Riesling – a fine Australian asset

It all began with an offer by Wines of Australia, the generic body currently struggling to get the world to take more notice of the great wines that smaller outfits are producing, when the news is full of the problems currently besetting the workhorse vineyard in the interior and some of the big companies that dominate the Australian wine industry.

Their London office proposed sending me six Clare Valley Rieslings. I wasn’t going to refuse that, was I? Clare is the epicentre of Australia’s steely...