This week, Pattaya Mail introduces a new column on wine by Max Crus from Australia. Max is an amusing writer who writes for the "common-folk". Although his writing centers on wines produced or available in Australia, with a little bit of hunting, most of the wines he writes about can be found in Thailand. Enjoy.

Grape Expectations

by Max Crus

This is a wine column. Written by someone who knows little about wine for those who know even less. Do I still have your attention?

Yes, there’s plenty of high brow stuff around and altogether too little low brow info on the subject. Throughout the course of this column I hope to impart some hard earned knowledge garnered from years of, well, drinking. (None of that spit in the bucket approach for me).

By the good grace of friends and family, over the years I’ve had the pleasure of tasting a varied and substantial array of fabulous wines. Equally, by the disgrace of the other half of my friends and family, I’ve been subjected to some truly dreadful wines. I now keep a list of both to cover all occasions.

I’ve also been dragged, against my will, through countless wineries throughout the country and seen the process by which grapes are turned into wine so often, that I now experience a concussion-like amnesia as to how it all happens.

Speaking of wineries, it always intrigued me why wines at the cellar door, or at your local bottle tasting, tended to taste better than they do when you pop the cork at the next barbie. Then I realised, and it hasn’t been a problem since. More on this next week.

Thus I feel adequately qualified to offer some tips on good wines, some tips on cheap wines, maybe even which wines to tip out, and all without being even mildly technical. Further to this I will offer suggestions on wineries you might visit, (did you know there is nowhere in Australia that is more than 1,800 km from a winery?) or look out for
in your bottle shop, and
get the butchers and greengrocers involved with ideas on what you might eat with your new found knowledge.

To top it all off I will be interviewing a few winemakers and industry big wigs, which will no doubt reveal which of their wines is suitable for you, and also speaking to some local connoisseurs for their hints on how to talk about wines we can’t afford.

Finally I am hopeful that some wineries may send me a few cases to try and these may become the subject of reader giveaways when I’m finished with them.

And what wine column is complete without at least one recommendation. Let’s start with the one I had with dinner last night:

Tyrrell’s Old Winery Shiraz 1995, $11.00. Somebody else brought this one to the BBQ and I was a bit jealous - it tasted better than mine which cost a few dollars more. Drink and learn. I gave it 7.5 out of 10.

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