Word: sauvignon
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Dates: during 1980-1989
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...reds that are notable for fruit and balance, as well as soft but less distinctive whites. The Wine Spectator, the leading American journal of wines and spirits, last year gave an impressive 88 (on a scale of 100) and a best-buy rating to Vina Los Vascos' 1984 Cabernet Sauvignon, which sells in the U.S. for a mere $5. Other bargain-priced Chilean wines, including Concha y Toro and St. Morillon, have also scored well in U.S. tastings...
There are more than 550 wineries in Australia, and roughly half of them are less than ten years old. Some of the Aussie brand names have an exotic charm (Koala Ridge, Wirra Wirra), but the principal varietals, such as Cabernet Sauvignon and Chardonnay, are familiar to U.S. buyers. Nonetheless, winemakers Down Under are carefree about tradition, and some of their practices are downright heretical by American or French standards: for example, blending Cabernet Sauvignon, a red grape from the Bordeaux area, with Shiraz, a Rhone Valley varietal known in France as the Syrah. Labels can be confusing as well...
...tasting, and here the Aussies are doing just fine. Anthony Dias Blue, a San Francisco-based wine-and-food writer who was a judge at last year's Qantas Wine Cup, an annual taste-off of U.S. and Australian varietals, says, "I expected to lose in the Rieslings, Sauvignon Blancs and sparkling wines, but I never in a million years thought we would lose in Chardonnays and Cabernets." Down Under wines, Blue concludes, "are going to be accepted on a par with California. They've gotten their foothold...
...Australia's wine output. Until this year, many of the independent growers who supply such major Down Under producers as Penfolds, Seppelt and Lindeman's were rooting out Shiraz (even though it makes some of the country's most distinctive wines) and replanting with the more fashionable Cabernet Sauvignon...
...drunk in moderation, as a socializing accompaniment to food" -- with hard liquor as an enemy of sobriety. Since wine's variety is its glory, he deplores what he calls the "internationalization" of styles, particularly the trend in California and elsewhere to concentrate on the production of two "supergrapes," Cabernet Sauvignon and Chardonnay. "There ought to be more experimentation with wines made from Syrah ((a Rhone varietal)) or Nebbiolo ((from northern Italy))," he says...