Yearly Archives: 2010

When wines push our buttons

Wine

YouTube could be onto something. They revamped their website recently, paring the five-star user-rating system back to a stark “like/dislike” choice for content. It seems that under the old system most voting viewers hit the five star button, only a handful voted one star and just about no one voted in between. Overwhelmingly, viewers liked or disliked what they saw. Is it any different for wine drinkers? Do we simply like or dislike wines? Should reviewers follow YouTube to a thumbs-up or thumbs-down approach?

Hugh Johnson, one of the world’s most popular wine writers – and an admitted “relativist” – might be a supporter. After judging at the Royal Sydney Wine Show some years back he commented, “I judge wine by loving it or hating it and there’s not much in between. I love vitality in a wine, the sort of wine where one bottle is not enough. So giving wines points creates a spurious sense of accuracy and if you can believe it means something when someone gives a wine 87 points out of 100, then you would believe anything.”

But Johnson’s subtle approach won’t help everyone, notwithstanding his elegant, meaningful wine descriptions. Faced by thousands of wine labels, most of us become confused and insecure when buying wine. Little wonder then that we seek direction. For example, endorsements – such as awards, reviews and ratings from trusted, disinterested experts – give us direction and security. These ratings tend to be expressed in stars, points or show awards.

As a lapsed retailer I’ve seen gold medals and trophies boost sales. But buyers care nought for silver and bronze medallists – winemakers shouldn’t bother putting them on labels. Paralleling YouTube, gold medals and trophies become the “like” button for some drinkers.

Largely through the influence of American critic Robert M. Parker, many critics now use a 100-point rating system – although the five-star scale survives and a 20-point scale dominates Australia’s wine show system (15.5 equals bronze; 17.0 equals silver; 18.5 equals gold – however, the public seldom sees the scores, just the medals).

Even if we agree with Hugh Johnson that scores out of 100 give a spurious sense of accuracy, it’s hard not to accept that critics need some sort of rating scale and that whatever we use ought to give meaningful help to drinkers. If scores can’t describe wine styles they should at least reflect the relative quality of wines.

Wine shows build this principle into their medal-rating systems – and drill it into trainee wine judges. The first message an associate judge hears is, if you like a wine give it a high score; if you don’t like it give it a low score; if you think it’s middle of the road give it a middling score; if you thinks it’s seriously faulty, give it a very low score – in short, let your scores reflect the quality.

But the 100-scale rating system seems to push sales towards wines scoring 90 points or more – perhaps the YouTube phenomenon again. But, confusingly, critics seem to use very little of the 100-point scale.

In a recent advertising catalogue, the Dan Murphy tasting panel awarded 92 points to a $16 Cotes-du-Rhone and 94 points to a $60 Chateauneuf-du-Pape. Despite the price gape, that’s a plausible quality difference – a well-made Cotes-du-Rhone could equal or better a mediocre Chateauneuf-du-Pape

But I’d recently tried both wines and noted a big quality gap. They’re made by reputable Rhone Valley producer, Michel Chapoutier, and imported by Dan Murphy. One was a rich, rustic, slightly rough but enjoyable country wine; the other fragrant, subtle, silky and elegant – a classy example of a much abused appellation. As Johnson says, scores can’t be precise; but they shouldn’t mislead us and they ought, at least, reflect relative quality. On a 100-point scale, that’d be more like 75 for the Cotes-du-Rhone and 90 for the Chateauneuf-du-Pape.

As wine drinkers we quickly decide our likes and dislikes. But I suspect we have more than two buttons. If we’re interested in our wines, we invariably like some more than others. And the more we explore wine and the wider the range we drink, the more likely we are to develop complex rating systems in our minds.

When we head down this track, someone else’s score means less than a clear description – a note written in plain English, describing a wine’s provenance, style, and an opinion on where it rates within that style. This gets closer to the Johnson relativist view, and it opens the door to increased drinking pleasure.

While rating systems can be useful sources of information, they’re best taken with a grain of salt – and not used as Navmans that keep us on the narrow 90-point, gold-medal, five-star path.

