Mount Horrocks Cordon Cut Clare Valley Riesling 2015 $26.90–$33
OK, dessert’s on. Should we go refreshing, dry and light, leaving the sweets on centre stage? Or we could pile sugar on sugar: kind of invite Beelzebub to Satan’s party, upping the voluptuous sweetness of the dessert with Stephanie Toole’s Mount Horrocks Cordon Cut Riesling. What a wine. It brings to the table Clare riesling’s pure, intense lime-like flavour on a delicate, luscious palate, cut with searing, refreshing acidity. It’s an harmonious, irresistible sweetie that captures the essence of Clare riesling.

Copyright © Chris Shanahan 2016
First published 23 January 2016 in the Canberra Times Panorama magazine.

Bay of Fires Riesling 2015
Derwent and Coal River Valleys, Tasmania
$28.49–$35
The Bay of Fires winery at Pipers River, northern Tasmania, sources grapes for this wine from the Derwent and Coal River Valleys to the south. In a masked tasting alongside the other two rieslings reviewed today, it revealed a unique combination of Germanic apple-like and Australia floral aromas. The gloriously fresh, vivacious palate mirrored the aroma. Intense but delicate acid accentuated the fruit flavours and a small amount of residual sugar harmonised perfectly with the acidity.

Pikes Clare Valley The Merle Riesling 2015
Gill Farm and Hill blocks, Pike Vineyard, Polish Hill River, Clare Valley, South Australia
$38–$45
Clare Valley veteran Neil Pike produces a number of Clare Valley rieslings, led by his flagship, The Merle. Pike sourced the 2015 vintage from the Gill’s Farm and Hill blocks within the family’s vineyard in the cool Clare sub-region, Polish Hill River. Alongside two rieslings from significantly cooler sites (Henty, Victoria, and southern Tasmania), Pike’s normally austere young wine showed appealing floral and lime-like aroma and a comparatively gentle, rounded, delicious palate of great finesse and length.

Seppelt Drumborg Riesling 2015
Drumborg Vineyard, Henty, Victoria
$30–$35
In 1964, well ahead of Australia’s table wine boom, Karl Seppelt planted grapes at chilly Drumborg, southern Victoria. The vineyard produces excellent pinot noir, chardonnay as well as rieslings of great subtlety and finesse. We lined the 2015 up in a masked tasting beside Bay of Fires Tasmania 2015 and Pikes Merle Polish Hill 2015. What a beautiful, albeit varied, lineup it proved to be. Drumborg showed lean, taut acidity with delicate but intense fruit pushing through a finely textured palate. A little kiss of residual sugar perfectly balanced the high acidity. This is one to enjoy every year or two over its potentially very long cellaring life.

Moppity Vineyards Cabernet Sauvignon 2014
Moppity vineyards, Hilltops, NSW
$32
Being slightly warmer than Canberra, the Hilltops region makes slightly fuller, rounder styles of shiraz and fleshier, riper styles of cabernet sauvignon. After a lot of hard work in the vineyard, cabernet is now emerging as a standout variety for Moppity Park’s Jason and Alecia Brown. Their 2014, winner of a trophy and seven gold medals, offers ripe red-currant-like varietal aroma, overlaid with a sweet and spicy oak character. The ripe fruit flavours flow through to a fleshy, medium-bodied palate, cut with fine, firm cabernet and oak tannins.

Tscharke Matching Socks Touriga 2014
Barossa Valley, South Australia
$20
Sixth generation Barossa vigneron, Damien Tscharke, operates a unique cellar door in the Barossa’s Marananga sub-region. Tscharke and his German wife, Eva, imported pre-cut timber from Germany then assembled the building, comprising cellar door, mezzanine pottery gallery (Eva makes the pots on site), four-metre underground cellar and bed and breakfast facility. Tscharke makes traditional Barossa styles but also works with less well-known varieties, including savagnin, montepulciano and this pretty red, made from the port variety, touriga nacional. It’s a rich, soft red with flavours reminiscent of summer berries and Christmas cake – a wine to serve lightly chilled all summer long.

