Good taste: Falling in love with an Aussie

2007 Wyndham Estate Bin 444 Cabernet Sauvignon, 2006 St Henri and 2007 George Wyndham Shiraz Tempranillo. Photo / Supplied

The air is cool, the shiraz is dark and I am falling in love with the muscle and power of Australia's most famous and commercially successful wine all over again. Shiraz, shiraz, shiraz. If I wasn't tired of it before a week of devoting my mouth and mind to shiraz, I certainly should have been afterwards. Instead, it tastes to me like the first throes of a love affair; irresistible, intense and addictive. The week of shiraz was at Tasting Australia. And this year there's a bittersweet tang of a global wine glut hanging in the air like sour grapes.

The winemakers of McLaren Vale, Langhorne Creek and the Adelaide Hills are surprisingly optimistic, proudly asserting their shirazes possess "cool climate spice flavours".

Whatever it is, they taste less like fruit jam and more like wine. "Is great shiraz the Dan Carter equivalent of the wine world," my boyfriend asks as I plunge into another glass of big, smooth, young Australian shiraz.

Not a bad analogy, I think, savouring every dark red drop of St Henri that passes my lips. Unlike Dan Carter - who is as popular as ever - Australian shiraz has taken a massive hit in the last year. Sales in its biggest market, the UK, fell from 21.2 per cent to 20.4 per cent (Nielsen data). Combined with the country's massive wine glut and things don't look rosy.

Several Australian winemakers at Tasting Australia estimated their over-supply of grapes this year at about 400,000 tonnes, or nearly a quarter of this year's harvest of 2 million tonnes. Little wonder Aussie winemakers are a tad anxious.

It makes New Zealand's wine glut look like a glass of spilt sauvignon blanc - and a tiny one at that.

But there is light in the dark Australian wine tunnel. I see it at one of Australia's tiniest wineries in McLaren Vale, tasting a shiraz made by top winemaker Steve Pannell. The 2006 S C Pannell McLaren Vale Shiraz has a minimal 10-15 per cent new oak only - very restrained. "We don't want to make jam with alcohol," says Pannell. "We want to get away from the simplicity of wine."

Surprisingly, I hear the same mantra at one of the world's largest wineries in the Barossa Valley, Jacob's Creek - the place Wyndham Estate wines are made. Jammy flavours, high alcohol and lots of oak have reigned sovereign in Barossa reds, but winemaker Nigel Dolan wants to make subtle shiraz rather than knock-your-tastebuds-around wines. This is good news for Kiwis. His Wyndham Estate Shiraz Bin 555 is the No1 selling shiraz in New Zealand at about $9 a bottle. Dolan is experimenting with quirky new ways of presenting shiraz too. And what irks him more than anything else is the assumption that there are only two speeds in the wine industry - small and caring or big and uncaring.

"That's nonsense," Dolan tells me, midway through five Wyndham shirazes, each one clearly made with TLC. "I work every day with people in this large winery, people who really care and pay every bit as much attention to detail as the small boutique wineries."

The proof is in the bottles below.

Wines of the week

Within your means
2007 Wyndham Estate Bin 444 Cabernet Sauvignon $17
Great structure and gorgeous dark fruit flavours of blackcurrant and boysenberries fill ever mouthful of this luscious red, which begs to be poured into a large glass, left for a couple of hours to open up, then enjoyed. Give the wine room to move by not filling the class to the brim.

The splurge
2006 St Henri $70
The 2006 St Henri tastes like landing on a velvet pillow feels. I want to savour every silky, subtle, smooth sip of this complex red. It's still very youthful with dark chocolate and rich plum flavours behind a veil of spice and black pepper. It's been aged in old, large oak barrels, which enhance its softness.

Test the waters
2007 George Wyndham Shiraz Tempranillo $23
Don't dismiss this wine just because the word "tempranillo" doesn't ring any bells. This outstandingly red is made mostly from shiraz with 30 per cent being tempranillo - a Spanish red grape that's taking hold in Australia, where the hot climate and Italian immigrant culture provide the perfect combination for success.