Grape Expectations by Max Crus Surviving and solving the beep test.

It seems last week’s column really hit a nerve and generated more feedback than any other column in recent history.

Yes, two readers were driven to relate their car troubles.

My car beeps at me constantly!!! Every time the speed-limit changes it fu*&%$ beeps and distracts me. How is that a safety feature?

Sometimes you have to

Taylors Clare Valley St Andrews Riesling 2020, $45 . Sometimes there’s a quantum leap in a wine’s character after a mere four years. The latest version, as below, is lovely, but this is next level by a margin, tasting older, rounder and more mature and is easily the best Riesling this year. Just the thing to help forget about beeps for a while. 9.8/10.

Taylors Clare Valley St beep language, but speedlimit changes?

All the bells and whistles, eh? Everyone wants them, yet now that car manufacturers have fnally acquiesced, we don’t.

Another reader, my car slows down around bends when in cruise control, and even switches the cruise control off if it thinks I am cornering too quickly. Talk about taking the fun

$45. Some people prefer young Rieslings and when they’re the same price it’s an easy choice for your dinner table. This young one however, feels somewhat more than four years behind its older sibling, but still serious and smart stuff. 9.4/10.

Taylors Clare Valley The Pioneer (Exceptional Parcel Release) Shiraz 2018, $220 (bottle No.2385). It looks out of driving. signature and bottling date are hand-written, but I’ll get forensics onto that. Impressive feat if so, and in such lovely script. Surely, you’d get a bit wonky towards the end? Meanwhile the wine just got better and better toward the end and for some, will still represent good value at $220. Wonder if it’s discounted by the dozen? 9.7/10.

One of the few legal driving pleasures remaining is doing 80kmh around a hairpin bend and as all good, advanced driving courses teach us, you should accelerate from the apex, not brake. That can be dangerous, specially if you’re racing someone who is not expecting that. What? That’s not allowed either?

Taylors Clare Valley The

Sure the nanny state is there to protect us against ourselves, but as all Australians know, were all good drivers.

Anyway, what possible purpose does it serve that when my car slows while navigating a corner, say in peak-hour traffc, all the screen info disappears replaced by three highlydistorted wide-angled camera angles of the front

Parcel Release) Cabernet Sauvignon 2018, $220 (Bottle No.2024). Not sure if I was singled out for special treatment but Bottle No.2024 seems pretty special. I was tempted to keep it but nah, who can resist something called ‘Exceptional Parcels’? Exceptional stuff, alas at an exceptional price but grab a few friends and lash out, $50 for a big glass, of the car and what it will hit if I am not careful, which I am not because I am distracted by the bloody screen.

And another thing intermittently, and mercifully infrequently, my car will start beeping.

A regular, unhurried beep which stops after 30 seconds, during which time I have scoured every millimetre of the dash

9.6/10.

Taylors Clare Valley Masterstroke (Prestigious Parcels Exceptional Regions) Cabernet Shiraz 2018, $60. This has a million medals on the cover from around the globe, including Australia. Unsurprisingly, it is pretty good. Well-rounded with about the right level of everything you like about red wine int he right looking for a reason but give up after ten seconds thinking whatever the issue, it has corrected itself. Then it starts again. Then it stops until next time. I still don’t know why. Neither does the manufacturer, or Google. A frst for the platform. Clearly one of the great mysteries of the world that can only be solved by wine or not.

Taylors Clare Valley Masterstroke (Prestigious Parcels Exceptional Regions) Shiraz 2021, $60. Not as many medals on the label as the cabernet but still enough to impress people who are impressed by that sort of thing. Quality Clare shiraz is always a joy, if not quite as joyful as Clare cabernet in this instance.