Q&A: Sue Hodder

"I'm an agriculture person and I studied agriculture science. I like soil, the climate and growing things. Then I moved from grape growing into winemaking. Alice Springs, where I grew up, is not a wine area, but it's certainly in the country."

"It depends on the time of year. When the vintage is on and the grapes are coming in, we go to the vineyards early in the morning and taste the grapes. And then come back to the winery to taste the parcels that are fermenting and decide whether they need to be pressed. Then we organise some barrels for the wine to go into, and we make plans for the next lot of picking and just keep an eye on the quality. Sometimes we need to see some visitors at the winery - Coonawarra is a small town so if people come all this way we need to greet them. And then we do some blending and analysing the wine, and get the labels ready for bottling. It can be a very busy day."

"I like both. In the vineyard I like to see the impact of the season on the vines and try and anticipate the style of wine that's going to be made from a given year. In the winery I like to taste the wine and work out how it could be subtly better or what it is that has brought that wine to what it is."

"The wine has a more refined style now due to the subtle changes that we've done. Technology has been useful, but it's really more philosophical. Technology is a tool but really you still have to taste everything and love it and understand it. You have to have the passion."

"Through a lot of tasting and loving wine and just understanding and trying to think about what it is about its taste that has brought it to this point; like the vineyard - is it a hot or cold year? - or the [type of] barrel and so on. I don't like beer, spirits or anything else. I do love sake though. I also love champagne, white burgundies and a lot from France. The champagne I like is Salon et Delamotte. I also like Chateau Latour and a Spanish winery called Vega Sicilia."

"If someone says to me that a cup of tea is hot, I won't have any. I'll just wait because I burn my mouth easily. And we have to look after our teeth. We have a lot of different wines and the young ones are highly coloured. You can end up with black teeth. We have something like a tooth mousse and you put some on before your start a tasting. It creates a protective layer, like a sun block I suppose."