Well, that's it

Well, all good things must come to an end, and the not so good things as well. There hasn't been any deliberation this time and as of today, the jury will no longer be in session.

There's a number of reasons why, but they all relate to when I/we changed the name. You might say that we're only a blog, and you might be right, but there lies part of the problem; It's safe to say that we have big, fat, golden tickets on ourselves, and our ego's demand something bigger and better than just another blog with a few loyal readers. Our name was wrong, the design was wrong and ultimately as a result, the content went wrong. We never stuck to our mission, because we never had one in the first place.

Last week I flicked through of Matt Skinners 'Juice' books, and while I wanted to punch the very easy target of his long snout for using '!' at every opportunity, I couldn't help but be infected by his joy for the wines he talked about. It's been a while since I've felt excited by the wine world, and that's symptomatic of the way wine writers approach the subject. Wine is a joy, a pleasure, something that we should celebrate. It cannot be defined by a number between 1-100 and as Jancis Robinson so rightly states, a love of wine is not defined by the amount and/or cost of the bottles in your cellar.

The world of wine is overpopulated with pomposity, arrogance and conceit. There's a million and one things that make me not proud to be a wine lover, but they're too many to list and frankly I don't have the energy.

So to everyone who's been fool enough to follow me to this point, so long and thanks for coming.
I'll lick my wounds, decide what exactly it is the world of wine doesn't need and I'll be back once I'm fully reloaded.

Anyone wanting to comment can do so by mailing me (northcotegrandjury@gmail.com). I'd genuinely appreciate thoughts/opinions etc.

Until then, be seeing you.

Gentle Annie Cabernet Shiraz

Last night I dreamt I was a columnist for the Daily Mail. It was terrible.

I'm still suffering from post traumatic stress, so I'll make this quick. The Gentle Annie Shiraz Cabernet 2003 is from a small independent producer in Central Victoria, and as such is a wine that I really wanted to like. Did I? Sort of.

The easy thing to say is that it's a good wine rather than great wine. It's predominately shiraz, and it shows with soft, dark fruits on the palate. Although its been in bottle for almost 6 years the fruit is still going strong, but the tannins don't seem big enough to support it, and altogether it feels a little out of balance. There's some nice mint and eucalypt notes, but on the finish there's a slightly odd character which I neither identified or went wild for. I have an 03 Cabernet kicking around somewhere, and I'll see how that measures up.

Looking at this, it's not the greatest tasting note I've ever written, but I'm sure that it won't be the worst. Either way, it's Friday and we've got three days off work, so it must be good.

That's it. Be seeing you.

Trees. Sandals. Tofu. Hugs

I'm pretty sure you don't want to read even more tasting notes about budget Australian Chardonnay, but tough biscuit. This one is good, affordable and will also make Al Gore as giddy as a schoolboy.

The tasting note first this time; The Allira Chardonnay 2006 is a delicious, cool climate Chardonnay with citrus and nectarine characters, some vanilla from the oak (about 9 months in barrel) and the creamy textural palate is nicely offset by the citrus and balanced acidity. For $12 it's surprisingly complex, with a nice purity that I've not found at this price point. There, that wasn't too hard, was it?

What makes this wine even more interesting is that the producer, Elgo Estate in Victoria's Strathbogie Ranges, is using sustainable production techniques. Part of the Elgo Estate is apparently located in a naturally windy spot, so they've erected a 150kW wind turbine to power the winery. They're also recycling their waste water and the CO2 that's generated during production.
While my pasty white derrière has gotten blisters from sitting on the climate change fence, it's good to see a producer that actually seems serious about sustainable practices rather merely making a press release sound good.

I've also recently sampled the recent releases of the Allira Shiraz and Cabernet Merlot and they're pretty good too. I have tasting notes somewhere, but I'm too lazy to look.

That's all, I'm off to get intimate with some tofu. Be seeing you