Kirrihill Regional Range Riesling 2015
Clare Valley, South Australia
$16
From the three the top-shelf rieslings reviewed here today, all of gold-medal standard and built for long cellaring, we come to a more affordable, drink-now version. Sourced from a number of vineyards across the Clare Valley, it presents a fuller, rounder side of Clare riesling, with the regional thumbprint of vibrant, citrusy varietal flavour and refreshing dry finish. The winemaking focuses entirely on capturing riesling’s aromas and flavour with no discernible winemaker add-ons.

Copyright © Chris Shanahan 2016
First published 19 and 20 January 2016 in goodfood.com.au and the Canberra Times

Coldstream Hills Yarra Valley Pinot Noir 2014
Yarra Valley, Victoria
$26.60–$35
Nothing focuses the mind on a pinot like a good example of it. Three times over a period of over 20 years Coldstream Hills Reserve Pinot Noir 1992 did this: on its release in the early 90s, at a 2011 tasting hosted in Bernkastel, Germany, by winemaker Ernie Loosen, and in November 2015 at Coldstream’s thirtieth anniversary tasting, chaired by founder James Halliday. Halliday handed over winemaking to Andrew Fleming and Greg Jarratt in 2001. The pair displayed their new vintages alongside Halliday’s oldies at the tasting. The latest Reserves sit with the best of the variety in Australia. And the Amphitheatre 2013 ($150) is surely one of our most remarkable. But even the entry-level wine, combining fruit from the upper and lower Yarra, is a chip off the bigger, more expensive blocks. The supple wine starts with vibrant ripe-berry varietal flavours on a medium-bodied palate, with tang and savour derived from whole-bunch ferment and juicy, silky texture.

Penfolds Koonunga Hill Chardonnay 2014
South Australia
$13.30–$15
Penfolds chardonnay is produced in a combination of stainless steel tanks and oak barrels. The tank-fermented component preserves fresh peach- and melon-like varietal flavours; and the barrel component gives a smooth, creamy texture, a touch of spice and nut an exotic yeast-derived “funky” note. It’s a very fresh yet sophisticated chardonnay at the price, and a very good example of using multi-region grape sourcing to make high quality, affordable wine.

Tahbilk Marsanne 2015
Tahbilk, Nagambie Lakes, Victoria
$12.35–$18.85
The Purbrick family’s beautiful Tahbilk property sits on an anabranch of Victoria’s Goulburn River. The property holds one of the world’s oldest and largest plantings of marsanne, a Rhone Valley white variety. The oldest vines, planted in 1927, make a separate, higher priced wine. While marsanne tends to be viscous and a little tough on the palate, Alister Purbrick fine-tuned the winemaking approach to maintain varietal character but reduce the viscosity and firmness. The result is a richly textured wine with pleasantly tart, savoury citrus-like flavours on a bone-dry palate.

De Bortoli Windy Peak Shiraz 2014
Heathcote, Victoria
$11.40–$15
Windy Peak provides a drink-now side of Heathcote shiraz. The region in general produces deep, dark, savoury shiraz. But de Bortoli tames the beast by presenting more of the ripe, juicy, red-berry varietal flavours, with less grunt and savour. Fine, drying tannins and a savoury undercurrent add interest to a lovely red made for immediate drinking pleasure.

Tyrrell’s Rufus Stone Shiraz
Heathcote, Victoria
$16.90–$25
Tyrrell’s provides a full-bore, albeit highly polished version of Heathcote shiraz. The very deep colour and vivid crimson rim point to the wine’s power – an impression confirmed by the intense, black-cherry-like aroma and big, juicy, mouth-filling flavour. While the wine’s big, it’s also harmonious and layered with fruit- and oak-derived tannins. The oak also injects spicy and vanilla-like characters that compliment the cherry-like flavours, solid tannins and background savouriness.

Holm Oak Riesling 2015
Holm Oak and Lipoto Springs vineyards, Tamar Valley, Tasmania
$21.75–$25
Who can argue when winemaker Rebecca Duffy spruiks the virtues of Tasmanian riesling and oysters. Their unique crackling acidity seasons the briny tang of oysters as surely as a squeeze of lime or lemon juice. The steely acidity also accentuates a varietal flavour reminiscent of lime and tart green apples. Indeed the acid is the structure that holds the wine together and also suggests good cellaring ability.

