Yellow Tail Chardonnay 2006
Simply awful tasting wine. It tasted like it was altered. I picked up the taste of clove. We threw the contents of the bottle out. This is most surprising as Yellow Tail has been an ok wine for us in the past. Yellow Tail is made in Australia.
My wife and I took a honeymoon cruse on a cruise line that offered French wine with just about every dinner. Before, during and after that cruise just about every French wine we had was disappointing due to the impression that the wines were watered down. That cruise really created the impression we now have about European wines. At other times drinking Italian wines, for me, have had the same impression, anemic flavor. I have suspected that some French vintners, have allegedly stretched their purse strings by being allowed to bottle more through the addition of water to their wine vats. It seems inconceivable to me that in one continent the wines could be so lacking in flavor. Could it be that the more expensive wines are just not watered down? In my opinion, it seems that just about every other continent can offer robust flavors except Europe. We think South Africa, South America, Australia, and New Zeland can pretty much stand up, and even surpass, California wines. We use California wines as a bench mark to judge any other wines because we live in California.
I do hope that no United States winery would modify their wines with any watering down process, chemicals or additives. My wife thinks that air might have reached the wine leading to the altered taste. I am not so sure.