Truly Great Wines Not Imported to the U.S.?

WINE TALK
21

Wendouree was my first thought too. And isn’t Grosset no longer imported?

22

Tyrrell’s Vat 1 is really widely available (sadly not in MA, but that’s no surprise). Did they recently part ways with their importer?

23

Domaine Peyre Rose from the Languedoc?

24

That would be a shame.

Oh, and great thread idea.

25

Actually, since by their nature most of these are wines we won’t have heard of, when you throw out a name, please give a little bit of explanation (where they are from, what kinds of wines they make, some brief statement about how/why they are great wineries). Otherwise, the names just by themselves don’t really add much to the discussion.

26

Seppelt St. Peters Shiraz

27

Bob, if you were coming tonight (and since your recent enlightenment!), I’d pour some Metras for you.

Remember that delicious Domaine Chassorney St. Romain white? Pretty sure there’s little/none imported. I wouldn’t call it great, but would love to have several bottles.

I’ve read/heard that there are excellent Swiss wines that don’t get exported, or if so, only very locally. Don’t know the names of any off hand.

RT

28

Here is a very nice Swiss one:

Pinot Noir de Cully 2008
Frédéric Blondel

29

I had some terrific wines in Sicily that I have not found in the US.
These include Castelluci Miano (Perricone and a wonderful Nero d’Avola)
and Cottanera, from Mt. Etna. I have seen Cottanera’s Barbazzale at some shops but not much else.
Delicious wines, that speak volcano.

30

Domaine de Chassorney and other Cossard Wines were imported by Langdon Shiverick. They did a terrible job.

They are now imported by Zev Rovine whom I am sure will do a much better job.

Great wines.

31

A few months ago there was a thread on great German red wines, particularly pinot noir. However, when I tried to find some of them on wine-searcher, many appeared not to be available in the United States.

32

Does anyone know if Cims de Porrer currently has a U.S. importer?

Old school Priorat that would easily be my favorite in the region.

http://vimeo.com/58090290

33

The interesting thing is…I see a lot of Clarendon Hills on the flash sites…WTSO, Last Bottle, Invino, etc…

34

Yup. Most of this thread could read like a who’s who of Australian wine (traditional, classical Aussie wine, that is…)
Wendouree, Grosset, Mt. Mary, Mt. Langi, Giaconda, Best’s (Bin 0 and Thomson Vyd), Wynn’s John Riddoch Cabernet, Tyrrell’s Vat 1, Cullen Diana Madeline, St. Peters… bah.

Now I’m suddenly tempted to break into my lone bottle of '00 St. Peters Shiraz - if only it weren’t so damn warm here.

35

A LOT of small but super high quality / famous guys in northern Italy can’t be bothered as they can sell everything at the winery for full price for CASH to customers from Germany, Austria, Switzerland and the low countries.

36

I bought one bottle of Mt. Mary Chardonnay, cellared it for a number of years (maybe 7-8 years from vintage), and it was horribly oxidized by the time I opened it.

I’ve had probably a half dozen bottles of Cullen Diana Madeline, and it was a good, more traditionally-styled cabernet. Not exceptional, but a good wine.

I had one bottle of a 1990s vintage of John Riddoch maybe a year or two ago, and it was excellent.

This whole “Australia makes all these awesome non-spoofed wines, you just can’t get them in the US” dynamic is annoying. It starts to sound like the dorky kid in junior high school who says he really has this gorgeous girlfriend but she lives on the other side of the country. How do we break out of this impasse?

37

Play linebacker at Notre Dame? [snort.gif]

38

Chris, I am sorry if it is annoying to you but there is truth here too. Of course Aust produces vast oceans of very ordinary wine but equally it has a large group of dedicated passionate wine makers who are producing wines of real interest and character.

Best way for you to break the impasse is to go to Australia, contact some berskerkers in Sydney and Melbourne drink some wines, then visit some of the regions and wineries yourself. I doubt if there is any other way tbh.

I have had the same discussion with some other American wine friends and the only solution was to them to try the wines themselves. In that case I brought some Wendouree, Mt Mary, Rockford, Yarra Yering, Dalwhinnie, wines from my Aust cellar for them to try and the argument was resolved. They agreed that the Aust wines readily available in the states were not at all representative on what Aust wines are capable of…

And no I do not have a gorgeous girlfriend on the other side of the country.

Cheers Brodie

39

Given that the producers named by definition are not in the US, like Bob, I would appreciate people not just naming producers but saying where they are from and telling us a bit about them.

40

I am confused. [scratch.gif] I thought that was how one got into this problem.