Wines with Attitude Blog

Italian grape varieties in Australia

Shiraz or Syrah, Chardonnay and Cabernet Sauvignon remain by far the most planted wine grape varieties in Australia, in fact 60% of total grapes crushed there in 2016 *. But for quite some time now several Italian varieties have been creeping into Australian vineyards: so why and why now?

Diversity

Australia's vineyards are dominated by French varieties - at least 90% of crush in

Featured Winery - First Drop

Wines With Attitude has been supplying First Drop wines since mid 2015 and I have never been disappointed in them. It seems that I am in good company - Master of Wine Julia Harding of JancisRobinson.com wrote in August 2016 that their wines never fail to impress her " Firstly in terms of consistent wine quality and style – firmly Australian but with sensitive use of the accelerator

2017: what's in (the wine) store?

Farewell to 2016 and welcome 2017!
Let's hope this year is less of a rollercoaster than last year. We're starting the year with a brief look at what it is likely to bring us in terms of wine.

Lower alcohol levels

At this time of year especially we are thinking of our health and trying to making amends for the higher alcohol consumption

PORT - PART 1 - THE RUBIES

I have just taken delivery of the first Wines With Attitude port, a beautiful Crusted Port , just in time for Christmas. A good time therefore to look into port and all its different styles.

rabelos on the douro port wine.jpg

All port is produced in a similar way to still wine up to the fermentation stage; during that process grape-based alcohol is added to interrupt fermentation, effectively killing off the

The cool Chardonnay comeback

I'll show my hand upfront - I love a good Chardonnay though I have not been shouting about it in recent years as Chardonnay has not been a very popular wine for some time. Remember the "Anything but Chardonnay" or "ABC" era in the late 1990s? This was almost certainly in part a backlash against "Nothing But Chardonnay" being served. It was just everywhere and

Ways in which your wine glass can affect the taste of your wine

There are some people who have strong views about the type and shape of wineglass that should be used for each wine and we'll write about that subject in a future blog. But regardless of the type or shape of glass you use, to appreciate a good wine a really clean glass is required . This may seem blatantly obvious but it can make a

All about terroir & its impact on wine

We confess we have long been great fans of terroir at Wines With Attitude. We use the expression quite liberally in our unique tasting notes but there are many who think the term over-used and the concept over-rated, little more than a marketing ploy. So what exactly is terroir and why is it such a topic of hot debate?

What is terroir?

Terroir determines the

English Sparkling Wine

It would be rude not to give it a try!

At a couple of our recent blind sparkling wine tastings, participants voted for their favourite wine of the evening and in both instances English Sparkling Wine came out on top, pushing aside certain well-known and reputable vintage and non-vintage champagne brands (not stocked by Wines With Attitude). This might come as a surprise to

Wine Faults ~ Part 2

Corked Wine - the only true wine fault

You may wonder what on earth an article on wine faults has to do with this photo... wet dog.jpg
Well, the smell of a wet dog is often associated with the wine fault, cork taint or corked wine . Other terms used to describe it are damp cellar, wet cardboard, mushrooms, wet newspaper, musty and mouldy. Cork taint