So now it’s mid-summer. You’re the wine-drinking type, it’s as hot as it’s ever going to get and the thought of a gassy, sweet Australian lager at the end of the day makes you want to puke. Only wine will do, to be sure, but which wine? Now before you think it’s a little far-fetched to start considering different wines for different seasons, do remember that there are people who spend time outside the perpetually air-conditioned comfort of surgeries and offices. Furthermore, it’s become almost as fashionable these summer days to eat in the often stifling heat outside a restaurant as it is to dine amid the cooler temperatures inside. It’s my unwavering view that those self-same honking-great, blockbustingly chunky reds and sumptuous, creamy chardonnnays, many of which you could cut with a knife, simply fall apart when tasted and tested in extreme heat. And, as a consequence, so will you if you drink them. It’s almost self-evident to suggest such a thing, but wine for the blazing heat of mid-summer should be designed and optioned to refresh. Summer food is lighter, more delicate in texture, but often piercing and provocative in flavour and summer wine should reflect that. Summer wine should revitalise, cleanse and reinvigorate. Its flavours should be clearly penetrative and defined, its acidity lively and tingling, its overall effect as resuscitative as a desert spring of Evian water discovered by a Foreign Legionnaire just minutes before expiring of thirst. So what are the best summer wines? Here are some ideas to get you going. Young Riesling Young riesling is bracing, tangy, dry and steely. It’s a serious wine, without doubt, and one likely to develop superbly with age. But who cares now? Before it enters its abominable adolescence at around eighteen months of age it’s everything a summer wine could ever be. And because it’s just so much more aromatic than chardonnay or semillon you can chill it just that little bit further without detriment. Today there’s a good range of riesling to choose from, although you could hardly go wrong with most makers in South Australia’s justly famous Eden and Clare Valleys. It almost sounds non-patriotic, but there’s also some really exciting riesling coming from New Zealand, France and Germany. The better Kiwi examples like those of Villa Maria, Stoneleigh, Grove Mill, Collards and Dry River combine some of the austerity of young Australian riesling with the fragrance, delicacy and pear/apple flavours of good German riesling. The regions doing particularly well with the grape in New Zealand are Marlborough on the south island and Martinborough on the north. Good Alsatian riesling is slightly thicker and chalkier than Australian riesling, but packs a generous punch of fruit that lingers and lingers. The better years produce bone-dry wines which sit perfectly on the summer terrace. Brands to look for include Hugel, Josmeyer, Rene Mure, Domaine Weinbach and Domaine Trimbach. Meanwhile, the pleasing trend begun in Germany about fifteen years ago of making drier, zestier wines continues with the release of wines with ‘trocken’ (dry) and ‘halbtrocken’ (half dry) tags. Summer is the season made for these wines, with or without solid accompaniment. The names of these wines are simply too long to make a list of, but I had a bottle of Weingut Max Ferd. Richter Mulheimer Sonnenlay Kabinett Riesling halbtrocken 1997 the other day and thought it utterly delicious. Rose Has your wine critic gone completely mad? No way. Rose is a perfect beverage for the poolside, under the pergola, beside the river or around the boundary. It’s had years of bad press, but the still variant of the pink, blushing wine offers just that little more punchy fruit flavour than most whites. And provided it finishes clean and dry – unlike much of the fizzy European lolly-water sold as rose – you have yourself a perfect antidote to the hot Antipodean summer. Wines I’m happy to suggest include Garry Crittenden i Rosato, Yering Station ED Pinot Noir Rose, Charles Melton Rose of Virginia, Turkey Flat Rose and Mount Hurtle Grenache Rose. Some Tavel rose from the southern Rhone Valley is delightfully bright, dry and savoury. Fino Sherry It’s as dry as a crack, nutty, occasionally dusty, always savoury, lingering and unbelievably more-ish. It can be taken chilled, as the Tio Pepe label suggests, or else at room or cellar temperature. Heavens above, there’s so little need to stand to attention to it that you can even toss in an ice-block or a splash of soda. Fino sherry is the lightest and driest member of the sherry clan and once you acquire a taste for it, little else will do, especially in that crucial period between arriving at your dining table or venue and the appearance of the first entree. Australia is still blessed with volumes of good dry sherry, and names like Seppelt, Mildara, McWilliams, Angoves, Chambers and Peter Lehmann (cellar door only) are firmly imprinted in my mind. Valdespino and Lustau are two top-notch Spanish sherry houses whose wines are readily available in better wine stores. They’ve several finos between them, plus that incredible variant from Sanlucar, Manzanilla. Musky Traminer and Pinot Gris/Grigio As long as it’s dry, traminer (or gewurztraminer) makes a musky, spicy summer wine steeped with rose oil and lychee fragrance, and whose long, slightly oily palate finishes with taut, bracing acids. There are so few good traminers in Australia today, but do road test the wines of Knappstein Enterprise (Clare Valley), Straw’s Lane, Delatite, Brown Brothers, Chatsfield, Lillydale Vineyards, Moorilla Estate and Piper’s Brook. From the Land of the Long White Cloudy Bay comes stellar traminer by Huia and Lawson’s Dry River. Pinot gris and pinot grigio are the same grape. Its wines are dusty and chalky, very dry and savoury, and scented with apple and peach blossom. It’s also very trendy and there are some rather pricey new entrants to the market. Trust the wines of Seppelt, Pipers Brook, Drumborg, Adina and Brown Brothers. While they’re very popular, steer clear of these wines on those long, hot summer days. You’ll thank me for it later. Thick, old tarry reds. You hardly need explaining why, unless headaches are your stock in trade. Viognier Fat, forward, hot and alcoholic. Quite trendy, but better suited to autumn and winter. Unwooded chardonnay Fat, oily, broad, coarse and short. Hardly refreshing at the best of times, so perfectly useless during summer. Sauvignon blanc Broad, confection-like, coarse and short, often lacking length and totally unbalanced in acids. If you have to drink it over summer, choose one with some semillon in the blend. Of course there are exceptions, like the 1999s from the Adelaide Hills. Fizz Anyone who can sit outside drinking pints of frothy dry wine, which in summer goes straight to your head, gets equal measure of my admiration and sympathy. It just burns me out too quickly.