Copyright © Chris Shanahan 2010

Wine review — Tyrrell’s, Coldstream Hills, Printhie and Voyager Estate

Wine review

Tyrrell’s Hunter Valley Vat 47 Chardonnay 2007 $40
Coldstream Hills Yarra Valley Chardonnay 2008 $29
Printhie Orange MCC Chardonnay 2008 $35
Voyager Estate Margaret River Chardonnay 2008 $38

This is a run of beautiful, luxurious chardonnays, all fermented and matured in oak barrels – but in every case the oak simply disappears into a wonderful amalgam of fruit-led flavours. My pick, by a small margin, is Tyrrell’s ultra fine, ripe-but-taut Vat 47 – a proven keeper. The others run in a tight pack, with Coldstream and Printhie sharing intense nectarine-like varietal flavour – the Printhie being a little tighter and steelier in structure. Voyager Estate delivers riper, peach-like flavours but, as in all of the above, harmoniously enveloped in barrel-derived complexities.

Craggy Range Hawkes Bay Block 14 Gimblett Gravels Syrah 2007 $28–$32
Hermitage (Domaine des Martinelles) 2005 $72–$80
Collector Canberra District Reserve Shiraz 2008 $45–$50

And for luxurious fine-boned, cool-climate shiraz try these contrasting styles from New Zealand, France and Canberra, all purchased in local liquor stores. NZ and shiraz, you ask? Isn’t it too cold? Yes, generally, but at Hawke’s Bay a little pocket of land, the Gimblett Gravels, makes intense, succulent, fine versions of our favourite variety in warm, dry years like 2007. Craggy Range is a good example of it. Hermitage, Rhone Valley home of shiraz (syrah to the French), makes a more potent, sinewy style – well illustrated in this modern, clean example. And Collector Reserve shows the fine, spicy intensity of the Canberra style at its best.

Pewsey Vale Vineyard Eden Valley Riesling 2009 $13.49–$23
It won’t be long before the 2010 rieslings trickle into the market. But if you’re after absolutely outstanding drinking right now, mop up the rest of Pewsey Vale’s extraordinarily delicious 2009. I’ve seen it as low as $13.49 but more commonly on discount at $15-$16 (though you can pay more if you want). It’s from the Hill-Smith family’s 50-hectare Pewsey Vale vineyard, located on the edge of the Eden Valley. Louisa Rose makes the wine just a few kilometres down the hill at the Yalumba Winery, Angaston, centre of the Hill-Smith wine operations.

Copyright © Chris  Shanahan 2010

Nick O’Leary carves a Canberra niche

People, Vineyard, Wine

You don’t have to own vineyards or a winery to make your own wine. Ask Nick O’Leary, owner of one of Canberra’s hot new brands. You’ll find his wines on Canberra retail shelves and wine lists. But there’s no winery and no cellar door, just a web site (www.nickolearywines.com.au). And even that bears a ‘sold out’ sign.

Little wonder there’s no wine left, though, given the quality O’Leary achieved so quickly and the accolades that followed. These include rave reviews from Australia’s leading commentators, and an impressive string of awards at reputable wines shows – four gold medals for the current-release 2008 shiraz and a gold and two trophies for the 2009 riesling. Though sold out on O’Leary’s website, both can be found in stores and wine lists around town.

So what propels a newcomer so decisively into the limelight? The answer lies in careful fruit sourcing, attentive winemaking and sound judgement. Clearly, by the quality of his wines, O’Leary knew what varieties to use, where to source top-notch grapes and how to convert them to medal-winning wines. How come he knew all this at a tender 26 years?

Like his mentor and mate, Alex McKay, O’Leary worked at Kamberra Winery until late 2006 when Constellation Wines Australia (formerly BRL Hardy) sold up and made him redundant. But by then he’d served his winemaking apprenticeship under McKay, starting in 2003 as a cellar hand and working through the ranks to cellar supervisor then vintage assistant winemaker, running night shift for the whites.
O’Leary says he’d always wanted to be a winemaker and when Constellation left town he decided to stay on and build his own Canberra brand. By the end of 2006 a good grounding in winemaking made the decision natural. As well, he understood Canberra’s strengths and knew where to source good grapes.

He says, “Hardys gave me a good exposure to new technology and new techniques. I gained a good overview of wine and from where we were, we had a good ear to the ground”. And as well as making wine, O’Leary tasted widely and continues to do so. “I drink a lot with Alex and others who are not winemakers”, he says, finding inspiration in German riesling and “I love rieslings from the Clare and Eden Valleys”.

