UnWined WA 2016 – Another EPIC year!

Yesterday we headed along to UnWined for the 4th year in a row – yes I might like this Perth wine and food festival just a little bit! Anything to support WA wines right? Mr. Spittoon and I had a fabulous time, we tried some great wines, hung out in the exclusive Club Lounge (it’s the first year this area has been available) and we even managed to attend one of the free wine masterclasses.

Firstly I just want to say a big thank you to CMS Events for inviting us along and also for providing us with Club Lounge tickets to giveaway on the blog – I hope the lucky winner has an absolutely fabulous time at the festival today!

The weather did look pretty miserable yesterday morning when we left the house – which was a bit of a downer – but rain, hail or shine – I was going! And it ended up being a beautiful sun shiny day in the end anyway – I was actually kicking myself I didn’t take a hat. Thank fully the wonderful Mr. Spittoon let me borrow his so my very pale skin didn’t get burnt at the first sight of the sun!

So what were this years’ highlights??

The Club Lounge

As soon as we entered the gates and received our lovely big Plumm tasting glass (which many people were very jealous of when we were going round the exhibitors to taste!) we headed straight to the exclusive Club Lounge area to check it out. Our tickets entitled us to 2 free glasses of wine in the Lounge so we thought since it was 11:30am it was definitely a good time to get stuck into our first glass. Both Mr. Spittoon and I thought a glass of the Sittella Sparkling Chenin Blanc would be a great way to ease into the day!

The lovely ladies serving us in the lounge explained the gourmet BBQ lunch (also included in the ticket) would be served up at 1:30pm so we made sure after we attended the free wine masterclass at 12:45pm on sparkling wines (see my notes below on this) that we’d head back for our second glass of wine and some lunch.

For our second glass, I went for the Talisman 2015 Riesling which went down beautifully and Mr. Spittoon went for the Cowaramup Reserve 2014 SSB – he loved it.

The food was all pretty damn good in the Club Lounge, my particular favourites were the:

• Hawaiian chicken with lime skewers
• Big red pulled pork, piccalilli and apple slaw brioche sliders
• Buckwheat soba noodles with roasted broccoli, snow pea, edamame and soy sauce
• Shark Bay salt and pepper prawns

All up we both really enjoyed having access to the Club Lounge, it made it a very relaxing day knowing we could sneak away to the lounge at any point and time. It was definitely a good retreat when the crowds started amping up later in the day.

The Wine Theatre

I love the wine theatre classes as they are free for anyone attending the event. I always try some new wines and learn something new too! This year, like 2015, the classes were run by the Wine Education Centre of WA.

The session we went to was the Sparkling Styles. We tried 4 sparklings from WA – all very different from one another which was great. My only qualm with the session was a few rude people who chatted with their friends the whole way through the class and didn’t listen to a thing the guy on the mic was saying. I was glad to see the next session on rose wines was a lot quieter when we walked past later in the day.

The Wines!

How can the wines not be a highlight – we managed to try some absolute stunners from a few new producers we haven’t yet come across before and we also tried some new vintages from some old favourites. Here are some of my winey highlights for this years event:

I really enjoyed meeting the guys from Grace Farm and trying through their range, the 2015 Chardonnay is an absolute beauty and their 2012 Reserve Cab made my taste buds jump for joy.

It was great to bump into Streicker again, I first came across these guys at Cellar Door in the City a few months ago. We felt privileged to try their brand new bubbles – a Blanc de Blanc style (made only of Chardonnay) which was tasting absolutely beautiful. They also have recently released their 2016 Rose – a lovely dry, elegant style. And last but not least their 2013 Syrah would be one of my favourites, if not my favourite red from the festival. I loved all the fresh protea flowers at their stall (especially that gorgeous handmade wreath!) and after making mention of them to the lovely lady taking us through our tasting, she explained that Streicker also have a protea farm down in Yallingup. But what’s even cooler is that they had a whole lot of protea there so you could make your own little posy to take it home – for free!

It was also great to run into Silverstream at the festival. As always it’s fantastic bumping into these guys as they have some amazing wines. And these guys picked up a trophy at last nights WA Wine Show Awards Dinner for their Riesling – well done guys!

Next door was Clownfish and Cowaramup wines – the 2012 Reserve Chardonnay is the bomb! If you like your big, bold Chardy’s like me, then this one is a must try.

It would have been rude not to stop in and see Faber Vineyard from the Swan Valley – plus you definitely couldn’t miss owner and winemaker, John in his fluorescent yellow shirt! It was great to try the newly released 2015 Scarp – this is a really interesting white blend made from Verdelho, Chenin Blanc and Semillon.

Moojelup Farm was another new one for us – in the Wine Theatre session we tried their Sparkling Shiraz which went down nicely. When we popped over to their stall for a tasting it was the 2015 Vermentino which stole the show for me.

By mid afternoon it was definitely rose weather – so it was great to come across The Blackwood ‘Rushy Creek’ 2016 Rose from the Blackwood Valley. And it was interesting to see House of Cards serving up Frosé (frozen rosé) – we didn’t try any as the line was huge but it looked pretty darn good!

We also stopped by the De Bortoli stand to have a sip of their Prosecco and yes I totally asked if I could steal a cap for my Wearing Memories ring!

Last but not least we stopped by the Bunn Wines stand. We tried both the 2012 Shiraz and 2012 Cabernet Sauvignon, it was the latter which stole the show for me and definitely one I’d be purchasing!

I wish I had the stamina and time to get around all the stalls and try the 200 odd wines which were at this years’ festival as I know I only scratched the surface with what I came across above.

Did you go to UnWined this weekend? If so, what were your highlights? Leave a comment below and let us know!

PS: Check out more photos in my UnWined 2016 Facebook album here