Category Archives: Vineyard

Wine review – Eldridge Estate, Bremerton, Billecart-Salmon, Murrumbateman Winery, Arrogant Frog, Sandalford

25 May 2016People, Vineyard, Wine, Wine reviewChris Shanahan

Eldridge Estate Pinot Noir 2014 – wine of the week
Eldridge Estate vineyard, Red Hill, Mornington Peninsula, Victoria
$60
David Lloyd’s wines demonstrate the power of growing grape varieties in the right climate, then mastering vineyard management and winemaking. His 3.8-hectare vineyard, at around 200-metres altitude and 38 degrees south, provides the cool growing and ripening conditions suited to pinot noir. Water on three sides (Port Phillip Bay, Bass Straight and Westernport Bay) further moderates the climate. Lloyd’s 2014, made from six pinot clones, gives us a pure yet savoury expression of the variety. Delicate perfume, vibrant varietal fruit flavours, savouriness and fine, grippy tannins make a complete pinot – one to savour and marvel at.

Bremerton Selkirk Shiraz 2013
Langhorne Creek, South Australia
$19–$22
Langhorne Creek lies to the south east of McLaren Vale. Its warm climate, moderated by cool breezes from nearby Lake Alexandrina, produces rich, fleshy, but not heavy crowd-pleasing reds. The region’s pleasing wine styles, comparatively high yields and water availability attracted massive, broad-acre investments during the nineties. Though much of the grape crop goes to anonymous multi-region blends, the locals continue to make a mark with rich, satisfying reds like Bremerton Selkirk shiraz, made by Rebecca Willson whose family owns 120-hectares of vines in the region.

Champagne Billecart-Salmon Brut Reserve NV
Champagne, France
$66.50–$80
A distinctive richness and delicacy sets Billecart-Salmon apart from the too many ho-hum non-vintage Champagnes. It always surprises because it’s so consistently outstanding. In our latest encounter, at Chairman and Yip, it accompanied some of the best oysters we’ve ever enjoyed: briny, juicy, plump and deliciously chewy. Billecart mingled happily with the tangy flavours, thanks in part to Champagne’s high acidity. But there’s more to it. A bit of pinot meunier in the pinot noir-chardonnay blend plumps out the palate and gives a fresh, fruity taste. Yet it remains delicate and dry, with the unique structure and harmony resulting from prolonged ageing on yeast lees.

Murrumbateman Winery Shiraz 2014
Murrumbateman, Canberra District, NSW
$30
Bobbie Makin and Jennifer Lawrence are the new young team running one of Canberra’s oldest wineries (established 1973). The brand’s been keeping a low profile for some years but we can expect to see more activity now as the pair make wine using grapes from their own and neighbouring vineyards. Then wine shows Canberra’s bright berry fruit flavours and medium body, albeit with a more than typical lick of tannin, some of it oak derived, drying out the finish.

Arrogant Frog Croak Rotie Shiraz 2014
Aude Valley, Languedoc, France
$7.90–$13
French winemaker Jean-Claude Mas launched Arrogant Frog in 2005 and now claims global sales of five million bottles annually – with over million of those sold in Australia through its importer, Woolworths. The brand includes two whites, a rose and two reds in addition to Croak Rotie reviewed today. For a modest price you get a flawless, screw-cap sealed shiraz–viognier blend of medium body and fresh fruit flavour. It’s taut rather than fleshy and finishes dry with slightly tough tannins.

Sandalford Estate Reserve Chardonnay 2015
Sandalford vineyard, Margaret River, Western Australia
$22–$35
You could pay much more for a chardonnay as good as this. And the quality’s explained by what’s gone into the wine: grapes from mature vines, free-run juice (the finest cut), and fermentation and maturation in a mix of new and older French oak barrels. A full-flavoured but fine-boned chardonnay, it shows juicy, nectarine-like varietal flavour, rich, barrel-derived texture and very fresh, zesty finish.

Canberra vintage 2016 – two good years in a row

13 April 2016People, Vineyard, WineChris Shanahan

Canberra vignerons rarely see two consecutive high quantity, high quality vintages as they have in 2015 and 2016.

But just how good 2016 quality is depends on who you ask. Ken Helm of Helms Wine, Murrumbateman, writes, “The 2016 vintage was the earliest and hottest season on record, but looks like equaling the great 2015, and 2013 vintages in production of quality wines; it shows the depth of the quality from Canberra can be realised across a range of climate conditions”.

Helm’s Murrumbateman neighbour, Eden Road’s Nick Spencer offers a more circumspect appraisal. He says, while quality and quantity were good for both reds and whites, it remains to be seen whether quality is outstanding.

“The shiraz flavours remind me of the 2014s. They have fruit intensity but perhaps not the structural balance of 2013 and 2015”, the most highly regarded of recent seasons. Riesling, all picked before March’s dry, hot spell looks good. “It’s bullet proof”, he adds.

The run of ten consecutive March days above 30 degrees came secondly only to the record of 12 days in another El Nino year, 1983. While most whites ripened ahead of the heat, some of the district’s shiraz felt it. Other late ripening varieties weathered the heat to ripen in the cooler conditions that followed.

Several winemakers, including Nick O’Leary, say the key to good shiraz was picking at the right moment. In the prolonged March heat, the variety tended to gain sugar and lose acid rapidly. “You could see the change in a day or so, making harvest time critical”, says winemaker Hamish Young.

“I’m happy with 80 per cent of my shiraz”, says O’Leary. “I have some excellent parcels and if others don’t measure up, they won’t go into the blend”. He rates the vintage as better than 2014, especially for riesling, “though it’s early days yet”.

