Yearly Archives: 2006

Wine review — Wynns, Framingham & Brookland Valey

22 January 2006Wine reviewChris Shanahan

Wynns Coonawarra Estate Cabernet Sauvignon 2002 $21 to $30
City Supa Barn last weekend offered a sky-high stack of Wynns 2002 at $20.99 – a bargain price for this satisfying, long-cellaring Coonawarra classic. It was one of my twelve gold-medal rated vintages at a recent tasting of all the Wynns cabernets back to the 1954 vintage. 2002 was a mixed vintage in Coonawarra as the cool conditions that favoured warmer areas further north caused some ripening problems and resultant greenish flavours. You won’t find these in Wynns, however. Low yields and careful fruit selection produced a particularly aromatic and concentrated cabernet with crystal clear varietal definition, good mid-palate richness, firm structure and velvet smooth tannins. It’s a joy to savour. And it’s built to last.

Framingham Marlborough Sauvignon Blanc 2005 $17 to $20
Judging at the New Zealand Top 100 Wine Show last year revealed the great superiority over 2004 of the 2005 sauvignon blancs. Not surprisingly at Marlborough’s southern latitude, vintage variation is quite marked. But when nature smiles, Marlborough makes fabulously fruity, distinctive whites across an increasing spectrum of subtly different styles. Using fruit from various points within the Wairau Valley (one of the two major valleys of Marlborough – the other is the Awatere Valley to the south), Framingham combines the herbaceous, in-your-face pungency of the cooler sites with the fuller, more tropical warm-site characters. The result is pure Marlborough refreshment.

Brookland Valley Estate Margaret River Reserve Cabernet Sauvignon 2001 about $60
If cabernet has a bad name in Australia at present, blame the proliferation of green and weedy wines from areas not suited to the variety. To restore your faith in the glory of this great grape, try the modestly priced Wynns wine above. Or splash out on this beautiful wine from Hardy’s Brookland Valley Estate, Margaret River. This is complete cabernet from the blackcurrant/black olive fruit aroma and flavour to the firm, tight, tannic structure to the powerful but not fat palate. At five years’ age it’s still youthful and fresh but and has years, if not decades, of development ahead.

How the Casella family built the Yellowtail brand

22 January 2006People, WineChris Shanahan

An air picture of Casella’s Yellowtail winemaking facilities shows rows of stainless steel tanks, each holding 1.14 million litres of wine! And there’ll soon be 68 of them.

Gigantic as they seem, they’ll hold less than half of the 200million litres of wine stored at this site – home to a brand launched in the USA in 2001.

Just five years later, it’s the number one imported wine in the world’s biggest wine market; the number one Australian wine in that market; and the fastest growing imported wine in US history – with annual sales projected by the owners at 8.5 million cases in the US this year and over 10 million globally.

To feed that demand, the winery will this year process 142 thousand tonnes of grapes (about 10.7 million dozen bottles) and supplement production by purchasing bulk wine.

Who is it? No, not any of the big four: Foster’s, Hardy’s, Orlando-Wyndham or McGuigan-Simeon — but Casella Wines of Griffith, owner of the extraordinary Yellowtail brand.

Yellowtail came from nowhere, overtook everyone and continues to dazzle the wine world as it achieves greater volume in five years than Jacob’s Creek, Australia’s other huge global wine brand, did in thirty.

Managing Director, John Casella, says, “I would’ve been happy with a fifteen thousand tonne winery and 100 thousand case brand”. But he and the family fulfilled the unanticipated and explosive American demand, maintained family control and leveraged the American success to launch Yellowtail domestically and in other export markets.

Casella is unrecognisable from the business founded by John’s parents, Philippo and Maria, in the 1960s. More remarkably, it’s unrecognisable from the business that exported its first wines to the USA, under the Carramar Estate label, in 1998.

Says John, “we crushed 200 tonnes in 1993 and 20,000 tonnes in 2001”.

By 2001, John perceived more scope for growth in exports than in the crowded domestic market. As part of a planned export push, in 2000 he purchased the Yellowtail brand name and distinctive packaging from Adelaide designer, Barbara Harkness.

However, with the Yellowtail due for launch in the US in June, 2001 and the first year’s sales projected at 50 thousand cases, Casella sold much of the 2001 production into the bulk market.

