Friday, December 27, 2019

What Have You Been Drinking This Christmas?

Our Christmas was a relatively quiet affair. Food was focused on seafood, with a filet steak on the evening of Boxing Day. The wine selection matched this.


Kreglinger Sparkling is vastly underrated in Australia, maybe because this Belgian name is difficult to pronounce for many English speakers. The 2016 vintage,quite young, did the trick. The light wines, the French Rosé and the 2019Yangarra Blanc were both a bit bland and disappointing. 

The last three wines were all terrific. It is a treat to drink a Chardonnay where the fruit can take 100% new French oak, as was the case with the 2011 Leeuwin Estate. The 2010 Bass Phillip Premium Pinot Noir had fantastic balance, expression and poise, and the 2001 Moss Wood Cabernet Sauvignon remains a star vintage from this producer. 

What have you been drinking this Christmas? What was good, what disappointed? 

4 comments:

kr1 said...

A comparatively tame affair this year Thomas, it was too warm for reds for much of the day but then we got into it in the evening.

Started off with a 2002 Tim Adams Fergus.
This was followed by
99 Rymill Cab,
97 Jacob's Creek Reserve Shiraz/Cab,
08 Torbreck Struie (magnum),
17 Murdoch Landau,
12 Penfolds 389,
17 Samuels Gorge Grenache,
02 Noon Reserve Cab,
04 Glaetzer Godolphin,
06 Hentley Farm Beast,
04 Noon VP,
NV Noon Tawny.

The older wines were drunk up as they would not have survived the night. The newer stuff was consumed on Boxing day too.
All in all good drinking finished with a few nips of a 79 Delord Bas Armagnac.

Anonymous said...

Here in western Canada, the weather called for some good, hearty wines....and some lighter ones to go with the turkey.
-14 Jean-Marc Burgaud Morgon Cote du Py - need to save a few of these for a few years
-05 Best's Old Vine Pinot Meunier - great "turkey" wine that seems to put weight on as it ages
-05 Bin 389 - good place right now
-07 Rolf Binder Sharaz/Mataro - most people's WOTN...perfect bottle, perfect cork
-07 Noble One - think we waited too long to open this
-NV Nk'Mip Qwam Qwmt Riesling Icewine Okanagan Valley Canada - had the bottle for at least
10 yrs., very viscous, not my thing but enjoyed by most in very small quantities.

Henry

Alontin said...

To kr1: quite a selection there. Which wine was your favorite? Noon?

To Henry: yes, weather conditions are certainly different in Canada. Interesting, how much Australian wine you drank. I had some very old Best wines in the past. They age incredibly well.

kr1 said...

02 Tim Adams was really nice but the 02 Noon took it. The other wines were just all really good, especially the 04 Noon VP which had amazing length!
Struie from the magnum was super fresh (it will easily go another 15-20 years without a problem).