The Barossa Valley

Adelaide is a very spoiled city when it comes to wine. To the south side of the city is the McLaren Vale, a world class wine region especially famous for its Shiraz. On the north side of the city is the Barossa Valley, another world class wine region also notable for its reds, including the infamous Penfold's Grange. Also within driving distance of Adelaide is the Clare Valley and the Coonawarra region, also both excellent wine regions in their own right. So, if you love wine and are visiting Australia, include Adelaide on your itinerary.

Today we went to the Barossa Valley. There are some world famous wineries in the Barossa like Penfolds, Wolf Blass and Jacob's Creek, which I have been too in the past, so today I wanted to hit some of the lesser known ones.

To prove that the world is an ever shrinking place, to decide which wineries to go to today, I reached out to my boss' wife back in the US. As it turns out, she is a wine rep. in the Orange County area and sells Australian wines. She gave us the names of a couple of wineries that she represents currently.

We were a little late leaving the house today, so by the time we got to the Barossa, it was time for lunch. We stopped at Kies Winery, which just happens to be home of the Monnkey Nut Cafe (just in case we hadn't had enough of monkeys at Callum's party). Lunch was very good, lots of local produce used and good wine to accompany the meal. Here are some photos from around Kies.




We then moved from the restaurant and into the cellar door where we tasted some more wines and purchased just a few bottles. We were somewhat restricted as to how much we can buy by how much we can transport back to the US and get through US customs.

After lunch we attempted to visit Tait Winery, but unfortunately their cellar door was not open today. We'll have to catch them next time.

Next on the list was Heritage Wines, which was open (since one of us was smart enough to call ahead on this one). More wines were tasted, more bottles were purchased. Surprising, I know. Here are some photos from Heritage.




Our last stop for the day was Saltram Wines. On my trip to Australia in July I bought a bottle of beer that Saltram makes. I forget if I mentioned it, it is a beer that has some shiraz grape juice (not wine) added to the beer. I wanted to see if they had another beers available. Turns out they do not. I did taste the beer again at their cellar door though, just to be sure of course. When I asked the lady behind the counter what style of beer it was based on, I got kind of a panicked look, I rephrased the question, and got a stammered answer of "it's an ale". Which I guess is technically correct, but it was not the detailed answer I was hoping for. Apparently knowing about the beer they are selling is not yet as important as knowing about the wine. The beer revolution is coming people, you should get ready! Anyway, here are some snaps from Saltram.