Fruit Wine Celebration

19th December, 2009

So we don’t have a grape wine industry in the tropics! That hasn’t prevented some local enthusiasts from making wine from our luscious tropical fruits such as Lychee, mango, passionfruit, papaya and jaboticaba; to name a few. So much so, that this is the largest commercial fruit wine industry region in Australia.

What is interesting is that when you taste a grape wine such as Sauvignon Blanc; you can often taste the characteristic tropical flavours of pineapple, guava and passionfruit. When tasting fruit wine it’s a whole new adventure where these flavours are predominant rather than secondary, yet they still provide the same complexities of grapes. The challenge is to experiment. So go ahead and give our local fruit wines a try. Delicious by themselves - refreshing as a summer sprizter.

From fruit wine there has been an emergence of fruit liqueurs which are proving very popular. Where the big beverage companies produce melon, lychee, passion and mango liqueurs, we have the authentic product. Liqueurs taste great simply with ice, with mixer (soda) or as part of a cocktail ingredient. Try the De bruey’s Boutique Wineries Tropical Temptation (reminiscent of an Irish cream), that took out this years trophy for Best Liqueur at the Australian Fruit Wine Awards, or their Coffee Elixir or Strawberry Temptation. Mt Uncle has their Elixier de Muse Banana, Sanguis Mulberry and Davidson Plum Liqueur as well as Lemon & Lime Cello’s and Sexy Cat Marshmallow.

All these fruit wines and liqueurs make great Christmas gifts if you don’t drink them yourself.