The Mudgee wine region will showcase its top drops and fine food in Sydney over the next five weeks during The Sydney Morning Herald’s NSW Wine Festival. The month long celebration starts with Sydney Cellar Door, the city’s biggest outdoor wine festival, over the weekend of February 25-26. This is followed by a list of regional wine dinners. Mudgee winery Logan Wines has been a major partner of NSW Wine Festival for the past five years and winemaker Peter Logan said it was a great initiative, reports the Mudgee Guardian.

Some new houses will be allowed on vacant rural land under changes announced to McLaren Vale protection legislation. Planning Minister John Rau announced last week he would make changes to the interim Development Plan Amendment, introduced to protect the region from non-complying development until the McLaren Vale Protection Bill is passed. Under the current DPA, residential development in rural areas is generally prohibited across about 40,000ha from Sellicks Beach to Cherry Gardens, reports Southern Times Messenger.

It’s that time of year again – the countdown for this year’s Margaret River Wine Festival. And Dunsborough will again host the prominent Vintage Festival, which is the pinnacle event of the four-day festival. For the second successive year Palmer Wines will be the venue for the Vintage Festival, on April 14. The Vintage Festival is a relaxed wine and gourmet food tasting event that allows guests to sample up to 300 new release and back vintage wines from an estimated 40 wineries as they enjoy live music and entertainment at Palmers, reports the Busselton Mail.

Tulloch Wines will maintain its strong commitment to Verdelho, which general manager Christina Tulloch says will definitely be the Hunter Valley’s standout variety this vintage. Tulloch told The Shout that her family is the largest producer of Verdelho in NSW, and with good reason. “Our commitment to it remains really strong because consumers love it,” she said. “Whether or not it gets awards at wine shows or is given credence by the wine critics, consumers really enjoy it, and to us that’s important – giving people what they want to drink.”

They are based in our far-flung corners, dealing with the wildest and harshest of climates to grow and make wines that most city slickers will never see. But bring on the Cellar Door Wine Festival at the Adelaide Convention Centre (February 24-26) and a rare opportunity beckons. Many of our widest spread winemakers will come to town, showing off the liquid gems of their regions, writes News Limited’s national wine writer Tony Love.

They may be rivals on the ground and in the air, but when it comes to knowing a good wine it seems some of the world’s best airlines are in agreement on which wine to serve their passengers. A number of The Mud House Group’s internationally honoured vintages have been selected for in-flight dining on several prestigious airlines for Asia Pacific routes and as far afield as Denmark, Norway and Sweden, reports Voxy News.

Hawkshead Pinot Gris 2011 and Hawkshead Riesling 2011 have both been awarded five stars in the annual aromatics tasting in Cuisine magazine’s latest issue. The Pinot Gris from Hawkshead’s single vineyard Lark Block at Gibbston, Central Otago, was also rated the second best wine overall from 167 Pinot Gris tasted. Wine writer and associate judge on the Cuisine panel, John Saker, described the Pinot Gris as “all purity and youthful exuberance, splashing over the taste buds with the freshness of a mountain stream”, reports Voxy News.

The Riverina’s largest winemaker, De Bortoli, says this is one of the best quality vintages in 20 years. Darren de Bortoli, managing director of the company, says a third of the grapes have been harvested so far. He says while the quantity is down, the flavour is among the best he’s tasted, reports ABC Rural.

Pianist Arthur Rubinstein was fond of telling the story of the wine connoisseur who once invited the composer Johannes Brahms to dinner: “This is the Brahms of my cellar,” said the collector to his guests, filling the master’s glass from a dusty bottle. Brahms looked at the colour of the wine, smelled it and finally took a taste. “Hmmm,” he said after putting down the glass. “Better bring your Beethoven.” That’s the trouble with old wines. Even if kept in temperature- and humidity-controlled conditions in a million-dollar cellar: they can go bad, oxidise or simply not taste very good after years of ageing, reports the Canberra Times.

The EU’s Standing Committee on Organic Farming (SCOF) has agreed new rules for organic wine that it claims will raise its profile within the bloc and worldwide. It’s a move welcomed by a prominent group representing organic producers, despite their warning about ‘challenging’ new sulfite reduction targets,reports Beverage Daily.