Australia's best wines

The best fortified wines in Australia

By The Tasting Team

The All Saints Estate Museum Muscadelle NV has been named the best fortified wine in Australia.

The Halliday Wine Companion Awards celebrate the top wines in Australia – as chosen by our esteemed wine critics who spend the year tasting and reviewing wine from across the country. Below, you'll find Australia's best fortified wines, along with the ratings awarded by the Tasting Team. Members can also click through for each fortified wine's detailed review.

Often this flight is poured and tasted towards the pointy end of the annual awards judging, in part due to the nature of the wines, but also for how they lift the spirits of the Tasting Team. It is a bracket of immense joy, for the senses, and also for the provenance, history and supreme quality of the wines. Congratulations to All Saints Estate on its third consecutive win in this category.

 

2026 Fortified of the Year

All Saints Estate Museum Muscadelle NV, Rutherglen

100 points | Price when tasted $1300

 

The best wines in Australia

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The stuff of dreams or, to be precise, history. With base wines reaching back 100-plus years, this offers a rare and privileged taste of extraordinary age, complexity and sheer hedonistic pleasure. Dark olive and walnut hues introduce a commanding, luscious fortified in dried fruits, caramel toffee, honey, chocolate praline, orange peel and a lasting, enticing rancio nuttiness. The art of the blender is on show, combining deep-set intensity of flavour with a remarkably clean, neutral spirit freshness. A few years back the winemaker decided to increase the aged component, putting stress on aged stocks of muscadelle. For that, we thank him. This is indeed special. 375ml. – Jeni Port

Learn more about fortified wine.

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The 2026 Halliday Wine Companion is available now. Secure your copy of Australia's most comprehensive wine guide at all good bookstores, or you can buy it directly from the Halliday website.

This is an edited extract from the 2026 Halliday Wine Companion, with reviews by Dave Brookes, Jane Faulkner, Jeni Port, Katrina Butler, Marcus Ellis, Mike Bennie, Philip Rich, Shanteh Wale and Toni Paterson MW. Cover art by James Coe.


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