, laugh often, wine alot.

Rusden Wines - A Gem of a Discovery

As you may have noticed, I previously have only specifically featured a winery once in my blog.  I mostly alert you to specific wines because they are bargains or specific wines I have tasted.  On this occasion, I had the luxury of sampling four excellent wines from one winery.  Rusden Wines in Vine Vale (Barossa Valley).  I had never heard of them before but I had heard of the Black Guts Shiraz.  It is a small family run winery consisting of (owners) Christine and Dennis Canute and their winemaker son, Christian, and some devoted support staff whose philosophy is certainly worth reading about.  The winess I was fortunate enough to taste were their Driftsand Grenache/Shiraz, Full Circle Mataro, Chookshed Zinfandel and the Black Guts.  I am a fan of Barossa shiraz and who isn't but, not everybody likes the big gutsy styles that smash your palate with high alcohol and drying tannins and take years to mature.  All of the Rusden wines I tasted, and I mean all of them, were very approachable now.  You know how sometimes you taste a wine and think, "that is fruity" or "it's dry" or "it's a bit bitey", well, these wines didn't have any of those in isolation or otherwise.  Imagine these characteristics all together, integrated and balanced.  That is what these wines were, or are, all about.  It's fair to say a couple of them are not cheap but, sometimes it pays to fork out a little bit more for a quality wine that doesn't have the "bulk wine" corporate stamp all over it.  If you get the opportunity, try them, you will not be disappointed, trust me.  'Til next time and remember to live simply, laugh often, wine alot.