20/12 2018

Red Hot and Cold: The Top 20 Sparkling Reds this Christmas

Red Hot and Cold: The Top 20 Sparkling Reds this Christmas

Red is the official colour of Christmas. Which is just as well because that’s also the same hue as Australia’s unique wine contribution to the festive season. Don’t worry if you can’t stomach the thought of clutching an over-warm glass of full-throated tannins on a 40 degree day. The answer to everyone’s Christmas prayers is […]

29/11 2018

Morris major: winemaker sweeps 2018 fortified category

Morris major: winemaker sweeps 2018 fortified category

If this looks like an advertisement for Morris Wines, we apologise – it’s not. (We don’t trade cash for comment if you were wondering). But it’s a rare thing for a single winemaker so completely dominate their category that they account for the top six wines in it. Especially when that category is the single […]

22/11 2018

Made in NZ: The Top 20 Kiwi Sauvignon Blancs

Made in NZ: The Top 20 Kiwi Sauvignon Blancs

The mighty All Blacks have lost a game and the knives are out. The captain is too old, the coach has to go, the back three are no good…. The Wallabies must thank the stars they don’t have to face such demanding fans. But one thing the kiwis can still count on is their mastery […]

13/11 2018

Bogans and cleanskins: the best of Australian shiraz

Bogans and cleanskins: the best of Australian shiraz

A bogan, a cleanskin and a $7 supermarket wine are the stars of Australia’s best-known wine variety – shiraz. Seriously. The Great Australian Shiraz Challenge rather immodestly describes itself as “Australia’s most preeminent, prestigious and valuable single class wine competition”. It is also chaired by a blue-blood member of Australia’s first families of wine. Which makes […]

31/10 2018

Best buys: 10 gold-medal winners for $10

Best buys: 10 gold-medal winners for $10

Petrol prices are at 10-year highs. Electricity prices are shutting down the air conditioner. And rising interest rates on falling house prices are playing the Grinch just before Christmas. Family budgets are starting to creak so it’s time to get a bit smarter about buying the daily necessities. Like wine. We at Vinloco thought it […]

18/10 2018

2018 Early Form: Best Rose Wines

2018 Early Form: Best Rose Wines

Chicquita Lodge is a famous landmark at Melbourne’s Flemington racecourse. One-thousand meters from the finishing line, it is the first point insiders look for a likely winner of the 3200m Melbourne Cup. So it is with wine show rankings. More than 25,000 of the 40,000-odd scores that will be reported this year have now been […]

12/10 2018

2018 Early Form: Australia’s Top 20 Sem Sauv Blancs

2018 Early Form: Australia’s Top 20 Sem Sauv Blancs

Vinloco’s survey of this year’s 40,000-odd wine show scores has just passed the half-way mark. With it comes some early observations about strong contenders for the “best of” lists we’ll produce at the end of the year. One class that has almost run its race for the year is semillon sauvignon blanc. SSB’s stronghold is […]

27/08 2018

The 2018 Vintage: The First Cut

The 2018 Vintage: The First Cut

The 2018 wine show season is well underway. And with it comes the first tastes of the year’s new vintage. Ten major shows have already reported this year including two capital city contests – Royal Queensland and Royal Sydney. These earlybird exhibitions have collectively assessed 7246 scores – 200 more than the same time last […]

19/07 2018

Que Syrah, Syrah: Top 20 Cool-Climate Shiraz

Que Syrah, Syrah: Top 20 Cool-Climate Shiraz

What’s in a name? That which we call a shiraz by any other name would taste as spicy… Well, that’s how Shakespeare might have put it if he’d been a wine writer musing about the different expressions of Australian shiraz. The Bard’s immortal question is of particular relevance in the contest between cool-climate and warm […]

07/07 2018

CTRL ALT DRNK. The Top 20 Alternative Reds

CTRL ALT DRNK. The Top 20 Alternative Reds

Alternative reds grabbed the spotlight in 2017 when a certain Victorian wine show (ok, maybe Melbourne) bestowed its highest honour on a grenache. Not bad for a grape that often gets relegated to the popular but critically patronised rose. Bring on the clowns! But grenache’s elevation wasn’t a one-off. Alternative reds were the highest-awarded red […]

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