He and McKay assembled enough good shiraz from the 2006 vintage to blend and launch their own Nick O’Leary and Collector labels in 2007.
Then in vintage 2007, O’Leary bought about 10 tonnes of riesling and shiraz from growers he’d worked with during the Kamberra years, making the wine at Affleck Winery, owned by his in-laws, Ian and Susie Hendry.

The wines hit the mark immediately, largely attributable, says O’Leary, to the grape quality. He sources these principally from Wayne and Jennie Fischer’s Nanima Vineyard, Murrumbateman, but buys as well from Mike and Denise McKenzie’s Murrumbateman vineyard and from Wallaroo Vineyard, Hall.

These growers all understand the connection between fruit quality and wine quality, O’Leary explains. They’re prepared to do the hard work of shoot thinning and crop thinning – essential in getting crop levels just right, maximising flavour and balance. O’Leary works closely with his growers, “spending lots of time in the vineyard, especially just before harvest”, he says.

O’Leary and McKay maintained their connection after leaving Kamberra. In 2007 both joined the Karelas family at Lake George. They embarked on a major rejuvenation of the vineyard and made wine there in 2007, 2008 and 2009 – initially in Dr Edgar Riek’s original winery, then in the larger cellars next door after the Karelas family acquired David Madew’s property. The two left Lake George in late 2009.

But the Collector and Nick O’Leary labels live on. And they’re about to be joined by a joint brand to be launched in May or June. The initial wine, says O’Leary, is a 2009 vintage Canberra shiraz, likely to sell at a modest $18 a bottle. It’ll be joined later by chardonnay and pinot noir, both from the 2010 vintage. While these will be from Canberra, O’Leary anticipates sourcing future material from Tumbarumba as the cooler climate there better suits these varieties.

And what’s in store from Nick O’Leary wines in 2010? He says, “It was a challenging vintage. I haven’t seen one like this with rain towards the end of harvest”. But there’ll still be good wines from good producers, O’Leary says. In general whites came in ripe at lower sugar levels than usual and made sound, delicate wines. The reds “are not as robust as the 2009s, but they’re balanced. Whether they’ll live as long, I don’t know”.

We’ll see O’Leary’s 2010 riesling in a few months. And the 2009 shiraz should be a cracker when it’s released later this year. The riesling will sell at about $25 and the shiraz at $28.

Copyright © Chris Shanahan 2010

Wine review — Montana, Vintage Cellars, Michel Chapoutier and Penfolds

Wine review

Montana South Island Pinot Noir 2008 $18–$22
Vintage Cellars Central Otago Pinot Noir 2008 $12–$17
Montana – Marlborough pioneer, New Zealand’s largest wine producer and now part of France’s Pernod Ricard group — set its sights on large-scale pinot noir production in the late nineties. They planted broad acres of the variety and developed winemaking systems specifically for this difficult-to-make variety — with convincing results. The latest vintage delivers pleasing, clearly varietal fruit and flesh and sufficient red-wine structure, albeit in pinot’s medium bodied way. Vintage Cellar’s version presents the less fleshy end of the pinot spectrum — the perfume and varietal flavour are there, but the palate’s more taut tannin, again in pinot’s fine-boned way.

Michel Chapoutier

  • Cotes-du-Rhone 2007 $16.90–$17.80
  • Chateauneuf-du-Pape 2006 $59.80–$62.90

These clean, modern wines from France’s Rhone Valley feature grape varieties familiar to Australian drinkers – grenache, shiraz and mourvedre, and probably half a dozen more in the Chateuneuf. This is a fine wine indeed – medium bodied, subtle, earthy, savoury and elegant; a wine that grows on you with every sip, and is quite unlike any Australian grenache based red. It’s fully priced, but a genuine and good example of the style. The cheaper wine’s fuller flavoured, if a little rough around the edges. It’s enjoyable enough but not in the league of its cellar mate – though the importer’s catalogue (Dan Murphy) scores them almost equally, which is nonsense.

Penfolds Bin 128 Coonawarra Shiraz 2008 $25–$34
Max Schubert made the first Bin 128 in 1962, maturing it in American oak barrels. But in 1980 Don Ditter switched to French oak. This proved more in tune with Coonawarra’s comparatively delicate fruit. In the 2008 vintage Bin 128 sits at the ripe end of the Coonawarra flavour spectrum. It’s very bright with sweet berry flavours, wrapped in layers of soft tannins. But if it shows the bigger, riper side of Coonawarra, it’s not over ripe and the elegant structure is already emerging. I suspect it’ll really strut its origins and class within three or four years and drink well for decades.

