1. After becoming a major global trend, rosé is starting to take off here. Three of the following statements about the style are true, but which gets the red lights flashing?
a) Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie make an award-winning rosé
b) Some of the world's earliest wines were likely rosés
c) They're all sweet
d) Some rosés are just a by-product of red winemaking
2. Emerging here in the 1980s and currently experiencing something of a comeback, what are people referring to when they talk about Fume Blanc?
a) A wine infused with smoke
b) An oaked sauvignon blanc
c) An unoaked sauvignon blanc
d) A Muller-Thurgau
3. On the eve of the England versus Black Caps test, British bubbles went head to head with some of the best from New Zealand. We won the cricket and a wine from which nation was named "player of the match"?
a) England
b) New Zealand
c) Neither, it was a draw
d) Neither, the tasting was annulled after allegations of match fixing
4. Erwan Le Brozec of Baron Philippe de Rothschild was here showing the legendary Bordeaux "First Growth", Chateau Mouton Rothschild. What is a first growth?
a) A top Bordeaux classification that consists of five chateaux
b) A wine made from the first grapes harvested in a vintage
c) A cane on a grape vine that goes on to produce top quality grapes
d) One of the first vineyards established in Bordeaux
5. Tropical wines I tried left me underwhelmed. Making and buying wines this close to the equator comes with challenges. Which of the following is not one of these?
a) Poor storage conditions
b) Multiple vintages in one year
c) Long growing season
d) Humidity
6. Which wine region now has its own glass that was specially designed by Austrian glassmaker, Riedel?
a) Hawkes Bay
b) Martinborough
c) Marlborough
d) Central Otago
7. Organic wine is starting to gain momentum in NZ, but what percentage of our vineyard area is now managed organically or in the process of conversion?
a) 2 per cent
b) 5 per cent
c) 50 per cent
d) 95 per cent
8. There's always a few wines that have me heading for the spittoon. One particularly unappealing specimen this year made me wonder if its maker had a bad case of cellar palate. What is this disturbing condition?
a) A mouth infection to which winemakers and tasters are particularly prone
b) A condition that leaves a dank taste in the mouth
c) An illness caused by a fungus that thrives underground
d) Acclimatisation to something tasted regularly leading to a blindness of its faults
9. I visited Alexandra, site of Central Otago's first winery, built by Jean Desire Feraud in which decade?
a) 1860s
b) 1910s
d) 1960s
b) 1980s
10. "It's all upside down in the Jura," Jura expert Wink Lorch told me at a tasting of this French region's enigmatic wines. Which is not one of their surprising features?
a) The reds are often best chilled
b) Many bottles taste better after being left open for days
c) Yellow flowers are added to the fermenting vin jaune style of wine
d) Oxidation and evaporation is encouraged in the making of its vin jaune wines
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8-10 correct — Bona fide buff
4-7 correct — Amateur
0-3 correct — Vignoramus
Answers: 1c, 2b, 3a, 4a, 5c, 6d, 7b, 8d, 9a, 10c
