by Ben Thomas
It’s the middle of winter and I’m drinking chilled riesling when warming reds should be in my glass – there’s something terribly wrong with this picture.
Wine’s a bit like fashion, and the wines we’ll be drinking next season have already hit the shops.
It means I end up tasting and drinking wines that are inappropriate for the current weather – heavy reds in summer followed by whites and rosé in the winter.
Longing to know what the drinks of choice for the current cold weather are, I asked a brewer, bartender, winemaker and sommelier what they’ve been enjoying.
The winemaker Franco D’Anna
Not surprisingly, this Yarra Valley winemaker is drinking red wine.
“I’m loving reds from southern Italy at the moment – just the right sort of tannins for a hearty soup – savoury reds without the fruit sweetness we see in many domestic wines. Any nerello from Etna hits the spot, or the more muscular wines from Puglia,” the Hoddles Creek Estate winemaker says.
The sommelier Liam O’Brien
You’d think the sommelier who curates an outstanding list of wines at Cutler & Co would nominate a wine as his go-to drink of the moment. But, refreshingly, O’Brien, who also makes wine under the Vinero label from the Macedon Ranges, nominates a beer.
“I’m quite hooked on Bridge Road Brewers’ Bling Bling IPA,” O’Brien says. “It’s straight out of the ‘more of anything? More of everything!’ school of brewing, but it’s everything that a thousand hopped-out, malted-up craft brews want to be and fail for one important reason: balance. My brain tells me I shouldn’t like it but my mouth says, ‘Shut up and enjoy the ride’.”
The brewer Steve Walker
“You start drinking beers that are a bit darker in the winter, with higher alcohol – less thirst-quenching beers, but ones with flavour,” says Walker, head brewer at Geelong’s Southern Bay Brewing Co. “They go with richer foods, such as casseroles, and with dark beers such as stouts, they really come to life at warmer temperatures. Pour yourself a large glass, drink it slowly and their true characters come out.”
The bartender Fred Siggins
“In the winter months, I tend to gravitate to simple whisky-based classics like the Bobby Burns. It’s basically a scotch Manhattan (whisky, sweet vermouth and bitters) with a splash of DOM Bénédictine for a bit of rich, herbal sweetness,” says Siggins, who can be found mixing drinks at Fitzroy’s Black Pearl.