Copyright © Chris Shanahan 2010

Savouring the shiraz spectrum

Uncategorized

Australia owns shiraz – not just in the generic sense of making juicy, soft, affordable quaffers (which we do very well) but in expressing a wide spectrum of styles across our dozens of regions.
We’ve arrived at an amazing diversity of extraordinarily good shirazes. And the quality we’re now enjoying seems to be drawn from long traditions, combined with attentive, sympathetic winemaking.

We can look up to expensive icons like Grange and Hill of Grace. But we don’t need to spend hundreds of dollars a bottle to enjoy comparable quality. There’s a wealth of superb shiraz out there in a sweet spot between $30 and $50 a bottle – not everyday prices for sure, but a modest enough sum for the luxurious indulgence they provide.

With shiraz in mind, eight tasters recently explored an eclectic line-up at Chateau Shanahan. We served the wines masked, in groups of three, over a long, leisurely meal.

The selection represented the finer, cool-grown end of the shiraz spectrum from seven regions – with one wine each from New Zealand and France thrown in to broaden our perspective.

Here’s our report. Remember, too, this is not a final tasting following an exhaustive search. They’re just nine wines, currently available in retail stores and representing a range of styles.

We found nine distinctive wines each enjoyable. Only one, considerably cheaper than others, seemed out of its depth – the selector’s fault, not the wine’s. Mea Culpa.

BRACKET 1

Penfolds Bin 128 Coonawarra Shiraz 2008 $25–$34
Max Schubert made the first Bin 128 in 1962 and matured it in American oak barrels similar to the ones he used for the other Penfolds reds, generally from much warmer regions than Coonawarra. In 1980 chief winemaker Don Ditter switched from American oak to French oak. This proved more in tune with the comparatively delicate fruit of Coonawarra.

The 2008 vintage is on the ripe side of the Coonawarra flavour spectrum. It’s very bright with sweet berry flavours, wrapped in layers of soft tannins. The oak flavours are already well integrated with the fruit.

Some of the earlier Bin 128s seemed swamped by tannin in youth, but over time the lovely elegance of Coonawarra came through. But this could take ten or more years.  Although the 2008 shows the bigger, riper side of Coonawarra, it’s not over ripe and the elegant structure is already emerging. I suspect it’ll really strut its origins and class within three or four years and drink well for decades. Thumbs up from all eight tasters.

Meerea Park Canberra District XYZ Shiraz 2008 $19–$22
Brothers Garth and Rhys Eather focus most of their winemaking on the lower Hunter, around Pokolbin. But the “failure of the 2008 Hunter Valley shiraz vintage forced us to look elsewhere for suitable fruit”, writes Garth. They found what they wanted at Murrumbateman.
On opening, the wine had the unpleasant pong of hydrogen sulphide, but this largely dissipated with decanting – leaving a tiny trace in the glass, picked up by some but not all of the tasters. The wine’s in the spicy, savoury Canberra mould and just a little raw at present. The fruit flavours seemed simple in comparison to the other two wines in the bracket – but hardly surprising given the price difference.

Coldstream Hills Yarra Valley Reserve Shiraz 2006 $36–$40
Like Penfolds, Coldstream Hills is part of the Foster’s wine group, though the wines are grown and made in different regions by different winemakers – Penfolds by Peter Gago, Coldstream Hills by Andrew Fleming.

This is a beautiful wine, showing the benefit of a few years’ bottle age and the lovely aromatic lift given by a touch of viognier co-fermented with the shiraz. The medium bodied palate is lively, buoyant, silk smooth and packed with ripe, cherry-like fruit flavour, and a spicy, savoury note. Pure class; loved by all tasters.

BRACKET 2

Tyrrell’s Vat 9 Hunter Valley Shiraz 2007 $45–$53
About a decade ago Tyrrell’s began installing 2,500-litre French oak casks to mature, and in the case of chardonnay, to ferment, their flagship wines. The move away from the more widely used 300–500 litre hogsheads and barriques, recognised the subtleness and keeping qualities of earlier wines matured in larger, old-oak vessels. Essentially, it was about providing an aerobic environment to stabilise and mature wine while reducing the overall impact of oak flavour. Hence, Vat 9, the company’s flagship red, now spends time in these large casks, old and new, before bottling.

