Out Of The Bottle
With David Ellis
Unusual Wine Christmas Stories
This is the story of how three colleagues will celebrate Christmas
this year, and some quite different wines they’ll be doing it with.
The
first is a group of around a dozen couples who through Mother Nature’s
misfortune, have never experienced the joy of having children. They
come together early each December, pull out their cheque books and go
on a buying spree for kids’ toys... which they give to agreed charities
and childrens’ hospitals.
On Christmas Day they come together
again and share their love of Chardonnay, each contributing the
least-known label they can find and sharing it over a Very Long Lunch,
and interestingly this year two of them have chosen the same label.
It’s from Diamond Creek Estate in the small, cool-climate winemaking
area of the NSW Southern Highlands, and the vintage chosen is the
excellent 2008.
Our colleagues tell us that its beaut
stone-fruit characters and tropical pineapple overtones will make it a
great choice with their salmon mouse and lobster salad Christmas Day
Long Lunch; it’s not widely available so ring (02) 4872 3311or look at
www.diamondcreekestate.com.au if you are interested in finding out
where to buy it. It’s certainly good value at $20 a bottle (by the
case.)
The second of our unusual Christmas lunches is hosted by
a mate who invites all his single employees – this year that’ll be
around forty of them – to another Very Long Lunch at which he, his wife
and their adult ‘kids’ will cook ten legs of lamb in a battery of
hooded barbecues, and roast vegies in as many electric frypans.
And
as he says he’s got to pray it won’t rain, we’ve tipped him towards a
Cabernet Sauvignon that’ll be ideal with his roast lamb luncheon – and
is appropriately-labelled Hail Mary Full of Grace.
It’s made
by the irrepressible Julie Barry who owns the equally
delightfully-titled Good Catholic Girl winery in the Clare Valley; with
fresh and intense black fruit flavours and spicy tannins, it’s got lamb
and home-made mint sauce written all over it. Julie made just 133
cases; phone her on 0419 822 909 if you want to grab one or six at just
$25 a bottle.
And the final unusual one is a mate who
traditionally finishes his family’s Christmas lunch with a homemade
apple pie and custard to a recipe handed down a half-century ago by his
Grandmum who always said "on Christmas Day we don’t have to eat stodgy
English Christmas pudding".
And the wine he’ll have with it will
be a Chenin Blanc, not one of our biggest sellers and mostly made in
Western Australia, with his choice a 2011 from Voyager Estate; at $20
its great value to enjoy with his Grandmum’s apple pie and custard.
And a Merry Christmas to you all...
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