Our wines win trophies all over the world, but are underappreciated at home, with many restaurant lists still drawing heavily on imports. Change is coming. August 23, 2024 You have reached your maximum number of saved items.
Remove items from your saved list to add more. Save this article for later Add articles to your saved list and come back to them anytime. Australia is the most exciting wine-producing country in the world, according to US-based wine importer and sommelier Jane Lopes.
“But it could sometimes do a better job of self-promotion,” she says. Lopes and sommelier husband Jonathan Ross wrote the award-winning book How to Drink Australian after falling for our wine while living and working here. “Every time we are back in Australia and immersed in this country’s wines, we are reminded of how world-class they are,” says the former wine director at Melbourne fine-diner Attica.
“Australia is at a perfect nexus right now of tradition and innovation, and the wines are just on fire. It’s exciting.” The problem is, many Australians are simply unaware of how good they have it.
Nashville-based Lopes and Ross are amazed by how few Australian wine lists feature domestic wines in meaningful ways. According to alcohol industry analysts IWSR, domestic wine accounts for 80 per cent of the volume of wine consumed within Australia, considering both retail and hospitality industry sales. Yet, only 11.
2 per cent of the wines on Sydney lists are from NSW, while 46 per .