November 21 edition
Top ten alternative red wine varieties revisited
A note about this week’s Taste and Talk session is at the bottom of this newsletter.
A couple of years back I wrote an article surveying the top ten alternative red wines in Australia.
Since then the number of producers of several of these varieties has grown considerably. So I’ve given the article a gentle edit to bring the statistics up to date. Here it is as an article on Vinodiversity.
The top two varieties are Tempranillo (435 producers) and Sangiovese (322).
Are these top two varieties still alternative? Probably so. They are still included in the list of classes at the Australian Alternative Varieties Wine Show. There are still plenty of licensed restaurants which don’t have one or other of them on their wine list. You will rarely see them ‘on pour’ in bars, except in the the most sophisticated venues.
My friend Dan Traucki of Wine Assist likes to use the term Emerging Varieties rather than Alternative Varieties. I reckon there is a case for saying Tempranillo and Sangiovese are alternative, but I don’t think you could say they are emerging. I’m not sure they are mainstream yet, let’s say they are in transition.
Three other varieties in the list are growing at a fairly rapid rate - Malbec, Montepulciano and Nero d’Avola. But all of those in the article are on the up and up.
A couple of years ago Kym Anderson and Signe Nelgen’s revised edition of Which Winegrape Varieties are Grown Where? contained statistics showing that the Australian wine industry is increasingly dependent on just a few French varieties. This is certainly true for the production of bulk wine and wine destined for export, but I suspect that alternative varieties the share of wine in the $15+ per bottle range sold domestically is actually riising.
Check out the full article about those top ten reds on Vinodiversity. Remember if you buy using the links in that article Vinodiversity will get a small commission to defray costs of running the website and this newsletter.
You might like to leave a question or a comment at the bottom of this newsletter, or perhaps check out the discussion there.
Taste and Talk sessions.
In our last session the question was asked “What is the most diverse region in Australia?” This looked like an interesting topic for discussion, so on Thursday 4th Nov we will take up this question, looking at a few regions in detail, namely Hunter Valley, King Valley, Riverland and Geographe.
As usual I will prepare a short presentation for a start and then we will open the forum to participants.
The link to the Zoom session will posted on the
and a reminder sent on Thursday.