DAN'S WINE BLOG

NEW YEAR - NEW NEWS

?Friday, February 10, 2023

?Last weekend Adelaide celebrated wine with the incomparable Cellar Door Fest at the Adelaide Convention Centre. Normally this week I would be reporting on this fabulous event that exhibits the wines from every wine growing region of South Australia, as well as South Aussie micro-breweries and distilleries.?

?However, due to my right-hand “man”- wife, Vicki, preparing for an operation I didn’t attend the Cellar Door Fest and therefore I will not be reporting on this great event.

?For those who may not know, Adelaide is officially one of the 10 “Wine Capitals of the World” and it is events such as this that strengthen/re-enforce this status. The Cellar Door Fest is laid out by producers within wine growing regions. This enables one to not only compare wines from the same variety within a region (which can be done at many tastings) but also compare wines of the same variety across different regions, such as say Fiano from the Riverland vs Fiano from McLaren Vale.

?In the meantime here are a couple of news snippets you may have missed.

?CHINA:?As if to further reinforce my pessimistic views/thoughts on wine in China, Vino Joy (see link below), recently reported that at the same time as Italian wine exports globally rose by 12.1% their sales to China dropped by 14.9 %, Hong Kong 11.3% and Korea dropped by 3.9%.

?In summary of China’s wine sales – Chinese wine production down, imports of French wines down, Italian imports down and Australian imports almost non-existent. Not looking good!!

?Thus, despite our Federal Governments sterling efforts to “normalise” trade with China, don’t hold your breath for significant wine sales back to China, let alone the volumes of the heady pre-sanction days.

?Article Link:?https://vino-joy.com/2022/12/19/italian-wines-suffer-declines-in-asia

?FRANCE:?The Drinks Business reports on “fake Champagne” (see link below) is reporting that €2million worth of “champagne” (300,000 bottles) has been confiscated from a Champagne House because they have allegedly included ‘disqualified varieties’ in their wine. That is to say that they included in their wines, grape varieties outside of the seven varieties officially approved. Sacré Bleu, what a crime!

?The inspectors first suspected the deception after noting that grapes were being harvested outside of the official dates. At the same time some of their vines were observed to be carrying more grapes than permitted. The court condemned the producer for disregarding the strict rules that govern the industry. They said: “The non-AOC product corrupted the AOC product, which thus cannot be sold and becomes entirely an object of deception.” Nearly 100,000 of the confiscated bottles of “illegal” wine were discovered hidden on the estate in the south of the Champagne region, which, though produced using the official méthode champenoise, contained grapes from vines that had been disqualified.

Wow! Imagine having the government telling you:

?Which varieties you could grow.

?When you could harvest your grapes.

?How much yield per hectare you are allowed.

?Which methods you are allowed to use in making your wine.

These are just some of the joys of having AOC (Appellation d’origine Contr?lée) status for your growing region!! Thank goodness we don’t have AOC (and hopefully never will) here in Australia, so that each winemaker can do “what the bloody hell she/he likes” and consumers determine their success or failure by either buying or not buying the resultant wine. Long live Vinous Freedom!!

?Article Link:?https://www.thedrinksbusiness.com/2022/12/e2m-of-fake-champagne-confiscated-from-producer-over-fraudulent-practises/?utm_source=AfternoonBrief&utm_medium=newsletter

?Well, that’s it for another week, stay safe and make sure you #chooseaustralianwine and where possible try #emergingvarieties . Cheers, Dan T.