Top 100 red wines of Victoria - Page 8
Discover the top 100 best red wines of Victoria as well as the best winemakers in the region. Explore the varietals of the red wines that are popular of Victoria and the best vintages to taste in this region.
Victoria is a relatively small but important Australian wine state. Located in the Southeastern corner of the continent, with a generally cool, ocean-influenced Climate, Victorian wine is remarkably diverse, producing all sorts of wines and styles in different climates. In all, the state covers almost 250,000 square kilometres (over 90,000 square miles) of land (almost the same Size as the US state of Texas), well under a quarter the size of its western neighbour, South Australia, and less than a third the size of New South Wales to the North. As such, Victoria's size - and to some extent, the state's viticultural history - can defy generalization.
Climate and soils vary enormously, from the cool, positive Macedon Ranges just north of the state capital, Melbourne, to the alpine valleys of the Australian Alps in the east, to the vast, flat, Dry Murray Darling, shared with New South Wales in the North West Victoria Geographic Indicator (GI). Despite its vast size, North West Victoria has only the Murray Darling and Swan Hill as wine regions within its boundaries. The majority of regions are clustered in the south of the state, with most in an area radiating out from Melbourne for about 200km (130 miles), generally divided into five other GIs. Melbourne itself is located in the Port Phillip GI, based around the eponymous bay.
It is the result of a seedling planted in the United States, around 1840, recovered near the Concord River, a small river located east of Massachusetts. According to genetic analysis, it is an interspecific cross between the catawba and a vitis labrusca. Concord was for a long time the main variety cultivated in North America. It was introduced into Europe at the beginning of the 19th century, in France at the beginning of the phylloxera crisis, but was not widely propagated. It could be found in the Valleraugue region (Gard) at the foot of Mont Aigoual, in the Ardèche (our photos), etc. Today, it exists only as an isolated strain that can sometimes be found on the edge of a slope, which was our case. Through various and numerous crosses, it has been used to obtain some rootstocks and direct producer hybrids, which have now almost all disappeared.
red wines from the region of Victoria go well with generally quite well with dishes of beef, lamb or game (deer, venison) such as recipes of rosbeef casserole mamie, leg of lamb in braillouse or blood duck (tour d'argent).
On the nose in the region of Victoria often reveals types of flavors of strawberries, earth or spices and sometimes also flavors of red fruit, oaky or earthy. In the mouth in the region of Victoria is a powerful with a nice freshness.