Just thirteen months later US exports passed the one million case mark. But there couldn’t have been a better time to misjudge sales! Rosemount’s exit from the Australian bulk wine market after its takeover by Southcorp, meant easy availability and low prices for bulk wine.

John attributes that early US success partly to the low Aussie dollar at the time but principally to the appealing nature of the wine and an outstanding partnership with long established US distributor, W.J. Deutsch & Sons.

Such conspicuous success in the US drove interest in other markets. Yellowtail is now growing in the UK, number one Aussie import in the large Canadian and emerging Japanese markets respectively, and achieved sales of 130 thousand cases in the year following its domestic release in 2003 – with compound growth since of 30-40 per cent.

Continued extension of the Yellowtail range (there’s a new riesling and other varieties in the pipeline) and the successful launch (250 thousand cases) of the Yellowtail Reserve range in the US ($US11 a bottle versus $US 6 for the standard wines) suggest further growth for this family business.

Although a weak dollar combined with low bulk-wine and grape prices helped in establishing Yellowtail, John Casella believes that the brand’s future remains bright. It continued to grow as the Aussie dollar appreciated. And with growing numbers of long-term grape contracts, John says the brand is not reliant on the unsustainable prices of recent years.

Wine review — Krinklewood, Gosset Champagne & Margan

15 January 2006Wine reviewChris Shanahan

Krinklewood Vineyard Hunter Valley Chardonnay 2003 $25
This is a delicious example of how top-notch grapes and sensitive winemaking produce a first-class wine that’s truly expressive of the variety and region. Suzanne and Rod Windrim grew the fruit on their biodynamic Krinklewood vineyard at Broke in the lower Hunter Valley; Jim Chatto made the wine at Monarch Winery. It’s a full but delicate chardonnay of striking varietal purity and stunning freshness — enhanced by a subtle nutty flavour and textural richness derived from fermentation and maturation on lees in barrel. It’s screw cap sealed and at three years combines a mature integration of fruit and barrel flavours with drink-me-now vivacity. Available through Candamber, Vintage Cellars or phone 02 9969 1311.

Gosset Brut Excellence Champagne NV $60
The Ginger Room at old parliament house offers Gosset at $15 by the glass – a delightful way to rediscover Champagne from this great, but not widely distributed, old Ay-based producer. Having been stung by a tricked-up NV from one of the major producers at Christmas it was a delight to taste a beautifully fresh example of the real thing, based on the classic rich but delicate blend of chardonnay, pinot noir and pinot meunier from top vineyards. Distributor David Burkitt says it’s available at Georges Liquor Stable and Benchmark as well as at The Ginger Room.

Margan Hunter Valley Semillon 2005 $18
Andrew Margan sources this from a low-yielding Broke vineyard planted by Lindemans in about 1970. It’s notably more fragrant than the semillons of nearby Pokolbin and a tad fuller on the palate, too. But it has similar, taut acid backbone, and lemon-like varietal flavour. The combination of delicate, lemony fruit, low alcohol (about 11 per cent) and bracing acidity is at odds with the prevailing Aussie ‘fruit bomb’ style. A pleasant tartness in the finish adds to its appeal with food. And, of course, it has the ability to age for many years, even decades, given correct storage. Cellar door phone number is 02 6574 7216.

King Valley overview

15 January 2006People, WineChris Shanahan

Victoria’s King Valley stretches northwards from the sub-Alpine country around Whitlands, at a chilly 800 metres above sea level, gradually descending and comparatively narrow, before fanning out over the hot Oxley plains around Milawa at around 170 metres.

Growing conditions vary greatly in this thirty kilometre long valley. Varying altitudes, rainfall, latitudes, soils and aspects produce a correspondingly wide spectrum of grape and wine flavours.

The mean January temperature at Milawa in the north is 22 degrees Celsius; in the south at Whitlands it’s just 19 degrees. Grapes ripen in early March at Milawa but not until late April at Whitlands.

In short the area produces everything from thumping big, alcoholic fortifieds and reds, to delicate sparkling and white wines.

While the Valley’s winemaking began in the late nineteenth century, most activity remained at the warmer northern end around Milawa until the 1970s.

Milawa owes its prominence on the winemaking map to Brown Bros whose presence, from 1889, sustained the industry in the region and, ultimately, sparked the southward vineyard expansions into the higher, cooler southern end of the valley.