Copyright © Chris Shanahan 2016
First published 12 and 13 January 2016 in goodfood.com.au and the Canberra Times

The Four Tonne Project Canberra District Shiraz 2015 6-pack $100
In the 2015 vintage, two Canberra wineries turned four tonnes of excess shiraz from Four Winds vineyard into a tasty fund raiser for Companion House – a provider of support to asylum seekers and refugees living in Canberra. Collector’s Alex McKay and Eden Road’s Nick Spencer and Hamish young produced perhaps the best red you’ll ever buy at this price. The medium bodied wine combines vibrant summer-berry varietal flavours with regional spice and subtle, stalky notes (and silky texture) derived from the inclusion of whole bunches in the ferment. It’s available at fourwindsvineyard.com.au and $174 from each case goes to Companion House.

Four Winds Vineyard Canberra District Riesling 2015 $25
The riesling vine performs well across the Canberra district, from the lowest altitude warmest sites to the highest and coolest – a range of over 300 metres. And in 2015 every one of our widely spread sub-regions produced beautiful rieslings. Styles vary slightly with the sub-region and winemaking inputs, but there’s a regional thumbprint, too. The wines tend to be shy and sometimes austere on first release, but as the months tick by the delicious citrus-like varietal flavour sticks its head above the acidity. Four Winds 2015 is in that delicious zone now, offering ultra-fresh, delicate fruit flavours, racy acidity and dry finish.

Jacob’s Creek Classic Shiraz 2014 $5.65–$10
In 1976 Orlando Wines launched Jacob’s Creek Claret along with a raft of other now defunct labels. Jacob’s Creek alone flourished, first in Australia and then on a large scale in export markets, notably the UK. It started as a single product – a shiraz cabernet malbec blend labelled as “claret”. The makers gradually added other varieties and introduced wines at higher price points. Despite this so-called “premiumisation” of Jacob’s Creek, the lower price classic range remains the biggest seller. And little wonder – the quality is excellent as in this medium bodied red with its gentle, ripe varietal flavour and soft, dry finish.

Copyright © Chris Shanahan 2015
First published 19 and 20 December 2015 in goodfood.com.au  and the Canberra Times

Australia’s more than 2,400 vignerons make a greater diversity and higher quality wine than ever before in a wine history dating from the first fleet.

My top-15 therefore represents a wide range of Australian styles from seven distinct regions in four states, plus five multi-region blends, including one bubbly. Completing the lineup are two imports – a delicate riesling from Germany’s Mosel region, and a savoury montepulciano from Abruzzo, Italy.

While several wines in the selection bear recommended prices over $15, they are frequently discounted and you should never have to pay the full price. As a guide, the price ranges I give cover the lowest discount price at time of writing and the recommended price.

Happy drinking.

TOP WHITES

Hay Shed Hill Pitchfork Margaret River Semillon Sauvignon Blanc 2015 $14.25–$16
Winemaker Michael Kerrigan praises Margaret River’s 2015 vintage, but laments the tiny quantities. He writes, “We experienced some of the wildest, windiest weather for decades” resulting in the record low yields. However, a dry and balmy end to the season ensured lively, grassy, herbaceous flavours in this classic, slurpy Margaret River blend.

Tahbilk Nagambie Lakes Marsanne 2015 $12.35–$18.85
The Purbrick family’s beautiful Tahbilk property sits on an anabranch of Victoria’s Goulburn River. The property holds one of the world’s oldest and largest plantings of marsanne, a Rhone Valley white variety. The richly textured wine offers pleasantly tart and savoury citrus-like flavours on a bone-dry palate.

Jacob’s Creek Classic Riesling 2015 $7.85–$12
Humble Jacob’s Creek often upstages expensive wines. In the recent National Show, for example, Jacob’s Creek Classic Pinot Gris, topped its class and won the best “other white variety” trophy. Jacob’s Classic Riesling, an even better wine on my scoresheet, captures the aromatic appeal and lime-like flavour intensity of this great variety – on a delicate, dry and beautifully refreshing palate.

Peter Mertes Mosel Riesling 2014 $9.99
Aldi’s semi-dry riesling comes from the vicinity of Kues, the village opposite Bernkastel on Germany’s Mosel River. The area produces some of the world’s great rieslings, noted for delicacy and intense flavour. Mertes captures the regional style with its full flavour, delicacy and good balance of high acidity and grapey sweetness.

