The biggest champagne showcase in the new world is returning to Hong Kong in 2019! Taste Champagne is hosted by Tyson Stelzer, International Wine & Spirit Communicator of the Year, in conjunction with Watson’s Wine. On 27 March 2019, Taste Champagne will return to Hong Kong with a trade tasting in The Centenary Room at […]

Regular readers will be well familiar with my now 12 year conviction that Mike Press makes the best value wines in the country from his beautiful little vineyard high in the Adelaide Hills. I first visited Mike and Judy at their place in 2006 and I’ve been buying their wines every year since. I now […]

The results are in and we got quite a surprise when we unveiled the winner! It’s great news for affordable red wine lovers… A stunning shiraz cabernet blend with a street price under $30 has triumphed over wines priced up to $295 to win The Lipman Karas Great Australian Red two years in a row. […]

On the eve of Grange 2014 lobbing into the wine world at a cool $900, a glance at a decade of auction prices reveals an alarming dilemma. The place of Australia in the grand expanse of the wine world is changing. As my events more frequently beam me into the key markets of the USA, […]

Penfolds is on sensational form right now, and next week’s annual launch represents an outstanding collection of no less than 21 releases. But should you buy them? There’s a twist this year, and it’s a big one. The annual Penfolds Collection media tasting is unlike any other release event on the calendar. Not only is […]

After a week of intensive conversations and visits with more than 160 sommeliers, wine buyers and media in San Francisco and New York, I am more optimistic than ever about the opportunities for Australian wine in one of the world’s most important markets. The US is currently at a crucial juncture at which the reputation […]

I am flying to the US in early October 2018 and it’s my great pleasure to invite sommeliers, wine buyers and media to join me for very special, intimate trade tastings in San Francisco and New York City. Tasmanian wines have become a specialty of mine as an Australian wine communicator, and in recent years […]

In years to come we will look back on the past year as a dramatic watershed for champagne in Australia. We have witnessed a fundamental shift: never before has our champagne drinking evolved so far, so fast. Australia has transformed into one of the most important and dynamic champagne markets on earth, stepping into a […]

Did you know that Champagne pays its growers the highest grape price in the world, an average €6.20 per kilogram, more than 60% up on 15 years ago? It takes 1.2 kilograms of grapes to make a bottle of champagne, not to mention a production process more complex, more labour-intensive and more time-consuming than any […]

When I met Vincent Géantet for the first time in 2007, I discovered that this local fireman and bikie with a love for Harleys makes some of the smoothest, freshest, most pure wines in his village – who would have thought?! Gevrey-Chambertin is the most northerly of the truly great communes of Burgundy, making wines […]