2006
Late Harvest Riesling - impression by PJ - August 2008
There
you are staring at the most beautiful roast pork you ever saw and
you're
thinking, ok so what do I drink with this? That was the
situation I
found
myself in the other night and I was in a bit of a conundrum.
While pork
is a white meat and I remembered the old rule about white wine
with white meat, a roast is a very strong tasting dish, especially
the way we cook them. In this case the pork had been
marinated and
there was a
rich gravy. The question was how would a white handle that
combination.
Then I remembered a meal where I had matched a Barossa
Valley
late picked Riesling with roast duck and found that I liked it so I
thought lets see if it works with pork. Since Matt
Pooley had told me that their Riesling was something they were known
for I decided to open the wallet
and put their Late Harvest Riesling to the roast pork test.
What
does the
winemaker say?
Looking at the rear of the bottle you find out that
the Late
Harvest Riesling has "grapes sourced from the Cooinda Vineyard' and
whose bouguet comprises "fragrant fig, rosehip and bay leaf
aromas with
hints of dried spice and stone fruit ". Not only that
but "the palate is evenly balanced with a zippy finish" and
"intense fruit". Apparently it goes well with "delicately
flavoured
Asian foods". There is no need to rush as the wine will
"flower in the
bottle for at least 4 years"
What do we say?
I can't say whether this wine
goes well with 'delicately flavoured
Asian foods' but lordy wordy it goes really well with a strongly
flavour pork. I was amazed at how well the
combination
worked. The intense fruity / sweet flavour and crisp finish of the wine
really cut through and was a great counter balance to the rich taste of
the pork and gravy. I will definitely be doing this
again and I can't wait to try it with roast duck.
If
you don't
happen to have any pork, don't despair, it is still worth trying this
wine. I probably
have the worst nose for wine in Tassie so I didn't really get
the
rosehip and bay leaf. It just smelt like a very pleasant
Riesling to
me. But I have
to agree with the winemaker about the intense fruit taste.
You
get
a real burst of sweet fruit and I don't know about zippy but the finish
was very clean and crisp. I didn't detect any after taste at
all which
meant
that you enjoyed the flavour without any cloying residue.
Don't
let the idea that this is a sweet style wine put you off, it finishes
like a dry Riesling. So, you can eat it with some roasts as
well
as Asian style food and then use it as a dessert wine. So
many
uses so
little
time.
To sum up, lets answer the Punter
questions:
Should you buy this wine?
Seriously,
buy this wine, roast yourself some pork and set your
face
to happy happy joy joy.
What will it taste like in a real situation?
This
wine can be drunk on its own or with the right food. Try the
rule
' the more the heat / salt the sweeter the wine' and I think you will
be
impressed.
Will
the object of your desire be impressed?
Lets just
say if you bought this for me and we were having roast duck, well I
would just be putty in your hands (what
a wonderful mental picture - Ed).
What
do you think? Send us a comment