O’Leary sources riesling from Lake George and Murrumbateman in the Canberra District and, for the first time this year, from the high-altitude Cribbin Vineyard at Tumbarumba. “I’ve had my eye on it for six years”, he said.

He rates riesling from the old Westering block on the Karelas family’s Lake George vineyard as “some of the best in a number of years. It has higher ripeness than 2015 with a fair whack of acidity”. Murrumbateman riesling, though lower in acid than in the last four or five years, shows very good flavour. And he rates the Tumbarumba riesling as exceptional and distinct in style from Canberra riesling.

At Four Winds vineyard, Murrumbateman, Sarah and John Collingwood report an early, good and disease-free season. They say crops were a little bigger than expected despite fruit thinning.

Riesling flowered early and well in benign conditions. Shiraz flowering appeared to struggle in hot winds but eventually the vines set a good crop. They rate the 2016 riesling up with the stellar 2015, and the 2016 shiraz as “good and solid”. At the time of interview, shortly after the heat spell, cabernet sauvignon, merlot and sangiovese remained on the vine and all looked healthy.

Brian Johnston of McKellar Ridge, Murrumbateman, says he “Felt some doubts early on with uneven flowering”. But flowering ended successfully and fruit yields came in above average. The worries of a cool, wet January dissipated in the warm, dry spell that followed. Indeed the soil moisture provided a measure of relief for the vines during the heat wave, though irrigation was required.

Yarrh Wines’ Neil McGregor reports, “A quick and early vintage, a couple of weeks earlier than 2015, which was two weeks early. Everyone’s exhausted”. Sauvignon blanc copped it a hit from a November frost, but no other varieties suffered.

McGregor says riesling, cabernet sauvignon and sangiovese look best, along with shiraz “picked at the right time”. The compressed vintage put pressure on picking teams across the district, forcing Yarrh to machine harvest part of the crop.

He says, “Pickers were flat out, so we saw lots backpackers, including French, Germans and Americans”.

Clonakilla’s Tim Kirk praises another extraordinary vintage and marvels at “The huge bunches and small berries”. He believes the large crop slowed ripening and, indeed ripened only because of the long run of hot weather. “It’s miraculous”, he says. “If it’d been a smaller crop, with the heat it would’ve been too ripe”.

Kirk’s benchmark shiraz, “Shows great colour, vibrant and bright aromas and lovely tannins. They’re not classic like the 2015s, but more flamboyant, without perhaps the length or longevity”.

Kirk opened the family’s new cellar door facility at the peak of this early vintage. He sees it as offering, “An experience of beauty, space and light, in sight of the vines”.

Winemaker Bryan Martin helps Kirk with the Clonakilla wines. While the two crammed a record crop into the expanded winery, Martin also made wines for his own Ravensworth label. At the same time he experimented with what he calls “weird stuff”.

Martin’s weird stuff always sells out. And his methods – particularly in the use of ceramic, egg-shaped vessels for fermenting and maturing wine – influence winemakers across the district and beyond.

This year’s weird stuff includes a cider-like sauvignon blanc made by through carbonic maceration (where fermentation begins inside berries enclosed in a airtight container), two pet-nat wines.

Pet-nat, an abbreviation of the French petillant naturale (naturally sparkling) is the hot new thing among sommeliers. They’re simple, young sparkling wines and generally cloudy as winemakers mostly leave the yeast sediment from secondary fermentation in the bottle.

Martin made, and quickly sold out of a pet-nat riesling in 2015. This year he’s producing riesling and gamay in the style.

And he’s not alone. Paul Starr’s Sassafras label paved the way with a pet-nat Tumbarumba gamay in 2014. A year later Sassafras pet-nat Canberra savagnin set social media alight when sommelier Mads Kleppe selected it for Copenhagen-based Noma’s pop-up Sydney restaurant. Starr says he’s making another in 2016, using riper savagnin, with a touch of Tumbarumba chardonnay to flesh out the mid palate.

A revitalised Wily Trout vineyard on the high, eastern side of Hall, under Will Bruce, has a few 2016 vintage experiments on he go: a pet-nat from pinot noir and chardonnay; a Beaujolais-influenced, early-drinking pinot shiraz, fermented in a ceramic egg; and a hops-infused sauvignon blanc.

The latter, a joint effort with brewer Richard Watkins, will likely be served carbonated from a keg at the BentSpoke brewpub, Braddon.

On the significantly lower western side of Hall, Pankhurst Wines experienced an early, rushed vintage. Alan Pankhurst reports, “Good yielding but not overcropping, with everything so consistently good. I haven’t seen a year like this”.

He says reds are of superb quality. But he harvested only small quantities of white varieties following a recent grafting program. He expects the new varieties – arneis, marsanne and roussanne to crop more heavily in 2017. A small plot of fiano may or may not succeed in Canberra’s cool climate.

At Mount Majura vineyard, Frank van de Loo says, “I have no complaints” about the early and fast vintage. He juggled for winery space and competed for grape pickers with other growers in the district. “We had a Sydney-based Laotian family group, backpackers and a crew from Cowra. It was lie a united nations here some days”.

On the escarpment above Bungendore, Lark Hill’s Christopher Carpenter describes an “earliest start ever” to the vintage, commencing with the marsanne, roussanne and viognier from the family’s Murrumbateman vineyard and finishing with gruner veltliner from the original Lark Hill site, Canberra’s highest vineyard at 860 metres.

