[question] Question submitted by Chris. Why are your red wine drinking windows generally so much further out to either Halliday’s or most of the winemakers who supply data to Bradley’s Australian Vintages? Is this personal taste in that you prefer more mature wines or an objective view that we are generally drinking much of the better wines too early? I’m rather intrigued! [/question] [answer] Other than the often catastrophic effects resulting from poor seals, I enjoy the experience of pulling out red wines from my cellar. I believe that while you need to be selective about which wines you choose to cellar, and particularly which vintages, that Australia does make a significant number of wines worth cellaring. I have a great deal of respect for James Halliday, but neither consult his notes nor those of any other wine writers when determining my cellaring windows. I have no respect whatsoever for the Bradley book or the means by which it is assembled. In my view, winemakers have no place to be rating their own wines. Over the 22 years in which I have been writing about wine for a living, I have been able to watch many wines as they mature and fade, which has been to me the best possible school in this regard. Add to this the often extraordinary opportunities that wine writers receive to participate in spectacular vertical tastings, and I believe I have as good a chance as any of making a decent call with respect to cellaring time. I have two further comments to make. One is that I believe my cellaring windows are actually significantly less than many of my peers with respect to wines from seasons like 1997, 2000, 2001 and 2003 in which fruit was generally harvested at very uneven physiological ripeness due to the advanced sugar ripeness resultant from extreme heat. I tend to give many such wines a comparatively short cellaring life, since I question the balance of many from the outset. Others, especially certain critics across the Pacific, clearly do not share this view. Secondly, time and time again I am amazed by the confronting youthfulness of many ‘mature’ Australian wines, especially those I have kept for 15-25 years. Time and again, when following my own advice, I find their full maturity to still be some years distant. This perhaps says something about my own drinking preferences, for I really enjoy mature tastes in wines that retain palate length and freshness. My advice to those who take on board what I suggest is always to calibrate their own preferences against my drinking windows. That, I believe, is the way to get the best from my recommendations. [/answer]
