Given the fact that the special reorder prices run out at the end of February around the time we'll be looking to head back, I doubt that we'll be queueing up for any of these, regardless of how much I happen to like them. There is, after all, every possibility anything that represents particularly good value for money will be sold out well before February 28.
I started by trying the Talinga Park 2009 Sauvignon Blanc (TWS $10.99 Reorder $9.34), mainly because I thought that it might go nicely with a chicken curry. While the rest of the country seems to be glugging down Kiwi Savvy Blanc like it's going out of style, I find myself constantly baffled by the fact that there are pretty good local versions at pretty attractive price points that seem to be more or less ignored.
At $9.34 the Talinga Park would, under other circumstances, be a reasonably attractive proposition. It mightn't be quite up there with the wines you're looking at paying fifteen to twenty dollars for, but as a refreshing style for summer drinking it has the requisite limey tropical fruit characters on the nose and on the palate. It's a wine that, under other circumstances, I might be interested in, but...
Drayton's 2009 Hunter Valley Semillon (TWS $12.99 Reorder $11.05), on the other hand, was an example of a wine that neither Madam or I "got". The wine was an attractive golden yellow in the glass, but the nose wasn't all that interesting and in the mouth, while it was pleasant with soft rounded flavours it wasn't the sort of style that makes your taste buds sit up and pay attention. Possibly, since the notes accompanying the pack suggest that it'll develop nicely until 2016 it's still young, but if that's the case limited space in the wine fridge means that buying and cellaring isn't a possible scenario either.
The final white, the cool climate Mastermind 2008 Chardonnay (TWS $10.99 Reorder $9.34) wasn't bad either. Very light yellow in the glass with a pleasant nose and a rounded mouthfeel.
There's obviously a fair quantity of surplus Chardonnay out there (there’s a fair quantity of surplus everything, in fact) and in other circumstances you'd probably be looking at paying more than $11 for something of this standard.
The wine might have come up better if I'd tried it with something other than a vindaloo, but it was a pretty reasonable example of the newer style of Australian Chardonnay without offering anything that was going to have me hurrying in to reorder.
Tiredness and insufficient local knowledge meant that dinner plans the night we returned from a side excursion to Stanthorpe didn't involve the pizza that had motivated my decision to open a bottle of the Yarraman Hell Raiser 2006 Cabernet Merlot (TWS $10.99 Reorder $9.34), though the chilli factor in my selection at Ichiban Bolsho would certainly have played hell with Madam's taste buds.
We'd opted for eat in rather than take away and when we returned to base the bottle had been breathing for close to an hour and three-quarters and needed to be sampled. Had I known what was going to ensue I wouldn't have opened it before I made a phone call to order a pizza from a place that isn't open on a Sunday, but there you go....
More...