And Canberra has a new label for 2016 – Hamish Young’s Mada Wines, due for release later this year. Young left Eden Road Wines late last year and this year made single vineyard shirazes from Yarrh, Wily Trout and Quarry Hill vineyards. He also made a riesling from Four Winds vineyard, and pinot gris and gewürztraminer from Brian Freeman’s vineyard at Hilltops. Young, too, owns a ceramic egg, convinced it builds more interesting wines.

While many Australian winemakers struggle, 2016 sees Canberra vineyards optimistic and confident. After years of development, the district now thrives on increasing quantities of its great specialities, riesling and shiraz, along with well-known varieties like pinot noir, cabernet sauvignon, sauvignon blanc and chardonnay. But the new confidence comes, too, from success with other varieties including sangiovese, tempranillo and gruner veltliner – and our ability to sell a few weird, whacky and sometimes wonderful things being made on the fringes.

Wine review – Robert Stein, Cockburn, Domain Day, Irvine, Majella, Van Volxem

30 March 2016People, Vineyard, Wine, Wine reviewChris Shanahan

Robert Stein Riesling 2015
Stein and Mirramar vineyards, Mudgee, NSW
$25
With his 2015 vintage, winemaker Jacob Stein takes us away from traditional floral, delicate Australian rieslings. Thirteen per cent alcohol puts it at the bigger end of the variety’s style spectrum. Then spontaneous fermentation on skins of a component, and barrel-fermentation in old oak barrels of the pressings, bring extra weight and grip to the palate. The result is a ripe, full, dry (if not bone dry) white that retains citrus-like riesling flavours and racy acidity. This is an impressive and interesting riesling, heading off in its own direction.

Rockburn Pinot Noir 2013
Gibston and Parkburne, Central Otago, New Zealand
$38–$43
At two degrees south of Australia’s southernmost vineyards, Central Otago produces wines of greater body and ripeness than we might expect at the latitude. But the area’s dry, sunny, continental climate produces distinctively powerful pinots that fetch high prices in world markets. Rockburn provides a taste of the style in a warm year. Vibrant, dark-cherry-like varietal flavours back an assertive palate, comprising fruit, warming alcohol (14 per cent) and strong, fine, drying tannins. Winemaker Malcolm Rees-Francis writes, “This pinot is generously proportioned but remains taut for the moment”. I agree. A year or two in bottle should bring all the flavour elements together.

Domain Day “S” Saperavi 2004
Mount Crawford, Barossa Valley, South Australia
$24–$35
Impressed by its longevity, winemaker Robin Day planted the Georgian red variety saperavi at Mount Crawford. Day writes “I have my vineyard and cellar door on the market as I aim to retire and write (an anecdotal travelogue is half written)”. While we wait for Day’s hilarious stories, his wines seep into the market, sometimes at very low prices. His 2004 saperavi, for example, can be found on winerobot.com.au for $24 by the dozen, while Dan Murphy offers the 2005 vintage at $28–$29. The 2004 appeals for its warm, earthy, mellow aroma and rich, firm, medium-bodied palate. It’s fully mature now and a delight to drink.

Irvine “The Estate” Shiraz 2014
Barossa Valley, South Australia
$25–$28
The Wade and Miles family recently purchased Jim Irvine’s brand and Eden Valley property. The revamped label now draws fruit from wider sources, including the Wade and Miles family’s Barossa Valley vineyards. Sam Wade writes, “The wine styles are also moving towards a fresher, brighter style in response to the changing palate of the consumer”. However, the Barossa’s warm-to-hot climate hasn’t changed. So the new, lighter style shiraz belies the reality of its warm origins. It’s a very pleasant, clean, fruity red of medium body, soft tannin and drink-now appeal.
Majella Shiraz 2013
Majella vineyard, Coonawarra, South Australia
$30–$35
Majella shiraz caught our attention from the very first vintage, 1991 – the year the grape-growing Lynn family began its gradual, and now complete, transition to winemaker. Their shiraz, though elegant and fine boned in the Coonawarra style, nevertheless requires cellaring to bring out its best, perhaps even more so in the powerful 2013 vintage. Behind the light, vivid, limpid colour lie deep, sweet berry fruit flavours, tightly bound up in fine but assertive fruit and oak tannins. The wine has its charms now, but from past experience we can expect the delicate and lovely fruit to flourish with a decade or so of cellaring. First reviewed in July 2015, the 2013 vintage looks even better half a year later, especially given its outstanding cellaring record.

Van Volxem Saar Riesling 2013
Saar River, Mosel wine region, Germany
$35
Roman Niewodniczanski’s historic wine estate, at Wiltingen, Germany, makes a range of single-vineyard rieslings as well as this dazzling blend from steep sites on the Saar River. At Manta Restaurant, Woolloomooloo, bone-dry Van Volxem 2013 served both as an aperitif and company for a variety of juicy, NSW oysters. Delicate yet intensely flavoured, with a laser edge of acidity, the wine suited the food, the moment and the setting. The unique combination of power and delicacy of Saar and Mosel rieslings comes from the very cool growing conditions at around 49 degrees north. The Saar flows north into the Mosel near Trier. Wines from both rivers belong to the official Mosel wine region. Imported by Fox Beverages and available by order through fine wine retailers.

Farewell Edgar Riek, Canberra wine pioneer

17 February 2016People, Vineyard, WineChris Shanahan

Dr Edgar Riek
1 May 1920 to 9 February 2016

How can we sketch even a portion of a life as long, rich, varied and inventive as Edgar Riek’s? The 95-year-old Canberra wine pioneer, and founder of the National Wine Show of Australia, died Tuesday 9 February 2016, following a fall a day earlier.

