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edited by Sue Courtney
e-mail address: winetaster@clear.net.nz
Murray Almond's view from the Left Island
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Murray Almond is a wine enthusiast from Geelong in Victoria, Australia. His
wine epiphany came tasting a Wynns 1982 Cabernet Sauvignon at an
introduction to wine course in 1989. Since then he's turned wine into a
passion. Murray participates in number of tasting and dining groups, runs
tutored tastings and is part of the Geelong Advertiser Wine Tasting Panel
"The Wine Jury". |
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Screwcaps - The Beta Videotape of the Wine World?12 Dec 2003
Seal of Approval - a book review. 7 Dec 2003
New Zealand New Release Tasting 2003 - 5 Oct 2003
New Zealand Wine through the Ages, an Abbreviated View - 17 Aug 2003
Moving Wine Around and the WINEpak Saga - 21 July 2003
Moving Around with Wine and Glasses - 31 May 2003
The Cork Industry Spins out the Fear Factor - 23 March 2003
Progressing Beyond the Cork Experience - 22 November 2002
Support For Cork Plummets according to Cork Industry Surveys - 15 Sept 2002
The Joy of the Occasional Big Wine Blowout - 28 July 2002
A Characteristic Reserve - 16 June 2002
Marketing Wine to Generation X - 25 May 2002
Cork Industry to prove that things go better with COAK - 1 April 2002
A Left Island Impression of the Taste of NZ Wine Fair - 2 March 2002
Taste of NZ Wine Fair - Day Two tasting - 4 April 2002
Taste of NZ Wine Fair - The Pinot Noir Seminar - 21 April 2002
Performing Seals - Cork and Screwcap head to head - 4 February 2002
How's your CDE? (Cellar Door Experience) - 20 January 2002
How about a sparkling red this Festive Season? - 20 December 2001
Are Real Riedel Glasses for Real? - 25 November 2001
What's in a name? - 15 November 2001
The 1999 Penfolds new releases - Oh Dear - 5 November 2001
Sauvignon Blanc - a Classic Dry White? - 28 October 2001
Is oak in wine a furphy? - 30 September 2001
A Bluffer's Guide to Blind Tasting
Part 2: Know Your Enemy - 19 August 2001
Part 3: The Snotta Method - 26 August 2001
Part 4: Taking a WAG and getting to Carnegie Hall - 25 September 2001
A NZ tasting in July - 15 July 2001
The Stelvin Dent Test - what happens when you drop a Stelvin-capped wine? 8 July 2001
The Essential Wine Tasting Guide - a review. 8 July 2001
A Quick Tasting
2001 Lawson's 'Dry Hills' Gewürztraminer (Marlborough, NZ)
Medium straw colour of nice intensity. The nose has spicey fruit with floral overtones.
Palate is rich and accentuates the spicey characters.
Nice acid/fruit balance and a good long finish.
Not really showing its 14.5% alcohol, it is a highly enjoyable wine that would suit
Asian foods or something else with a bit of spice.
I drank the wine at various times while it was chilling down in the fridge and
I found my preference was for it to be chilled almost to bubbly temperature,
where the spicey characters cut through the flavours, particularly alongside food.
Closed with a Stelvin screwcap and very good drinking at $16aud.
© Murray Almond. 26 Jan 2002
1999 Stoneleigh Vineyard Marlborough Riesling
This wine was a store bottle sample that had been open for a day. The wine
was a fairly firm straw-gold colour. The aroma was of steely reisling, mild
lime and passionfruit flower and showed just a hint of botrytis underlying
the more dominant flavours.
The palate is very dry and is not overly broad across the palate (this may
be an outcome of the bottle being open for a while, but I'm not sure).
There's a strong citric acid tang before a medium length finish. Overall the
wine seems a touch disjointed, although the fruit and acid present in the
wine indicate it should develop and come together with a couple of years in
the cellar.
© Murray Almond. 6 July 2001