THE WINE THREAD

[Classic Brewing Co]

 THE WINE THREAD 

I thought it was time to start a wine thread as I know from reading posts on this forum for years a lot of us enjoy a wine especially after sampling our beers & mostly in my case whilst preparing & eating the evening meal or lunch on occasion.

We all live in different regions but in Australia a lot of the well-known brands are readily available in most states along with the cheaper/budget wines that grace our local Bottle-O or Wine shop.

I was brought up in a wine growing area & my Parents were Viticulturist's & had large vineyards in the Riverland area of SA so I was thrust into wine at an early age (still am) My old man supplied the Berri Winery on contract as other growers did, so I pretty much got to see the grapes growing, harvested, transported to the winery & of course later in bottles & casks. My nephew works in the Winery now but when my brother & I left school we had no interest working on a fruit block as they were called so the properties were sold.

I was curious as to the type of wine is your favourite, which wines do you buy or can afford, also your thoughts on bottles vs casks.

When I was working full-time travelling Australia I stayed in Hotels/Motels & of course most of the time buying meals & wine which at times were quite expensive, some country regions are dearer than the city & often I paid $30-$40 for a bottle of wine as that was all you could buy in the restaurant.

If I stayed in a Caravan Park Cabin, I could cook my meals & buy some cheaper wine from the Bottle-O.  I quite often used to carry a few casks with me as it worked out much more economical.

Finally, are you a wine snob & only drink bottled wine, or do you find some of the wine in Casks acceptable?  I have wine racks with premium wines but I am not too proud to drink Cask Wine apart from special occasions.

Salute.

 

[thebeerpig]

I started my wine drinking journey back in the mid nineteen seventies. My mates and I weren’t very well off financially so we became connoisseur’s of $1.20 bottles of a sparkling wine called Spewmante.

We then moved on from the drinking of Spewmante when the girls started turning up with large one gallon bladders of wine in there shoulder bags called Goonies.

The wine in the goonies made spewmante look expensive so we moved on to become connoisseur’s of the various flavours of Goon.

Fortunately we soon got jobs and became more financially well off. With our new found wealth we found that beer was much more suited to our tastes than wine, so became beer pigs and moved on to become connoisseurs of 5 dollar one dozen bottle boxes of Melbourne Bitter long necks.

My memories of drinking cheap wine and the taste of cheap wine aren't that great, so since those good old days I’ve only ever drank wine on special occasions and now stick to and enjoy drinking my home brewed beer

[Malter White]

3 hours ago, thebeerpig said:

I started my wine drinking journey back in the mid nineteen seventies. My mates and I weren’t very well off financially so we became connoisseur’s of $1.20 bottles of a sparkling wine called Spewmante.

We then moved on from the drinking of Spewmante when the girls started turning up with large one gallon bladders of wine in there shoulder bags called Goonies.

The wine in the goonies made spewmante look expensive so we moved on to become connoisseur’s of the various flavours of Goon.

Fortunately we soon got jobs and became more financially well off. With our new found wealth we found that beer was much more suited to our tastes than wine, so became beer pigs and moved on to become connoisseurs of 5 dollar one dozen bottle boxes of Melbourne Bitter long necks.

My memories of drinking cheap wine and the taste of cheap wine aren't that great, so since those good old days I’ve only ever drank wine on special occasions and now stick to and enjoy drinking my home brewed beer

I'm so disappointed I can only like this post once. It resonates with me very strongly. Only difference is my wine experiences started in the 80s and Brandivino was my Spumante. My god it was good to finally get a job and afford quality beer like West End Export. LOL

[thebeerpig]

14 hours ago, Malter White said:

Only difference is my wine experiences started in the 80s and Brandivino was my Spumante.

I remember Brandavino well Malter as it was also very popular back in the mid 1970’s - along with Stone’s Green Ginger wine, Spewmante & Goonies. We knew them then as the “cheap but effective” wines

[Classic Brewing Co]

15 hours ago, Malter White said:

I'm so disappointed I can only like this post once. It resonates with me very strongly. Only difference is my wine experiences started in the 80s and Brandivino was my Spumante. My god it was good to finally get a job and afford quality beer like West End Export. LOL

The old Brandavino was the poor man's Brandy, but I remember in the Drive-In days sitting in the back seat (only because there was more room for the esky in the front) with the little darlings & producing a bottle, well ...... you know what I mean