Riek’s influence rippled through every one of the diverse areas that came under his gaze, including his distinguished CSIRO science career, viticulture, wine, winemaking, horticulture, fly fishing, bridge and food.

In a Canberra Times article marking Riek’s 90^th birthday in 2010, Albert Caton chronicled some of Riek’s non-wine-related achievements:

“One of the old-school natural scientists, Riek’s main professional interests concentrated on the study of insects. He wrote eight of the chapters of the definitive Insects of Australia. Somehow, he also managed to find time to prepare a definitive taxonomic work on the Australian freshwater decapods (yabbies, marrons, Tasmanian freshwater crayfish, and such)”.

Caton also notes Riek’s breeding, at his Lake George property, of prickle-less prickly pear and thin-skinned walnuts. He also established there hundreds of fruit and nut trees, including truffle-inoculated hazelnuts, a magnificent bay tree and a spectacular mulberry tree. Later, in his Ainslie backyard, he crossed small, looking-up hellebores with a tall, droopy variety to produce a vase-friendly, mid-sized, looking-up version.

Perhaps Riek’s most enduring contribution to Canberra horticulture, came long before his move into grape growing. At a time when garden books referred to European practices, he contributed chapters for the Canberra Gardner (now in its 10^th edition) on “varieties growing in Canberra and their propagation”, writes Caton.

In 1953, eight years after joining the CSIRO in Canberra, Riek and others founded the Canberra Wine and Food Society. The club originally bottled its own wine, but gradually developed an extensive cellar and took food as seriously as it did wine. But Riek’s interest in wine and food extended well beyond club activities.

A 2006 Canberra Times article reported Riek worked for a time on CSIRO weed research in Bright, Victoria, and took the opportunity to visit nearby Rutherglen. “I just started going to Rutherglen fairly regularly, two or three times a year, and got to know that industry very well – so much so that they invited me to judge at the Rutherglen shows”, said Riek.

The Rutherglen connection sparked a life-long friendship with winemaker Mick Morris and led to Riek’s great expertise in making and blending fortified wine. Indeed, a barrel of Riek muscat lies under his Ainslie house. And other barrels of fortified remain in Riek’s old winery, says current owner Peter Wiggs.

Later, Riek and his wife Mary purchased land on the western shore of Lake George. Here they pastured their daughter Helen’s horse and established fruit and nut trees. In 1971, shortly after buying the land, Riek planted his first grape vines. In the same year, another brilliant CSIRO scientist, Dr John Kirk, planted vines at Murrumbatemen.

The Canberra wine industry was thus established in 1971 by two distinguished scientists acting entirely independently of one another.

With little information about which wine grapes might grow best, Riek planted 40 varieties, including several native American and Chinese vines. However, the Burgundy varieties, pinot noir and chardonnay, featured prominently in the 3.25-hectare vineyard.

He held great hopes for the pair, and at a lunch celebrating the 41^st anniversary of the Canberra District Vignerons Association on 20 November 2015, Riek recalled, “I thought we had Burgundy conditions”.

Like any of Riek’s decisive actions, his selection of the Lake George site resulted from a thorough understanding of what was required to grow grapes and other plants successfully.

Winemaker Alex McKay worked on the property during Riek’s ownership. He also led a rejuvenation of the site for the Karelas family some years after they purchased it from Riek.

McKay says, “His site selection was absolutely brilliant. It was brilliant how he worked it out”. Riek had figured that even on a very slight slope, warm air moved to the slightly higher northern end of Lake George, providing a measure of frost protection. And Riek had told winemaker Ken Helm how his car windows defrosted as he drove along that section of the lake.

McKay adds, “the soil, drainage and aspect” all suit grape growing, and “you would struggle to find better sites in the area”.

By “sites”, McKay refers not just to the Lake George vineyard, but a vineyard site Riek selected on Mount Majura for a friend, Dinny Killen in the late 1980s. The vineyard now belongs to Mount Majura Winery.

Winemaker Frank van der Loo says he came to Majura aware Riek had selected the site. But he became deeply impressed as he realised the depth of Riek’s involvement. He selected the site for a reason, then designed the irrigation and vineyard layout and even helped in the digging and planting.

Had Riek done nothing more than establish Lake George vineyard and identify the Mount Majura site, he would have left an enduring legacy. But his influence reached far wider.

On the strength of Riek’s savoury pinot noirs, Jim Lumbers hoped to establish a vineyard next door. He sought Riek’s help, and he obliged. “Edgar persuaded the owner, Betty Bolas [Riek’s next door neighbour in Ainslie], to subdivide the land and sell half to me”, recalls Lumbers. He adds, “Edgar identified the best bit of the land [for a vineyard]”. Lumbers, with partner Anne Caine, subsequently established Lerida Estate and winery on the site.

In 1974, Riek with John Kirk and Ken Helm formed the Canberra District Vignerons Association. All three attended its 41^st anniversary lunch last year, where Riek gave what was probably his last public speech.

Riek’s wine interests reached well beyond the Canberra District. Over many years he developed a network of friendships with major figures in the Australian industry.

The networks indicate deft political skills on Riek’s part, which he used to build the Canberra Wine Show, later the National Wine Show of Australia, on behalf of the National Capital Agricultural Society.

Riek acknowledged support he received in the early days from the Hunter Valley’s Murray Tyrrell and Lindeman’s Ray Kidd. And over a longer period, the influential Len Evans helped Riek forever tweak the quality of the national show.

