Food review by Bill Alexiou-Hucker and wine review by Stephen O'Halloran

Wine

A small but willing crowd turned out for another mid-winter lunch on a cold, bleak Tuesday, but beautiful lamb shanks and some excellent wines lifted our spirits to a sufficient degree to rate the afternoon a success. 

Our first wine was a delightful 2017 Watervale Riesling from KT Wines @ 12%. Kerrie Thompson is an outstanding Riesling producer.  The vintage of 2017 in Clare/Watervale was rated 10/10. So, when you combine a great year + a top district for Riesling + Kerrie Thompson = a terrific wine, which indeed this wine was.  An 8 yo Riesling drinking at its peak was pure joy. Fresh, clean, but at the same time powerful fruit flavours, combined to give us a wonderful wine, so flavoursome, balanced with still crisp acid leading to a lingering finish. Hints of green apple and grapefruit remained on the palate long after the wine was gone. My wine of the day.  

The second wine was the Paulazzo Hilltops Cabernet 2022 @ 13%. This wine was received with a mixed reception by the room. Some did not like it all, others greeted it warmly, including myself. Quite clearly a very young cabernet, medium bodied with good balance between oak, tannin and acid. Given time, I feel this wine will develop in 5/6 years to become an elegant, lighter style of Cabernet. Lots of flavour from earthy spice and blackcurrant. Lovely, clear ruby red colour. An attractive looking and tasting wine, one to hold for the future. Hope our wine master has stashed away a few dozen so we can try again in a year or so. In body and texture, more like a Bordeaux than an Australian Cabernet. Let's see what happens in a few years. 

The next wine needs no introduction to the WFS members. One of our Society favourites, the Wynns Black label Cab 2013 @13.5% This wine, vintage after vintage, never lets you down. This particular wine, now 13yo, is just hitting its straps. A wine of great power, rich and intense with dark fruit flavours, traces of leather and spice, all held together with perfectly developed oak, tannin and acid. A sumptuous mouth-filling finish with a persistent aftertaste. Let's hope we have a stack more in our cellar.

We then moved on to a white wine, the famous Dr Loosen Kabinett Riesling 2022 @8%. To be frank, I would have much preferred this wine to have been served as an aperitif wine rather than being sandwiched between two big reds. As far as the wine was concerned, it was most enjoyable. A typical high-quality German Riesling, low in alcohol, with an abundance of delicate citrus flavours, smooth and mouth-filling with that typical German crisp acid, and a powerful finish. The wine may have been there for the cheese, a Marchetto, but it did not pair well with that particular cheese. A soft, creamier cheese would have been better. No reflection on the wine, it was excellent, just out of place. 

Final wine of the day was the Stephen Pannell Adelaide Hills Syrah 2016 @14 %. A wine from one of our most successful wine makers, son of Dr Bill Pannell, founder of the distinguished Moss Wood vineyard in the Margaret River, WA.  These grapes were straight SA shiraz from an excellent year.  A dense, medium to full-bodied wine, with a soft, voluptuous taste and wonderful mouth feel. Rich in tannin, spice and oak flavours, the wine, in my view, is still a few years off full development. Drinking today, the wine is juicy and intense with the promise of future delights in store for those prepared to wait another year or two.  Sadly, as with the German wine, the Marchetto did not pair well with this wine, a mismatch of flavours, not doing justice to either cheese or wine. A scenario that occurs only rarely in our WFS.

Food

It was a modestly sized but delightfully rowdy crew that gathered on Tuesday to savour the culinary creations from the ever-impressive REX kitchen. The mood was light, the laughter plentiful, and as our President Steve O’Halloran quipped, once his presidential duties are done, he might just take up a new role herding cats, a fitting metaphor for the spirited group before him.

True to form, the kitchen team delivered a procession of delights that left no palate wanting. Tuesday was no exception, if anything, it raised the bar yet again.

We kicked off with a smoked salmon blini, but this was no dainty dollop on a dry disc. Generously topped with silky, smoky salmon, it was a rare sight to see such abundance in a canapé, a true one-bite indulgence that set the tone for the lunch.

Next came Amosh’s now-iconic pork, fennel, and apple sausage roll, a crowd favourite. Packed with punchy flavour, this little parcel needed no sauce, no garnish, no introduction. The trio of elements combined to deliver a full-flavoured blast, the kind that makes you pause mid-conversation to savour every chew.

Then came the chicken tandoori balls, Chicken thigh marinated with tandoori paste and yogurt, roasted in the oven (180C), then shredded and mixed with mozzarella cheese, into a perfect ball, then coated in panko crumbs and served with a Sriracha mayo. Golden-fried and teasingly spicy, a delicate crunch giving way to tender meat and subtle heat. If finger food had royalty, this was surely it.

But the undisputed star of the day was the lamb shank. Twice cooked, first a slow, love-filled four-hour session, then finished to perfection the next day, this was comfort food with a capital C. Served atop the kitchen’s famously smooth, creamy mash (you know the one), with perfectly diced, just-firm carrots and a sauce that kissed rather than drowned, it was a plate of pure satisfaction. The meat, soft and gelatinous, surrendered to the fork, falling off the bone like it had better places to be.

All in all, it was another stellar session of great food, good company, and laughter echoing through the room. The REX team does it again, and we wouldn’t have it any other way.