The spread south and upward towards Whitfield, Myrrhee, Whitlands and Cheshunt was driven by growing demand for high-quality table wines. Brown Bros led the way, developing its own high altitude Whitlands vineyard and encouraging local landowners to diversify into grapes.

The first independents — Guy Darling and John Leviny — established vines between Moyhu and Whitfield in the higher, cooler northern sector in 1970. Both sold grapes to Brown Brothers. Indeed, older readers may recall Guy Darling’s Whitfield vineyard name – Koombahla — appearing on Brown Bros labels in the late seventies and eighties, before Darling established his own brand.

During the eighties and nineties, other landowners, including several Italian descended tobacco growers, commenced growing grapes, originally to sell to Brown Brothers or other winemakers.

However, during the recession of the early nineties Brown Brothers reduced its grape intake. This shock, Arnie Pizzini once told me, was the catalyst that forced himself and other growers to adopt a broader, more independent approach to marketing their product.

During the late nineties, driven partly by the export boom, the numbers of independent growers increased, as did the number converting all or part of their production into branded product.

The late nineties, too, saw the arrival of the large independent makers De Bortoli and Miranda, both Griffith based and both Italian descended.

By this time the Valley had acquired a distinctively Italian flavour as the Corsini, Pizzini, Cavedon, Dal Zotto and other families planted indigenous Italian varietals, including sangiovese, arneis, barbera, marzemino, prosecco, barbera, nebbiolo, dolcetto, primitivo (aka, in California and Australia, zinfandel) and verduzzo.

These joined the usual mix of French and German varieties plus a sprinkling from Spain (tempranillo and verdejo), Russia (saperavi) and France’s little known petit manseng and increasingly popular pinot gris.

This diversity of landscapes, climates, grape varieties, growers and makers means that the King Valley gives wine drinkers an exceptional range of taste sensations – subtly different in the case of the mainstream varieties like chardonnay and shiraz but totally removed from our usual fare when we encounter sangiovese, nebbiolo, barbera, verduzzo and the like.

In this instance the principal driver of difference was the Italian connection – the sons and daughters of post-war immigrants. I’ll report back on what this Italian influence offers after a visit to the Valley in a few weeks.

Wine review — Leasingham Bastion, Brookland Valley & Jim Barry

8 January 2006Wine reviewChris Shanahan

Leasingham Bastion Clare Valley Riesling 2005, Cabernet Sauvignon 2003 $10 to $14
What a terrific couple of new releases from Leasingham, the Clare Valley arm of Hardy Wine Company. The white delivers the freshness, delicacy and vitality of Clare riesling with that extra fruit power of the excellent 2005 vintage. It’s just perfect for the remaining warm months. Bastion Cabernet 2003 offers rich, regional chocolaty, minty varietal aromas backed by generous, mouthfilling flavours and the variety’s firm, satisfying tannins. Both of these regional specialties offer good value at $14 but the inevitable specials at $10 to $11 put them in bargain territory – another benefit of the intensely competitive environment.

Brookland Valley Reserve Margaret River Chardonnay 2003 $60-$65
I wonder why this beautiful wine, from the Western edge of the Hardy empire, is priced slightly higher than the company’s flagship Eileen Hardy Chardonnay? That anomaly aside, Brookland Reserve is one to savour drop by drop: the colour, aroma and flavour all show youthful, slow-evolving wine of exceptional dimension – a truly outstanding example of first class fruit warranting wild-yeast, barrel-fermentation and maturation. What might be intrusive inputs on lesser fruit, in this instance projects chardonnay at its opulent, just-one-more-sip best. And it has the structure to evolve with further cellaring.

Jim Barry The McRae Wood Clare Valley Shiraz 2002 $39.95
The unusually cool 2002 vintage produced wines of great concentration and sometimes elegance in South Australia’s warmer regions. While the term ‘elegance’ doesn’t quite fit this opulent 15.5 per cent alcohol red, the benign vintage conditions probably account for the impressive, sweet lift to the aroma and enormously concentrated palate. Although the fashion pendulum is swinging slowly but decisively towards more graceful, supple styles, there’s still widespread support for robust, traditional reds – especially when, like McRae Wood, they combine generosity of fruit with soft, juicy, easy-on-the-gums tannins. It’s a style that comes into its own with the onset of cold weather.