Riek’s intense curiosity about every aspect of food and wine (and whatever else attracted his interest) drew him into a wide network of colleagues and friends. Those interviewed for this article noted an intense, unremitting curiosity, inventiveness, ability to apply knowledge, and a lifelong willingness to embrace and explore new ideas.

Winemaker Nick O’Leary described him as “a good friend and mentor” who only recently visited the winery to comment on his 2015 wines. Winewise owner, Lester Jesberg, likewise called him a friend and mentor.

Alex McKay of Collector Wines worked with Riek as a uni student. Riek inspired him to become a winemaker through his “attention to detail, precision and deep understanding of biology, ecology and so on”. Riek also loved the sensual rewards of his trade and insisted on good food and interesting wine with lunch after a hard morning’s work.

“He was the ultimate forager”, says McKay, with a profound understanding of seasons and habitats. Riek would visit Lake Bathurst for sea-eagle eggs, climb nearby poplars for other eggs and eat anything that moved or grew.

Suzie and Ian Hendry, long-term vignerons, recall being alarmed by Riek’s appetite for fungi. Despite his great knowledge on the subject, he’d occasionally announce plans to try a new variety and would they please check up on him if he didn’t visit in the morning. They eventually paid for a phone to be installed in his farm cabin.

Riek’s old friend, wine merchant David Farmer, recalls, “Edgar would try things. He didn’t dismiss ideas. He embraced them. He would try, reject and try something new. He would join with other like-minded people in a collegiate approach”. That collegiate, scientific approach became a founding principle of the Canberra wine scene. Riek’s influence on it was profound and will continue.

Penfolds Grange 2011 leads a blue-chip lineup

14 October 2015Vineyard, Wine, Wine reviewChris Shanahan

Tasting Grange 2011, Penfolds Magill Estate, 25 August 2015. Photo: Chris Shanahan

The release of Penfolds wines on 15 October will create a great wave of publicity, intense retail activity and widespread consumer interest, especially in the heady prices.

Are the wines worth their asking prices? Can buyers resell the wines profitably? Or, as has happened so frequently in the past, will auction prices fall below retail levels?

Many people hoard Penfolds wines, whether to drink, gift, resell or, unintentionally, bequeath (what a wake).

However, speculation in wine remains as fraught and risky as any investment; perhaps even more so as wine generates no income – just the hope, often illusory, of a capital gain. Meanwhile the wine risks spoilage, breakage and dinner party raids.

Best then to look at the one great certainty Penfolds provides: the distinctive style, exceptional quality and long-term cellaring potential of the top reds – an quality now shared by the whites, albeit with generally shorter cellaring windows.

Penfolds Bin 51 Eden Valley Riesling 2015
$30
From a good Eden Valley vintage comes this floral and lemony riesling. A core of plump fruit gives it immediate appeal. But its intensity, delicacy and strong line of acid suggest long-term cellaring.

Penfolds Bin 311 Tumbarumba Chardonnay 2014
$40
Ultra-fresh Bin 311 2014 combines melon-rind and grapefruit-like varietal flavours with the texture and the slightly funky, biscuity influence of fermentation and maturation on yeast lees, without obvious oak flavours.

Penfolds Reserve Bin A Adelaide Hills Chardonnay 2014
$100
Spontaneously fermented in mostly new (82 per cent) oak barrels, Reserve Bin A shows a powerful, if oaky, face of chardonnay. Despite the power, oak and yeast-lees character, the wine shows lemon-zest freshness in a bold style.

Penfolds Yattarna Chardonnay 2015
Coal and Derwent Valleys, Tasmania; Adelaide Hills, South Australia
$150
Like Hardys with its Eileen Hardy flagship, Penfolds quest for the finest cool-climate chardonnay led it steadily south to Tasmania, which now contributes the majority of fruit. This is profoundly good, oh-so-fine chardonnay. Another bottle please.

Penfolds Bin 23 Adelaide Hills Pinot Noir 2014
$40
Winemaker Peter Gago takes Bin 23 pinot in a unique direction. It’s gutsy, firm and clearly Penfolds in one respect. But the inclusion of whole bunches, a wild ferment and no filtration gives the wine a deep, earthy, savoury, tannic character well removed from fragrant, pretty-fruit styles. People will either love or hate its idiosyncrasy.

Penfolds Bin 150 Marananga Barossa Valley Shiraz 2013
$80
That Marananga, in the western Barossa, is home to some of Penfolds’ favourite shiraz, shows in Bin 150’s irresistible, ripe, juicy fruit flavours. And the fruit comes in layers with plump, ripe tannins, and the uplifting influence of first-class oak.

Penfolds Bin 407 Cabernet Sauvignon 2013
McLaren Vale, Padthaway, Coonawarra, Wrattonbully, Barossa Valley, South Australia
$80
From a diversity of regions, ranging from warm to cool, Bin 407 shows definitive, ripe varietal flavours of cassis and black olive, with an overlay of sweet oak and the variety’s authoritative, firm tannins.

Penfolds Bin 389 Cabernet Shiraz 2013
Barossa Valley, McLaren Vale, Padthaway, Wrattonbully, Coonawarra, South Australia
$80
The ripe, alluring aroma that’s neither cabernet nor shiraz, leads to a tremendously vibrant, buoyant palate, seamlessly combining cabernet’s power with shiraz’s subtle, juicy, flesh. Oak lifts the whole wine and firm tannins wash through a great Bin 389, with long-term cellaring potential.

Penfolds St Henri Shiraz 2012
Barossa Valley, McLaren Vale, Adelaide Hills, Robe, Clare Valley, South Australia
$100
(Wine of the release)
An inviting, sweet, fruity-earthy shiraz aroma leads to a buoyant, lively palate with deep, sweet, red-berry shiraz flavours – caressed by the finest, softest tannins imaginable. This is one of the best ever – a truly great Australian shiraz, destined to evolve for decades.