De Bortoli Windy Peak Yarra Valley Chardonnay 2013 $11.40–$14
De Bortoli’s classy touch with Yarra chardonnay shows even in their lower priced Windy Peak. Splitting the ferments between French oak casks and steel tanks combines freshness and varietal purity with depth and texture. The resulting wine presents deliciously fresh nectarine- and grapefruit-like varietal flavour on generous, vibrant, smooth dry palate.

Penfolds Koonunga Hill South Australia Chardonnay 2014 $13.30–$15
Like the De Bortoli wine, Penfolds chardonnay is produced in a combination of stainless steel tanks and oak barrels. The tank-fermented component preserves fresh peach- and melon-like varietal flavours; and the barrel component gives a smooth, creamy texture, a touch of spice and nut an exotic yeast-derived “funky” note.

Tyrrell’s Lost Block Hunter Valley Semillon 2015 $13–$18
Tyrrell’s offers a range of Hunter semillons from the austere, long-lived Vat 1 to this approachable Lost Block. It’s low in alcohol (11 per cent) and light and fresh on the palate, with the region’s delicious lemongrass- and citrus-like flavours. It’s one of Australia’s distinctive regional specialties.

TOP REDS

Mr Mick Clare Valley Novo Sangiovese 2015 $12.80–$17
Tim Adams’ Novo Sangiovese 2015 sparks memories of the vibrant, light and fruity reds of France’s Beaujolais region. It’s a wine to enjoy lightly chilled, with or without food, during the warm months. The light crimson colour, shimmering, summer-berry flavours and tart tannins provide easy, refreshing drinking.

Illuminati Riparosso Montepulciano d’Abruzzo 2013 $8.90–$12
A favourite since its Australian debut in 1991, Riparosso starts with clean, fresh fruit flavours – before delicious, teasing, Italian savouriness sets in, distinguishing it from the generally more fruity Australian red styles and giving it a satisfying, dry, grippy finish. A Woolworths’ import, it’s available at Dan Murphy and BWS.

Jacob’s Creek South Australia Reserve Shiraz 2014 $14.25–$18
On a quality basis, Jacob’s Creek Reserve justifies its $18 recommended price. But it’s forever discounted, sometimes as low as $11. Lap it up and let the marketers worry about how they differentiate it from the standard Jacob’s Creek brand. The 2014 delivers pure, vibrant varietal fruit flavours on a medium-bodied, elegant palate.

De Bortoli Windy Peak Heathcote Shiraz 2014 $11.40–$15
Windy Peak provides a drink-now side of Heathcote shiraz. The region in general produces deep, dark savoury shiraz. But de Bortoli tames the beast by presenting more of the ripe, juicy, red-berry varietal flavours, with less grunt and savour. Fine, drying tannins and a savoury undercurrent add interest to a lovely red.

Taylors Estate Clare Valley Shiraz 2014 $13.95–$18
Taylors 2014 beat a who’s-who lineup to top the 2015 Great Australian Shiraz Challenge. The award followed a trophy and nine gold medals from other shows. The wine’s vivid fruit booms out of the glass and precisely predicts the juicy, soft palate that follows. Little wonder the judges lavished praise on it.

Twelve Signs Hilltops Cabernet Merlot 2014 $13–$14
The Hilltops region makes ripe, soft, medium-bodied reds with great drink-now appeal. Even at this modest price, Twelve Signs, from Moppity vineyards, captures the sweet-berry flavours of cabernet, the fragrance of merlot and the fine but strong tannins that distinguish good cabernet blends from other varieties.

Hesketh Twist of Fate Cabernet Sauvignon 2014 $12
Jonathon Hesketh and Phil Lehmann capture the spirit of cabernet in this bistro-style red from South Australia’s Fleurieu region. Though light in colour and made for current drinking, it offers particularly vibrant, lively cabernet aromas and flavours on a bright, buoyant, gently gripping palate.

A BUBBLY

Hardys Sir James Pinot Noir Chardonnay Cuvee Brut $8.99–$15
With big stocks on hand, Accolade Wines, Hardys parent company, dropped the price on one of Australia’s most popular bubblies. Independent retailers leaped in, dropping the price to under $10, leaving the big retailers flat footed. It’s a light, flavoursome bubbly with gentle varietal flavours, subtle yeast-derived brioche-like notes and deliciously fresh finish.

