Australian Wine Companion Online  Add/Read Comments

Italy has the Gambero Rosso, Spain the Peñín Guide and France the Guide Hachette - all written with authority and acclaimed as the best for impartial coverage. For Australia it has to be the James Halliday Wine Companion (2008 edition about to be released).

For more than 15 years James Halliday has compiled detailed tasting notes on thousands of Australian wines annually, each with vintage-specific ratings and advice on optimal drinking, as well as each wine's closure, alcohol content and price, creating a vast archive of invaluable information on Australian wines and wineries.

For the first time, this information is now available online via winecompanion online, a comprehensive resource with information on Australian wines and wineries spanning the past 15 years.

Members of winecompanion.com.au can login and access hundreds of detailed tasting notes and ratings for wines by James. Non-members also have plenty to access, including information on the best wines and wineries for 2008, Australian wine industry information and details on every winery in current operation in Australia. The features of the site include:

easy access to the 37 000+ tasting notes and ratings for members
options to search via wine label, region, rating or variety
search results that allow the user to view multiple tasting notes on the same page
An interactive map, facilitating the users' search for wineries via state, region or winery keyword"