Penfolds Magill Estate Shiraz 2013
$130
One of the best Magills yet, from a warm vintage, retains the distinctive, elegant and medium bodied style. Ripe, plummy, jube-like fruit aromas lead to a warm, lively, seductive palate, where the high-quality oak gives thrust and spice to the lovely fruit.

Penfolds RWT Barossa Valley Shiraz 2013
$175
RWT shows a fragrant, fruity, supple side of Barossa shiraz, supported by high-quality French oak; it contrasts strongly with the power, and American oak influence, of Grange. Luscious fruit flavours, reminiscent of ripe, black cherry, saturate the 2013’s palate, combining lusciously with ripe, soft tannins and an appealing cedar-like character, derived from maturation in French oak barrels.

Penfolds Bin 169 Coonawarra Cabernet Sauvignon 2013
$350
Bin 169 cabernet provides an elegant contrast to the great power of Bin 707. In the warm 2013 season, Bin 169 leads with ripe, blackcurrant-like varietal flavour, with a touch of leafiness. Sweet oak and tannins come in waves, washing through the ripe fruit flavours and giving a uniquely “Penfolds” experience. I would expect Coonawarra’s elegance to emerge as the wine matures over the next few decades.

Penfolds Bin 707 Cabernet Sauvignon 2013
Adelaide Hills, Barossa Valley, Wrattonbully and Coonawarra
$500
Bin 707 resembles Grange in its dense, crimson-rimmed colour, distinct barrel-ferment character and unique elements of its aroma. However, these are mere seasonings to a potent cabernet, built on amazingly concentrated fruit, in a matrix with powerful, ripe tannins, partly oak derived. Like Grange, Bin 707 becomes increasingly finer and elegant with very long term cellaring. It’ll be a wonder and a joy to experience the journey of this great vintage.

Penfolds Grange 2011
Barossa Valley, McLaren Vale, Magill Estate, South Australia
$785
From one of the coldest, wettest vintages on record, comes a successful Grange, whose sweet, ripe fruit belies the cold season. The fruit proved flavoursome enough to absorb 17 months’ maturation in new American oak hogsheads. The palate combines fruit, oak and winemaking inputs in typical Grange style. But the vintage character shows in the way the supple, ripe fruit bubbles up through the tannins on a softer, more approachable palate than usual. However, even soft, easy-drinking Grange (1982, for example) ages well, and I’d be surprised if the 2011 isn’t drinking well 30 years from now.

Penfolds supplied these recommended prices ahead of the 15 October release. Expect retailer discounts.

Wine review – Freeman, Long Rail Gully, Vasse Felix, Yering Station and Ulithorne

23 September 2015Vineyard, Wine, Wine reviewChris Shanahan

Freeman Nebbiolo 2013
Freeman Altura vineyard, Hilltops, NSW
$35
Nebbiolo, the great red variety of Barolo and Barbaresco, Piedmont, provides more disappointments than triumphs. All too often intractable tannins swamp any initial pleasure in the soaring aroma and fruit sweetness. However, in Brian Freeman’s nebbiolo from Young, NSW, deep fruit flavours – reminiscent of dark, sour cherries – maintain a happy balance with the robust tannins. Indeed, this delicious consummation of opposing but equal forces creates an exciting flavour and textural sensation.

Long Rail Gully Riesling 2015
Long Rail Gully vineyard, Murrumbateman, Canberra District, NSW
$22
The Parker family established the 22-hectare Long Rail Gully vineyard, one of Canberra’s largest, in 1998. They originally sold fruit to Hardys, but these days they make wine for their own and other labels, and continue selling grapes to several local winemakers. The consistently outstanding wines, made by Richard Parker, son of founders Garry and Barbara Parker, remain very modestly priced for whatever reason. The 2015 shows the floral-and-lemony aromatics of riesling, with a delicate and delicious palate, featuring lovely lime-like varietal flavour and lingering, ultra-fresh dry finish.

Vasse Felix Filius Chardonnay 2014
Vasse Felix vineyard, Margaret River, Western Australia
$20.90–$28
Each vintage Vasse Felix winemaker Virginia Willcock makes many batches of chardonnay – all fermented and matured for nine-months in a mix of new and older oak barrels. She grades the barrels and from them blends three wines – the flagship Heytesbury ($75), a “quintessential” Margaret River chardonnay ($37) and “Filius” ($28), so-called son of quintessential. This is an exciting wine for the price as it captures the dazzling richness and freshness of Margaret River chardonnay, complete with the aroma, flavour and textural seasonings introduced by high-quality oak barrels. This is a brilliant chardonnay for the price.

Little Yering Shiraz Viognier 2013
Yarra Valley, Victoria
$18
Little Yering “spent its childhood in French oak”, declares the back label. I can report 12-months solitary confinement did nothing to restrain its youthful exuberance. Indeed the wine cartwheels pure, fruity enthusiasm across the palate, spreading the vibrant red-berry and spice deliciousness of Yarra Valley shiraz. Some of the vigour and thrust no doubt comes from the small portion of the white viognier in the blend; and the fine, spicy, soft tannins perhaps derive from oak as well as the fruit. It’s a pretty and yummy medium-bodied red to enjoy now.
Long Rail Gully Shiraz 2014
Long Rail Gully vineyard, Murrumbateman, Canberra District, NSW
$25
Long Rail Gully 2014 sits towards the lighter-coloured end of Canberra’s medium-bodied shiraz spectrum. Consistent with the lighter colour, the aroma reveals a cool-grown, spicy, even peppery, side of shiraz. Spicy-pepper flavours carry through on the palate, in tandem with lively, fresh fruit flavours. Spicy, fine tannins cut through the fine, smooth palate giving length to the dry finish.