The style used to be called Hunter “burgundy”– a salute to its supple, soft texture and earthy notes. Attentive modern winemaking delivers a Vat 9 of extraordinary dimension. It’s ripe and juicy with traditional soft tannins; but it’s tremendously bright and fresh with soft, tender tannins, a subtle, complex spicy bite from the oak and an underlying earthiness that marks it as Hunter, even in a masked tasting like ours.

It’s a distinctive and potentially very long-lived wine that should become finer and more ethereal over the decades. Pleasing to all tasters.

Best’s Bin O Great Western Shiraz 2006 $50–$55
Henry Best established a vineyard at Great Western, Victoria, in 1866. The Thomson family bought it in 1920 and fourth and fifth generation Viv and Ben Thomson today make Bin 0 Shiraz from four low yielding blocks planted between 1966 and 1994 using cuttings from older vines on the block, some dating from 1868.

In our tasting Bin 0 seemed brawny, wedged between Tyrrell’s gentle, soft Vat 9 and the highly aromatic, lingering, medium bodied Clonakilla O’Riada. It had the body and power of warm-grown shiraz; but a note of “mint” underlying the ripe, black cherry flavour suggested a cooler climate. The wine blossomed over time in the glass, displaying great power with elegance, and attracting heaps of discussion. I suspect it’ll cellar for decades.

Clonakilla Canberra District O’Riada Shiraz 2008 $36–$40
This delicious, fine-boned shiraz viognier is an offshoot of Clonakilla’s $75 flagship shiraz viognier. The wine comprises about 40 per cent of components “declassified” from the flagship blend plus material from three local growers favoured by winemaker Tim Kirk: Phil Williams of Hall and Long Rail Gully and Quarry Hill Vineyards of Murrumbateman.

I’ve seen enjoyed the wine over several meals now and in this masked tasting it once again showed class, in Clonakilla’s unique way. I noted its lifted, spicy, gorgeous aroma; lively, spicy, delicious flavours with a fine structure based on high acidity as well as fine-grained tannins.
Interestingly it didn’t please all tasters – one in particular preferred the rounder, softer wines to this more acidic style.

BRACKET 3

Craggy Range Hawkes Bay Block 14 Gimblett Gravels Syrah 2007 $28–$32
When we close our eyes and think of shiraz, New Zealand doesn’t normally come to mind. In general the climate there’s too cool to ripen shiraz. However, the Gimblett Gravels – a stony, well-drained part of the Hawke’s Bay region – produces some rippers, especially in warm seasons like 2007.

In our final bracket, featuring shiraz (aka syrah) from three countries, Craggy range showed the intense fragrance and pepperiness of its cool origins. And, like the Clonakilla wine before it, high acid and fine tannins seemed to accentuate the deep, juicy, delicious fruit flavours. It’s a wonderful wine, right out there on the coolest end of the shiraz spectrum. Well liked by the tasters.

Hermitage (Domaine des Martinelles) 2005 $72–$80
For almost two centuries Australians knew “hermitage” as a synonym for “shiraz”. But after we recognised “Hermitage” as a protected French name, we dropped the name from our labels – hence Grange Hermitage became Grange.

Hermitage, the hill on France’s Rhone Valley, grows shiraz and its powerful, long-lived reds once rated among the country’s finest. Although the status has slipped, our representative from this hot little hill, showed the legendary strength and backbone of the style – providing a great contrast to the New Zealand and Canberra wines either side of it in our tasting.

It’s powerful, but not in the style, say, of a big, bold, fruity Barossa wine – but in a more sinewy way: the flavours are strong, but not fleshy and backed by taut, firm tannins.

It’s a good, clean modern wine expressing the regional style – and enjoyed by all tasters.

Collector Canberra District Reserve Shiraz 2008 $45–$50
Alex McKay’s Collector Reserve 2008 won four trophies at the recent Sydney Royal Wine Show, topping Aussie greats like Vasse Felix Cabernet and Best’s Bin O Shiraz. Alex sourced the shiraz from the Kyeema Murrumbatemen Vineyard – and added a few buckets of the white variety, viognier, from Kyeema and Wayne and Jennie Fischer’s vineyard.

In our tasting we saw parallels with the Clonakilla wine in general structure and style: medium bodied and spicy with a backbone combining acid and fine tannins. But we noted, too, the distinctive stalky character derived from including whole-bunches (stalks and all) in the fermentation.