Copyright © Chris Shanahan 2015
First published 19 and 20 December 2015 in goodfood.com.au  and the Canberra Times

Coldstream Hills Reserve Chardonnay 2014
Yarra Valley, Victoria
$52.25–$60
Gold medal winner, National Wine Show of Australia. Coldstream Reserve impressed at the National Wine Show. A few days later, in a line up of Coldstream Hills chardonnays dating back to the 1988 vintage, the 2014 Reserve stood out for the volume of aroma and powerful but very fine flavours. It combined all the elements of opulent, barrel-fermented chardonnay. The magnificent screwcap-sealed 2005 and 2006 vintages alongside it, demonstrated the wine’s impeccable provenance and cellaring capacity. If you want something truly memorable for Christmas lunch, or as a gift, this is one of Australia’s time-proven greats.

Jacob’s Creek Classic Pinot Grigio 2015
South Eastern Australia
$5.65–$10
It probably surprised Jacob’s Creek winemakers Bernard Hickin and Rebekah Richardson as much as it did the judges at the Australian National Wine. How does a sub-$10 wine top the pinot grigio class, then take on all comers to win the “best dry white other varieties” trophy? It reveals the levelling effect of masked tasting. Made in the bright and fruity light-bodied style (11.5 per cent alcohol) Jacob’s Creek offers pear-like varietal flavour, smooth texture and fresh, dry finish. Richardson says she sources grapes principally from the hot riverland regions, with “bits and bobs” from cooler sites.

Wynns Black Label Shiraz 2012
Coonawarra, South Australia
$24.85–$35
A few years back, Wynns introduced Black Label Shiraz, priced between the ever-popular grey label ($14–$22) and flagship Michael Shiraz ($114–$120). The 2012 appealed very much on its release in mid 2014 and again on the tasting bench last week at the National Wine Show of Australia, where it won a gold medal. The silky, medium bodied cool-climate style appeals even more with that extra bottle age. And surprisingly it’s still around in some retail outlets, alongside the current release (and equally good) 2013.

Eddystone Point Riesling 2014
Derwent and Coal River Valleys, Tasmania
$23.80–$27
In awarding the National Wine Show’s “best riesling” trophy to Eddystone Point, chair of judges Jim Chatto commented, “The judges deliberated over three wonderful expressions of riesling. Two in the classic citrus and floral styles of the Eden and Clare Valleys, the other a complex and spicy, off-dry, cool-climate expression from Tasmania”. In a similar comparison after the show, we noted the wine’s Germanic, apple-like flavours and the fine, intense acidity which offset the low-level sweetness and accentuated the delightful flavour.

S.C. Pannell Grenache Shiraz Touriga 2014
McLaren Vale, South Australia
$30
Gold medal and two trophies, National Wine Show of Australia. Steve Pannell’s juicy blend wowed a group of tasters in a post-wine-show tasting, just as it did the judges a week earlier. The musk-like fragrance of grenache lures the drinker to a joyously fruity, fleshy, slurpy palate. Pannell writes, “Grenache brings lifted aromatics and its trademark sandy tannins, shiraz chimes in with red fruits, spice and weight, whilst the touriga, a lusty, powerful Portuguese variety, adds pungent fruit characteristics of plum pudding, dried spices and floral notes”. It’s an irresistible medium bodied red to wallow in right now.

West Cape Howe Tempranillo 2014
Perth Hills and Frankland River, Western Australia
$17–$22
Gold medal and trophy, National Wine Show of Australia. West Cape Howe tempranillo combines fruit from the warmer Perth Hills and cooler Frankland region, located almost 400km south-east of Perth. Winemaker Gavin Berry says the Perth Hills component contributes earthy, savoury characters while the cool-grown Frankland component provides spicy and berry flavours. The combination gives a richly flavoured, medium-bodied red with deliciously vibrant red-berry-like flavours. Mouth-puckering tannins soon push through the fruit, reminding us tempranillo is a feisty Spanish variety, best enjoyed with savoury food.

Copyright © Chris Shanahan 2015
First published 15 and 16 December 2015 in the goodfood.com.au  and the Canberra Times