Ulithorne Immortelle 2013
Corsica, France
$34
Immortelle’s official French appellation, “Indication Geographique Protegee Ile de Beaute” translates to country wine of the island of beauty (Corsica). And, indeed this medium bodied red combines the local grape varieties minustellu, niellucciu and carcaghjolo neru with syrah. Ulithorne’s Rose Kentish made the wine in conjunction with Corsican friends. The result: a crimson-rimmed red of medium hue with delightful floral and herb-garden aroma. The bright, fresh, medium-bodied palate precisely reflects the aroma, combining sweet underlying fruit with herbs and fine, grippy, savoury tannins.

Wine review – Parker Coonawarra Estate, Yalumba Galway, Giant Steps, Curly Flat, Scuttlebutt and Wagner Steeple

2 September 2015People, Vineyard, Wine, Wine reviewChris Shanahan

Parker Coonawarra Estate Cabernet Sauvignon 2013
North-western Coonawarra, South Australia
$18.90–$24
Our wine of the week earned its place for sheer flavour, value and fidelity to the Coonawarra regional style. The winery now belongs to WD Wines, an energetic business that also owns the Hesketh and St John’s Road brands. Jonathon Hesketh and Phil Lehmann, drive the businesses – Hesketh in charge of marketing and Lehmann making wine. In the excellent 2013 vintage, Lehmann captured the ripe, full flavours of the cabernet grape, complete with the mid-palate flesh that can be missing in cooler years. His approach for this wine, made to meet a particular retail price, emphasises Coonawarra’s cassis-like varietal flavours (OK, there’s a touch of mint), with sufficient tannin to give true cabernet structure and authority. This is a lot of wine for the price.

Yalumba Galway Vintage Shiraz 2013
Barossa Valley, South Australia
$10.45–$18
Yalumba Galway “Claret” once counted among Australia’s great reds, built for the cellar. It raised important eyebrows, including the only ones that counted in 1965, when, at an Adelaide lunch, Prime Minister Bob Menzies declared the 1961 vintage to be, “the finest Australian red I have ever tasted”. But time, markets and marketing diluted the Galway name. Today it stands in the crowded drink-now segment, offering generous and loveable – if not eyebrow-raising – quality. Galway 2013 delivers the appealing flavours of Barossa shiraz – ripe and generous fruit, with soft, easy tannins.

Giant Steps Tarraford Vineyard Chardonnay 2014
Tarraford vineyard, Yarra Valley, Victoria
$45
Pulp Kitchen on a cold Saturday night, and the rich, earthy food calls for, and gets, equivalent wines: a taut, elegant, savoury 2007 pinot noir from the great Burgundy vineyard, Clos de la Roche, made by the highly regarded Olivier Bernstein. However, we begin with an outstanding Australian chardonnay, inspired by Burgundy’s originals. From a cooler Yarra sub-region, it reveals all the brightness and intensity of modern Australian chardonnay, boosted by the delicious inputs of barrel fermentation and maturation.

Curly Flat Pinot Noir 2013
Curly Flat vineyard, Macedon Ranges, Victoria
$50–$56
Curly Flat’s pinots invariably rate well on release and develop nicely with bottle age, and little wonder given Phillip Moraghan’s attention to detail in the vineyard and winery. Tasted alongside the leaner, savoury, maturing, richly textured 2011, the new 2013 appeared ripe, fruity and soft. But with air and patience over a few days of tasting, the wine’s deeper, savoury flavours emerged, along with the silky texture and substantial tannins essential in top-shelf pinots. Right now, the 2011 provides more satisfying, mature drinking, but the 2013 has great potential, which it should begin to reveal in as little as one year.

Skuttlebutt Sauvignon Blanc Semillon 2015
Margaret River, Western Australia
$16.15–$18
The back label gushes fruity descriptors: citrus zest, passionfruit, gooseberry, ripe melon and ripe peach flesh, with a sting of “savoury nettles” thrown in. On the other hand, we can settle for “very fruity”, because it is, with the unbeatable freshness of a young wine, barely away from the bosom of mother vine. Suck it down joyously now. You can never get closer to the freshly fermented grape than this.

Wagner Stempel Riesling Trocken Gutswein 2014
Siefersheim, West Rheinhessen, Germany
$36
Winemaker Daniel Wagner writes, “There is no doubt this is a vintage of very high quality, which, however, could only be brought in at the cost of tremendous losses through selection”. Wagner’s comment if anything understates his attention to detail in the vineyards, which ultimately produces such racy, delicate, deeply flavoured rieslings. Though full bodied for riesling, Wagner’s 2014 remains delicate, with apple-like flavours, cut through with thrilling acidity. The combination of intense flavour, finesse and high acidity suggest good cellaring prospects – if you can resist the urge to drink it now.

Tasting Victoria’s wine spectrum, from the cool Yarra to hot Rutherglen

23 August 2015People, Vineyard, Wine reviewChris Shanahan

Oakridge Over the Shoulder Yarra Valley Chardonnay 2014 $18.10–$22
Just-released Oakridge 2014 rates among the top few Australian chardonnays anywhere near $20 in price. There’s a thrill in every sip, underpinned by the most delicious fruit: imagine fresh, ripe nectarine with the added briskness of lemon or grapefruit juice. But there’s more to a really good wine than just the fruit. In this instance fermentation in oak barrels and maturation on spent yeast cells added a complementary patina of flavours and textures. These elements are the sauce to the main ingredient, fruit, which must always remain at centre. Congratulations to the chef, David Bicknell.