McKay says he worried at the time that he might have overdone the whole-bunch thing. However, though it’s apparent, it’s really seasoning in a superb, silky, sweet-fruited wine most of us ranked highly – one taster expressing a caveat on the stalkiness.

Copyright © Chris Shanahan 2010

Wine review — Tyrrell’s, Pizzini and Grosset

Uncategorized, Wine review

Tyrrell’s Lost Block whites $14–$19

  • Hunter Valley Semillon 2009
  • Frankland River Sauvignon Blanc 2009

The popular vote’s with sauvignon blanc at present and Tyrrell’s version – sourced from Frankland River, Western Australia – scrubs up better than most as it has flesh and texture to match the tropical-fruit-like varietal flavour. Almost apologetically, Bruce Tyrrell’s press release calls it “the result of commercial necessity”. I suspect Tyrrell’s heart and palate are more in tune with the semillon. It’s a refreshingly low 11 per cent alcohol and features appealing, delicate, lemon-like regional flavour. But instead of the bone-dry austerity often seen in young Hunter semillons, especially those built for decades of cellaring, Lost Block’s round and soft and quite juicy, despite the low alcohol.

Pizzini King Valley

  • Pinot Grigio 2009 $18.50
  • Whitefields Pinot Grigio 2009 $25
  • Nebbiolo 2005 $45

Pinot gris, pinot grigio – same grape, but understandably the Pizzini family adopts the Italian name and northern Italian winemaking style. The cheaper version always rates well against its Aussie peers. But the new Whitefields 2009 offers a lovely extra fruit concentration – and the textural richness and complex flavour derived from barrel fermentation (with wild yeasts). At a recent tasting people quaffed the Whitefields down in preference to the Tyrrell’s semillon reviewed above. At the same tasting Pizzini Nebbiolo 2005 upstaged the other reds. It’s an exciting expression of this powerful, elegant and tannic Piedmontese style.

Grosset

  • Piccadilly Chardonnay 2008 $53
  • Adelaide Hills Pinot Noir 2008 $66
  • Clare Valley Gaia 2007 $60

We tasted Grosset’s Piccadilly after a run of very good chardonnays. And it stood out – not because it was bigger or bolder; but for its delicacy and harmony. It’s a wine of great underlying power and richness – and it’s seamlessly absorbed all the winemaking inputs that often build layers of distinct flavours around chardonnay. One bottle seemed hardly enough. Likewise Grosset’s pinot delivered buckets of flavour and in the most subtle, enjoyable, more-ish way. And Gaia, a blend of cabernet sauvignon franc and merlot, delivered juicy, ripe berry flavours cocooned in firm, dry tannins.

Copyright © Chris Shanahan 2010

Beer review — Urquell and Velkopopovicky

Beer review

Pilsner Urquell 330ml $3.50
Perhaps it’s not as bitter as it used to be – but Urquell remains in the classic Bohemian Pilsner mould – richly malty but dry, with the appealing pungency of Saaz hops and a lingering, refreshing hops bitterness. It’s distributed by Coca Cola Amatil in a joint venture with Uquell’s owner, SABMiller.

Velkopopovicky Kozel Premium 500ml $4.00
Kozel, also from Plzen, is slightly more alcoholic and fuller bodied than Urquell and the hops less pungent and spicy. The hops provide a deep bitterness on the palate, offsetting the opulent maltiness, then linger on in the aftertaste. It’s a complex beer, thankfully in a decent sized bottle.

Copyright © Chris Shanahan 2010

Czech craft brewers on the rise

Beer, Beer review

In the New York Times recently, Evan Rail reported on the Czech Republic’s growing craft beer industry and its support by a number of pubs disappointed by the limited beer choices in Prague’s bars. Rail writes “many bars are locked into exclusive agreements with large breweries, which often install and control the taps”.

Prague’s not unique in that respect. But given Bohemia’s long and diverse brewing history, Prague’s beer tourists could be short changed should their tippling choice be limited to Gambrinus, Staropramen, Urquell and Budejovicky Budvar – the big local and global brands from the region.

If you’re travelling to Prague, you can Google Rail’s article for his list of recommended pubs. But us Canberra-bound drinkers face a more limited choice of Bohemian brews. I found five on the shelves at Plonk, Fyshwick, all except one in the robust, golden, bitter lager style pioneered by Urquell in the town of Plzen in 1842.

