Wines

Grape Expectations by Max Crus

Gralyn Estate Margaret River Reserve Shiraz 2011, $120 Yes, that vintage is correct. It’s older than our dog, This was to be yet another political and half the price. Grand fare, despite its minimalist column, because, well, there’s not 12.5 per cent, from one of Margaret River’s oldest much else going on apart from a wineries (and first cellar door) boasting only four global environmental crisis, a few hectares under vine, so it’s rare too. 9.6/10. species extinctions, a couple of wars, bit of poverty and housing Gralyn Estate Margaret River Reserve Shiraz 2018, stress, starvation and other health $120 matters, and anyway Albo is crook, It’s not often you get the chance to try a couple of so in deference this is an election- wines half a generation apart, nor be so indulgent. campaign-free column and won’t Lash out and savour le difference or dare to be that be a blessing? diffident and leave for another seven years. 9.4/10.

What better segue then, to count our other blessings. Howard Park (Great Southern) Arbor Novae Pinot

The Prime Minister might be Gris 2020, $30 blessed having a couple of girls It’s Earth Day, April 22nd, so get up and out who look like him (poor things), there and do something eco. Use that setting on but our house is blessed with an your washing machine or buy this wine or plant a amazing washing machine. new tree, which is what Arbor Novae means…the Actually, like kids, you are not so much blessed with a washing machine as with enough money to latter that is. Light, bright gris in a riesling bottle is appropriate. 9.1/10. make the transaction with Harvey Norman in exchange for a thing that throws your clothes around Howard Park (Porongurup) Arbor Novae, Riesling 2021, $30 and spins them until they are dizzy. Another Earth Day offering with art by Andy You used to be able to make kids Quilty, so if you soak the label off carefully and do that, except Whitlam outlawed frame it, you’ll get your money back easily. Soft and it about the time it became un-PC round (both the wine and the art) in that WA riesling to say how blessed you were that way. 9.4/10. your kids didn’t work in sheltered workshops, a term that became Richard Hamilton McLaren Vale Burton’s Vineyard un-PC at the same time. Old Vine Grenache 2020, $38

But I digress. Our washing Gimme that old vine religion, it’s good enough for machine has 12 settings, ‘Modes’ me. And so is grenache which hides its 14.5 per cent the manual calls them, but we’ve under a bushel. 9.3/10. only had it six months so haven’t read that yet. Maybe it’s time Richard Hamilton McLaren Vale Hut Eleven Single because I don’t understand any of Vineyard Cabernet Sauvignon 2019, $38 them. Like Barossan cabernet, McLaren Vale’s are often

There’s ‘ECO 40-60’, which is underrated, indeed ignored, which is good. It keeps a a term applied to rock bands of lid on enthusiastic accountants and therefore prices. the Whitlam era which I never Wine-scribes do this deliberately of course. 9.4/10.

Wash away your sins and put your blessings through the ringer

understood. Same with the washing machine’s. It’s not 40-60 minutes, it goes for three hours! Not very Eco, specially on Earth Day. There’s an ‘Express 20’ setting, which you would think means 20 minutes. Nup. It’s about 40 minutes. ‘Cottons’ is another. What happens if you put synthetics in accidently? Will it know? Ditto ‘Dark Garments/Denim’. Can you use the term ‘Dark Garments’ still or is that like ‘Blessed Children’? Equally, there’s ‘Woollens’, with a little hand beside it? What does that mean? ‘Delicates’? Mind your own business. Is that the opposite of ‘Outerwear’? Then there’s the most mysterious setting, ’Proofing’. Perhaps it’s something Germans do with their clothes. Ahh, washing was such a simple chore when you were blessed with kids to do it for you, after they finished their shift in the coal mine and Scomo was a boy. Oh, there’s one more setting, ‘Drain/Spin’, which is clearly political or about wine-tasting, so let’s go the latter and spin and drain these until Albo gets back :

Max Crus is a Clarence Valleybased wine writer and Grape Expectations is now in its 26th year of publication. Find out more about Max or sign up for his weekly reviews and musings by visiting maxcrus.com.au

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