Sunny Friday in May and a 64 Rheingau

Its a sunny afternoon on a cool Friday in May and we decide to open 1964 Ernest Mee's Winteler Steinader Natur Rheingau Riesling, golden yellow in colour, smelling of sweet honeysuckle, candied citrus, hay and some kero with breathing. The texture of the palate mouth coating and slightly oily, smooth and silky, honey, a touch of candied orange, lanolin and some gentle lemon butter. This wine took a good hour to open and reveal all of its nose and flavour profile. After about 2-3 hours the Kero characteristic starts to emerge but never seems to dominate the nose or the palate. The honey/honeysuckle characteristic remains dominate the whole time with the citrus and other flavours adding complexity and personality to a soft old wine. This would be just delicious with light or suttle flavoured seafood such as white Fish, salt and pepper Calamari or fresh Sashimi.


A late lunch of home made eastern inspired lamb meatballs witha tomato based sauce and hand made spaghetti was just too rich and spicy for a grand old German Riesling so a quick trip to the cellar found an Orlando, Jacobs Creek, 30th Anniversary wine made from the 2000 vintage and released in 2006 to celebrate 30 years of the Jacobs Creek brand and label. The bottle reads a blend of premium Shiraz 62% and Cabernet 38% from various wine regions around Australia. Although known as a lesser vintage this wine was impressive with a lovely nose of black fruits including cherry, blackberry, plums, cassis, mint and dark chocolate leaping out of the decanter. These flavours followed on the palate in a seamless medium weight wine, well balanced and smooth with drying tannins. While very good this wine did not show the dense melange of flavours or heavy weight concentration packed into every mouthfull that you would expect of a similar wine from a stellar vintage. Never the less it went very well with the spicy lamb meat balls. According to the label it should be just entering its drinking window and should continue to improve for another 5 years, i tend to agree.