Urquell scrubbed up well in the tasting. It’s richly malty and has the signature fragrance, flavour and bitterness of the local Saaz hops, albeit slightly toned down to how I remember it in the past.
Budvar disappointed, however; but Krusovice and the beautifully fresh, lively Kozel hit the mark, as did the amber, sweet, malty, alcoholic Primator in its own idiosyncratic style.

Pilsner Urquell 330ml $3.50
Perhaps it’s not as bitter as it used to be – but Urquell remains in the classic Bohemian Pilsner mould – richly malty but dry, with the appealing pungency of Saaz hops and a lingering, refreshing hops bitterness. It’s distributed by Coca Cola Amatil in a joint venture with Uquell’s owner, SABMiller.

Velkopopovicky Kozel Premium 500ml $4.00
Kozel, also from Plzen, is slightly more alcoholic and fuller bodied than Urquell and the hops less pungent and spicy. The hops provide a deep bitterness on the palate, offsetting the opulent maltiness, then linger on in the aftertaste. It’s a complex beer, thankfully in a decent sized bottle.

Copyright © Chris Shanahan 2010

Canberra – vintage 2010 a rollercoaster

People, Uncategorized, Vineyard, Wine

What might vintage 2010 hold for Canberra wine drinkers? The season began exceptionally hot  and dry in November, turned cool and wet at Christmas, warmed up in January, then dumped rain again in February and March – encouraging berry split and fungal diseases. A slightly too-cool week following the early March rain retarded grape ripening. But as I write the mercury’s rising and we’re moving into a final, idyllic run of cool nights and warm days.

This is likely to save the day for the district’s red grapes. But the vintage could be down as much as fifty per cent for both reds whites, due largely to outbreaks of the fungal disease botrytis cinerea and berry split.

Ken Helm at Murrumbateman calls 2010 “the most topsy-turvy vintage ever”. Pessimism set in as the November heatwave stressed vines and seemed likely to bring vintage forward by weeks. But optimism rose at Christmas when four days of rain and cool weather revived the vines and put vintage back on a normal track.

Optimism faded with the February rain and outbreaks of mildew and botrytis – especially after bird netting made anti-fungal spraying a nightmare. But Helm and his grape growers found a workaround, using a small tractor and an improvised technique to spray a mix of hydrogen peroxide and acetic acid through the nets.

By now Helm had written off the chance of making a premium riesling in 2010, despite a record crush of the variety. Yes, there’s botrytis in some of it. But Helm is amazed by the combination of high sugar, exceptionally low pH and high acidity of the riesling juice – enough to revive hopes of a ‘premium’ riesling. It’s still a long shot and he says the jury’s out until the wine’s bottled in June.

Chardonnay withstood the botrytis charge less well and is a complete write off – there’ll be none made in 2010. A little sauvignon blanc survived to make a botrytis affected semi-dry style.

Helm’s main red variety, cabernet sauvignon, sourced from Al Lustenburger’s block, looks healthy, he says but won’t ripen until early April.

Clonakilla’s Tim Kirk calls 2010 “a difficult year that’s not in the same league as 2008 and 2009 – and in fact shows what remarkable years they were”. He’s glad to have picked riesling before the early March rain and says because it’s on the low-alcohol, high-acid side, it’ll be a delicate style.

By 13 March, he’d already processed 70 tonnes of “fantastic” red grapes from the warmer Hilltops region, but still had some whites and all of his reds hanging on the Murrumbateman vineyards. He anticipated harvesting the reds between mid March and early April. “It’ll be a selective pick”, Kirk said, “and some of the fruit will be declassified”.

Roger Harris of Brindabella Hills, Hall, describes 2010 as complex, “even the vines are confused”, he says, with cabernet ripening ahead of shiraz when it’s normally the other way around. Harris says he escaped disease but berry split (followed by shrivelling) caused by the rain reduced his crop significantly.

He’s made tiny amounts of good sauvignon blanc and riesling (crops are down 50 per cent) and, if weather forecasts prove correct, he anticipates a small but high quality shiraz crop.

At our highest and coolest vineyard, Lark Hill, vintage generally begins later – the first fruit generally coming in as the rest of the district polishes of the last of its whites. Running against the district trend, Sue Carpenter calls 2010 “our most striking vintage yet” with picking of pinot noir and chardonnay for sparkling wine scheduled for 19 March and chardonnay and riesling for table wine a day later. She expects to wrap vintage up on 15 April, harvesting the Austrian variety gruner veltliner and riesling for Lark Hill’s legendary auslese.

