Casual Catch Up

Big Weekend. Preamble. Staying with old school friend and his family of girls. Noisy and fun.
Off to the pasta and pizza joint.

A trio of casual wines to set the scene - because we were to have some special wines later. But more on this in a later blog. Sometimes it's great not to think too hard about the wines you are drinking, and you get very pleasantly surprised, as was the case here.

A 2007 Mount Edward Central Otago Riesling. SWMBO loves this, and with reason. This was clean, fresh and delicately refreshing, but with enough body to handle the food situation. Nice wine that will live for some time. If you gave it some thought, it was shy, though.

A 2008 Single Paddock Central Otago Pinot Noir stole the scene. Delightfully vibrant, juicy, simple and gulpable. Made for a supermarket chain. But at that moment, it was all you needed. With air-time, its true colours came out. It was obviously (then) picked too early and green. It got a bit meaner and harder to drink.

Finally a 1996 Saltram Classic Barossa Shiraz. Great year in the Barossa. Great winemaking team too. Thoroughly integrated and a soft, smoothy. But with air time, the animal came out. Brett was rife in the past. It made for tasty, flavoursome, gamey-tasting wines that were deemed European in style. Hah! We know better now.

Eating and drinking in a fun environment made them all good. So there!