A frivolous, fizzy, fruity brunch wine from Barossa Valley to cool a hot Saturday afternoon

Did you know that there is a genre of wines know as “brunch wine”?  Neither did we, until we bought this bottle of 2013 Frivola by St Hallett Winery, Barossa Valley, Australia.

We bought the wine from Fairprice Finest, which we had discovered to be a good place to buy reasonably priced wine in Singapore.  They occasionally stock some very decent wine at discounted prices.  Faced with a wide array of unfamiliar wines to experiment with, we just be shallow and go for the most attractive bottle.  This time, we decided on this slender bottle of peach-coloured wine called Frivola.

It was on sale at a discounted price of $19.  Quite unusually for an Australian wine, the grape varietal was not indicated on the label.  Only when we visited the St Hallett website did we learn that it was made from the Gewürztraminer grape. We also learnt that it was a style of wine which “is sometimes known as “brunch” wine because it’s a great partner to dishes such as bacon and eggs, smoked salmon or a potato hashstack” and that Frivola means frivolous in Italian!

We had the Frivola over some snacks that we bought from the bakery.  The taste of this frivolous wine was slightly sweet and fizzy. It has a pleasant fruity taste. The low 7% alcohol content made it such an easy-going drink.  It was bursting with tropical taste of lychee, guava, red apples and ripe peach. No, we could not taste all that detail, this was the description on a label at the back.

It is common to have a fizzy drink at brunch like Champagne or a Prosecco to bring up the level of festivity.  The fizz level of Frivola is much lower. The bubbles are considerably less and run out 15 minutes after the bottle is opened.  It is less festive that than the other bubbly options but those who prefer to have less gas and some sweetness in the morning  might prefer this sort of “brunch wine”.

For us, we would prefer a more traditional bubbly and dry drink for brunch. But the $19 Frivola by St Hallett of Barossa Valley was nevertheless a nice light drink to drive away the heat on a hot Saturday afternoon.

Cheers!