Carpenter says the vineyard has no botrytis and attributes this to biodynamic vineyard management. She believes that mulching interferes with botrytis’s life cycle. As well, the berry skins are too thick for the botrytis to penetrate and it therefore dies.

Down the hill at Lerida Estate on Lake George, Jim Lumbers reports good quality but quantities severely reduced by a “huge amount of botrytis”.  He says he salvaged 50 per cent of the chardonnay by using sorting tables – eliminating rotten fruit and sending only clean fruit to the fermenters. The resulting wine should be on the light and delicate side, reflecting the low sugar and high acid of the cool vintage.

Lumbers says unlike other recent cool vintages, 2002 and 2005, 2010 received far more rain. The combination of cool weather and moisture means big crops losses to botrytis and significantly later ripening for the red varieties.

Lumbers anticipates losing half of his pinot noir crop and sees his vineyard “sitting on the boundary of possibility” – meaning that when the chances of ripening fruit is marginal there’s also the possibility, given a run of slightly warmer days, of producing exceptional wine.

At this stage, he says, merlot and cabernet franc are “bursting with health, with berries like melons – but they need weeks to ripen”. And shiraz, says Lumbers, “is as green as green and needs ages. Perhaps Edgar Riek was right after all” (Dr Riek, founder of the neighbouring Lake George vineyard believed Lake George foreshore too cool to ripen shiraz).

At this stage, with the whites largely in the vat and the reds still on the vine, we can’t assess the vintage properly. What we do know is that quantities are down and the whites will be on the delicate side. The fate of our reds depends on weather conditions over the next few weeks. No rain dances, OK.

Copyright © Chris Shanahan 2009

Wine review — Bloodwood, Toolangi, Champy, Punt Road, L’Enclave des Papes and Ruffino

Wine review

Bloodwood Orange Chardonnay 2009 $22–$25
Toolangi Yarra Valley Reserve Chardonnay 2006 $70–$75
Meet the yin and yang of cool-grown chardonnay – one almost unmarked by winemaker artifice; the other laden with it. The yin is Stephen and Rhoda Doyle’s Bloodwood 2009 – an extraordinarily intense, high-acid, taut, super fine chardonnay, fermented in steel vats, with only a passing (and undetectable) nod to oak. The yang is the equally intense Toolangi chardonnay – with the whole winemaker toolbox thrown at it by Rick Kinzbrunner: wild-yeast fermentation in oak, full malolactic fermentation and prolonged oak maturation. They’re striking wines indeed. But we didn’t finish either. We’d have like  more artifice in Bloodwood and less in Toolangi — yin and yang in the one bottle.

Bourgogne Pinot Noir (Maison Champy) 2008 $17.49–$24.99
Punt Road Yarra Valley Napoleone Vineyards Pinot Noir 2008 $25–$28
The Meurgey family’s profound influence on wine quality shows in Maison Champy’s lovely, entry-level Bourgogne. It’s screwcap sealed, clean, bright and a world removed from the feeble, grubby Burgundy’s passed off on unsuspecting drinkers for so long. It’s light bodied and finely structured, with fresh, slightly stalky varietal aroma and flavour and lightly acidic dry finish. Imported by Coles Liquor, owners of Vintage Cellars and 1st Choice. Punt Road’s pinot noir, from the Napoleone family’s vineyards, offers a more robust Australian expression of the variety – notably fuller, rounder and more tannic, but still the real pinot experience.

Cotes-du-Rhone L’Enclave des Papes 2008 $10.49–$14.99
Chianti Classico Riserva Ducale (Ruffino) $36–$40
These are imported by the Coles Liquor Group – Cotes-du-Rhone available in Vintage Cellars and 1st Choice; the Chianti Classico only at Vintage Cellars. Like the Champy Bourgogne reviewed above, the screwcap sealed Cotes-du-Rhone shows the bright, modern face of French winemaking — influenced by international competition and retailers like Coles insisting on screw caps and clean wine. It’s made predominantly from grenache and is therefore of medium colour and body with an attractive, dry, savouriness – a contrast to the sweet fruited Australian versions. Riserva Ducale is as good as Chianti gets – powerful and tannic but elegant, with a core of sweet ripe fruit.

Copyright © Chris Shanahan 2010