New Zealand in a Glass
I attended the Brisbane event at the Pullman Hotel. It was advertised as 230 wines from 40 wineries. There was a good range of wines available for tasting from all over the country. The stands were staffed by a mix of people from the wineries and local Queensland or Australian agents and distributors. All the ones that I spoke to were informative and enthusiatic about the wines they had on offer.
A clever innovation was the showcasing of a particular variety for an hour. When I arrived it was Pinot Gris. There were about a dozen Pinot Gris lined up on a stand in the centre of the room so you could do a horizontal tasting and compare them driectly without having to work your way around the room. After visiting a few stands I came back and it was Pinot Noir hour.
In talking to the exhibitors, it was interesting how many of them drew grapes from vineyards all over the country, so while it might be a Martinborough winery the grapes would be from Martinborough, Marlborough and Central Otago. This enables a winery to source fruit from the regions that it is best suited to rather than growing grape varieties in regions that just dont work.
As to my favourites, I spent some time tasting Matua Valley, Man O' War and Craggy Range and couldn't leave without revisitng old favourites Mt Difficulty and Greystone.