Wynns to re-launch John Riddoch Cabernet and Michael Shiraz

8 January 2006WineChris Shanahan

After a half-decade absence, Wynns Coonawarra flagship reds are to be re-launched in March.

Once headline grabbers and eagerly sought by collectors, Wynns John Riddoch Cabernet Sauvignon and Wynns Michael Shiraz fizzled and faded at the height of the red-wine boom, giving up the game to a flood of new, mostly unknown $50 to $100 hopefuls.

Management’s response was to terminate production of Michael and John Riddoch after the 1998 and 1999 vintages respectively.

However, the stock problem proved intractable and in 2001, following parent company Southcorp’s acquisition of Rosemount, new management slashed the wholesale price and offered rebates to retailers sitting on large back-vintage stocks. The retail price fell from around $100 a bottle to $50 and sales resumed.

These were dark days for a great brand. However, over in Coonawarra, winemaker Sue Hodder and vineyard manager Allen Jenkins continued working on vineyard rejuvenation projects and a fine-tuning of winemaking techniques.

Though production of John Riddoch and Michael had stopped, individual components continued to be made and kept separate — to learn more of progress in the vineyards – prior to blending into the standard Wynns cabernet and shiraz.

y this time, too, Sue and the winemaking team had developed a new vision for the flagship reds, based partly on observations of older vintages. In 1997 a tasting of Wynns Shirazes, embracing the 1953 to 1995 vintages, revealed the lovely elegance and keeping ability of the earliest vintages – wines notably lower in alcohol and oak than the modern wines, especially Michael.

The soon-to-be-released Wynns Michael Shiraz 2003 and John Riddoch Cabernet Sauvignon 2003, tasted in Coonawarra last October, crystallise that vision.

At the Coonawarra tasting, winemaker Sarah Pidgeon emphasised that both came largely from the same old vineyards in Coonawarra but that rejuvenation of the vineyards had resulted in the same ‘dense, dark fruit character but more supple tannins’.

Combine this with slightly earlier picking, hand harvesting of some components and a reduction of the proportion of new oak used in maturation and we have Wynns flagships that are big on elegant Coonawarra fruit yet more velvety and supple in structure than earlier vintages.

While these are earlier to love as young wines than most of the earlier wines, I believe they still have the essential fruit concentration and tannin structure to evolve with long-term cellaring. The low-oak, lower-alcohol wines of the fifties confirm the staying power of this fruit.

This was demonstrated yet again in 2004 with a tasting of all the cabernets from 1954 to 2004.

That tasting and other experiences with the more burly John Riddoch and Michael vintages revealed, too, that the essential elegance of the Coonawarra fruit tended to prevail over time – but that the tannins and oak ought, in general, to be more refined – as they are in the forthcoming 2003’s.

With continuing work on Wynns great old vineyards and in the winery, Sue and the team are on track to produce the truly great, long-lived elegant reds that Coonawarra has, to date, thrown up only occasionally — but often enough to know what can be achieved.

Wines of the calibre of Michael Shiraz 1955 and John Riddoch 1982 remain as unforgettable models. I have no doubt that over time these will be equalled and surpassed by Wynns. With the right commitment from Foster’s, the new owner of Wynns, Coonawarra could lead Australia into the super premium segments of the world markets.

Wine review — Shelmerdine, Rolling & Redden Bridge

1 January 2006Wine reviewChris Shanahan

Shelmerdine Yarra Valley Pinot Noir 2004 $24-$26
This was the Chateau Shanahan preferred wine of three mid-$20’s 2004 Yarra Valley pinots tasted recently. St Huberts 2004, while pleasant, captured little of pinot’s magic; Giant Steps 2004 presented the dark-berry fruit, power and gaminess of the variety – a very, very good wine on a quality par with the Shelmerdine wine — which edged ahead on a style preference. A tad paler in colour than Giant Steps, Shelmerdine expressed some of pinot’s elusive, seductive perfume, plush fruit flavour and fine acid/tannin backbone. The intensity of fruit flavour and persistent tannins suggest a made-in-the-vineyard approach. Winery telephone number is 03 5433 5188

