Nice and Fruity (Hardys Wines)

Member Name: pjs21

Product:	Hardys Wines
Date:	11/09/01 (375 review reads)
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There are several things in the world that make me happy, content and warm inside, and other than my girlfirend, there is only one thing that gives me that fuzzy feeling on top of all of the above - a decent glass of red wine.

I started drinking red wine about two years ago, and at that stage would drink pretty much anything that came in a bottle and was red in colour. It's only as time's gone on and I've drunk and brought many varieties that I have started to appreciate the difference between a good drinkable wine and a great one.

There is so much snobbery that goes with wine drinking, especially red, it's quite ridiculous. The thing is, you can never tell what's good and what's not till you've tried it. I've had a bottle of red in a restaurant that cost us £380.00 (I didn't pay for it I'd like to point out.) And I've had a bottle of plonk at £2.99. So was it worth it's £377.01 more? Quite frankly - No. IT wasn't to my taste at all. Very light, slight acidic, and above all £380.00.

Hardy's Cabernet/Shiraz/Merlot sells for about £6.49 in Tesco, though they kindly had it at half price recently - YAY!!! £3.25 a bottle.

This wine is a mix of three of Australia's main grape varieties, each of which you can buy as a wine on there own or mixed with others -

Merlot is widely grown in France and Italy and is used widely in some of the best wines (St Emilion and Pomeral), it is also experimented with by Calfornian wine makers. It has a very soft fruit taste and is a deep red in colour. Cabernet Sauvignon is the foundation of the red bordeaux. Caberbet on it's own is said to be quite harsh in flavour, and is often mixed with another grape like Merlot - this is the mix that makes Bordeaux. Shiraz is the Australian name for the French Syrah. (Shiraz is the name of the town, in what is now Iran, where the Syrah probably originates.) Shiraz on it's own
is a lovely wine, and I recommend Hardy's Nottage Hill Shiraz - In my mind Australia make some of the nicest Shiraz or Cabernet mixes.

It was pure pot luck that made me buy this wine in the first place. The bottle is black with a very stylish black and gold label about a third of the way up and the Hardy's shield at the base of the neck. It's a very good looking bottle of wine - and that's the reason I brought it - if I like the style of the label then I'll buy it. (NB - This doesn't always mean you'll get a nice wine - I've had some revolting stuff before in nice packaging!)

The wine itself is very deep red in colour, looks like srong Ribena, very strong Ribena. The smell is very fruity, which I guess is the Merlot coming through, though the Shiraz too is very prominent in it's taste.

It must be served at room temperature, it loses it's flavour even if it's a touch cold. I always let it breath for atleast 2 hours before serving, if you have a decanter then this will help.

It's a very full-bodied red which is incredibly smooth and quaffable (I love that word!)

This wine is a real treat. It is quite heavy and should really be served with meats like Lamb and Beef as recommended by Hardys, but if you're anything like me - you drink what you like when you want. There is too much snobbery around what wine goes best with what food, and although it can make a difference, you should really drink whatever you want. This is also a good wine to drink on it's own.

This is one I pick up every time I go shopping to ensure that I have enough of it in, and if, like me, you are building a wine cellar of your own, this one is good for about five years.

It can, however, be quite heavy and I avoid it during the summer (what we have of one!), as also red wines produce hystomines in your body and this can aggrevate your hayfever.

It's certainly no
t the cheapest of wines, you can get many that are nice for less - though being the wine snob I've become I never spend less than £5 on a bottle - there is a noticeable difference in taste and quality. However, if you're looking for something to impress at a dinner table, or as a gift to a red wine drinker, than this one comes heartily recommended. I brough a bottle for a dinner party with my girlfriends father - he who knows his wines - though he didn't know this one and when he guessed which was the French and which was the Australian - he picked the Hardy's as the French because of it's superior taste, aroma and depth. He was surprised he got it wrong (I guessed correctly - they were both decanted so there was no way of knowing - a little bit smug there!)and preferred the Australian at £6.49 to the French at over £30 that he'd provided.

More money doesn't necessarily mean a better wine, but for an extra couple of quid Hardy's Cabernet/Shiraz/Merlot is well worth every penny.

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