Rolling Central Ranges Chardonnay 2005 ($15), Climbing Orange Chardonnay 2005 ($20)
Former Rosemount winemaker Philip Shaw sources these lovely wines from the ‘rolling’ hills below 600 metres in the Central Ranges and from the adjoining ‘climbing’ slopes above 600 metres within the Orange appellation. The first is a pure, zesty, expression of chardonnay – strongly flavoured but deliciously crisp and dry. The second introduces the finer fruit character of the higher altitude subtly enhanced in texture, aroma and flavour by barrel fermentation and maturation. Both are polished, subtle, vivacious wines with capacity to evolve with age. Climbing, in particular, should reward a three-year rest in the cellar.
Redden Bridge Wrattonbully The Crossing Cabernet Sauvignon 2002 & Gully Shiraz 2002, both about $30
These are two outstanding single-vineyard wines produced by Greg Koch, a leading grower from Wrattonbully, the large newish wine-region abutting Padthaway to the north and Coonawarra to the South. I’ve tasted the wines during judging at the Limestone Coast Show, with Greg on his own turf and more recently in Canberra. They’ve passed the test every time. The cabernet sauvignon is textbook varietal, with a rare mid-palate richness and a very slight leafy – but not green — character. The shiraz is beautiful – ripe, generous and spicy with soft, fine tannin structure. And the trophy-winning 2003 is even better. Distributed by Winetrust Estates, phone 02 9949 9250

2005 review and a look ahead

1 January 2006WineChris Shanahan

2005 may be seen as a turning point for the Australian wine industry – the year when surplus production, created by an export induced vine planting spree a decade earlier, finally began to take its toll on winemakers and grape growers while providing drinkers with a cornucopia of low priced wine.

The squeeze on margins, while delivering lower retail prices, severely curtailed rewards to wineries, setting back most of those listed on the Australian Stock Exchange, and took an even greater toll on grape growers – most conspicuously in recent weeks those with contracts cancelled by McGuigan Simeon Wines.

With the wine surplus likely to drag on for another few years, the good times for drinkers should continue as the industry adjusts through growing export demand, domestic discounting, mergers, rationalisation of brands and winery ownership, grafting to varieties more in demand and, almost certainly, forced sales and liquidations.

The year began auspiciously with Foster’s bid for Southcorp – owner of Penfolds, Wynns Coonawarra Estate, Lindemans, Rosemount Estate, Leo Buring, Rouge Homme, Seaview and other familiar wine brands.

Ultimately the bid succeeded and the merging of the two businesses proceeds as the managers bring the Southcorp brands, vineyards, wineries, marketing, accounting, etc. under one roof with Yellowglen, Wolf Blass, Mildara, Ingoldby and others.

In 2006 and beyond investors will see whether or not the promised synergies and savings flow to the bottom line. And wine lovers, ever nervous of ownership changes, will see if some of Australia’s greatest wine brands – built on complex grape-growing and winemaking cultures — continue to deliver.

In other words, will Wynns Coonawarra still taste like Wynns Coonawarra? Will Penfolds still taste like Penfolds?

As an outsider looking in, the first signs are that the grape growing/winemaking cultures behind the prestige brands will survive in the short term.

Of more concern, though, is whether or not the marketing and marketing communication can be brought up to speed with the production/cultural side of these icon brands.

In my opinion, the Foster’s mass brands like Yellowglen bubbly have been effectively marketed. But the recruitment of fast-moving-consumer-goods professionals doesn’t seem to have paid off so well for the premium brands. Why? I think it’s because of a lack of understanding what makes these wines unique. And it shows in the communication.

This presents a huge challenge for the industry. If the aim is to introduce drinkers at home and abroad to our great inter-regional blends and increasingly good and diverse single region specialties, then the big companies must lead.

And their marketers must understand and communicate the regional, varietal and winemaking values that make the wine what it is. This is the core of any premium wine brand – flavour and character, not contrivance, not what a focus group thinks.

Of course, brand building requires a long-term commitment. And it’s easy to be distracted from that goal when surplus and slashed margins eat away at the rewards.

While the near chaos and deep discounting seen in 2005 appear set to continue for a few years, when the dust settles it’ll be the wines that mean something that survive and attract our dollar.

The best small makers tend to focus on what’s special about their region and vineyard and lead drinkers to it. Let’s hope for the sake of the vast majority of drinkers reliant on bigger companies that the innovation and leadership that’ve built our world-leading industry don’t give way to bureaucratic timidity and me-tooism.