Oakridge Over the Shoulder Yarra Valley Pinot Noir 2014 $18.10–$22
Oakridge Over the Shoulder pinot, like the chardonnay, offers most of the thrills of the variety at a fair price. However, where the chardonnay drinks beautifully now, the pinot, despite its rampant and lovely fruit, needs a year’s bottle age to move from fruitiness to what pinotphiles call “pinosity”. This is where the many elements of the wine come together as a fragrant, silky, seductive, satisfying whole. Right now the bright, ripe, pure varietal flavour hovers above the deeper savoury elements waiting to push through – which they did in the five days we spent with our bottle.

Anderson Verrier Rutherglen Durif Shiraz 2008 $32.50
Based largely on wines made from the durif grape, Rutherglen’s burly reds, have been called wines for heroes. Howard and Christobelle Anderson’s blend, from their unirrigated vineyard, fits the regional durif stereotype, mollified by the addition of shiraz. A deep and brooding winter warmer, it offers very ripe, earthy, porty aromas and flavours, fleshy mid palate, sturdy (but not hard) tannins and mellow bottle age. Durif, by the way, is an accidental cross of shiraz and peloursin, discovered in Montpellier, France, in 1880 by Francois Durif and imported to Australia by Francois de Castella in 1908.

Exceptional vintage revealed in Canberra, Tumbarumba 2015 wines

19 August 2015People, Vineyard, Wine, Wine reviewChris Shanahan

Ravensworth Charlie Foxtrot Gamay Noir 2014
Johansen vineyard, Tumbarumba, NSW
$30
Earlier this year winemaker Bryan Martin eagerly accepted a small parcel of red gamay grapes from the Johansen vineyard, Tumbarumba. With fruity, drink-now Beaujolais in mind, Martin picked the brains of a visiting French winemaker. The Frenchman contacted winemaking mates in Beaujolais. And before long Martin had two batches of gamay bubbling away: de-stemmed berries fermenting in an open-top vessel; and whole bunches, stems included, tightly sealed inside a tall, thin steel tank. In this oxygen-free environment they underwent enzymatic breakdown ahead of a regular yeast ferment. Well, the open-ferment wine matured in barrel for a short time, while the anaerobic one remained pure and fruity. Martin blended the components, ready for us to suck down in all its fragrant, fruity, juicy glory. It’s mainly about fruit. But there’s a savoury element and a teasing, subtle stemmy note derived from those whole bunches.

Ravensworth Riesling 2015
Murrumbateman and Wamboin, Canberra District, NSW
$25
The austere, lemon-like acidity of very young Canberra rieslings makes them, “a bit of an ordeal without sugar”, says winemaker Bryan Martin. So, he blends a little unfermented juice into both his own and Clonakilla rieslings. The addition introduces about four to five grams per litre of sugar into the wines – enough to offset the acidity, but not detectable as sweetness. For his own wine, Martin combines a pure, protectively made component with more richly textured material, spontaneously fermented on skins, grape solids and lees in a ceramic fermenter. The blend presents lemony tart, delicious Canberra riesling with the added flesh and grip contributed by the spontaneously fermented component.

Ravensworth Pinot Gris 2015
Long Rail Gully, Murrumbateman, Canberra District, NSW
$25
We’re sure to hear lots more of Bryan Martin’s ceramic egg – a small fermentation vessel that “allows oxygen circulation without the flavour of an oak barrel”, says Martin. In 2015 he made three wines in the vessel: a component of his riesling, a yet-to-be released grenache and this pinot gris. It’s a bright, fresh dry white with pear-like varietal flavour and, perhaps more importantly, a rich, smooth texture, derived from spontaneous fermentation of the cloudy juice and contact with yeast lees. Sulphur compounds, noticeable on first opening the bottle, add interest to the palate.

Helm Classic Dry Riesling 2015
Helm and neighbouring vineyards, Nanima Valley, Canberra District, NSW
$35
In the subtly varying world of Canberra riesling, Ken “Mr Riesling” Helm heads down a different path than Ravensworth or Clonakilla. Helm keeps his Classic Dry effectively bone dry, with residual sugar of just 2.5 grams a litre. It’s also slightly lower in alcohol at 11.8 per cent. It’s therefore leaner and more delicate and, at this very early stage of development, doesn’t have the body of wines with higher levels of sugar. Nevertheless the floral aromas and intense lemon-like varietal flavours are there and, from experience, the palate will begin fleshing out over the next six months or so in bottle. This is a notable riesling and even though lean and taut now, appears fleshy in comparison to Helm’s Premium wine.

Helm Premium Riesling 2015
Lustenberger and Helm 1832 vineyards, Nanima Valley, Canberra District, NSW
$48
Assessing Helm’s Premium riesling now, when it’s barely out of the fermenter, is really about guessing where it’s headed in future. Right now it’s delicate and fine, lower in alcohol than his Classic Riesling and also slightly lower in acidity. As an act of faith, based on past vintages, we can predict a bright future. I suspect its slightly more forward, cheaper sibling could pull in the gold medals from later this year. But the Premium will almost certainly pull ahead in a couple of years and show the class previously displayed by wine from the Lustenberger vineyard. However, we must rate it on how it appears now – probably a great wine in waiting.

Helm Half Dry Riesling 2015
Nanima Valley, Murrumbateman, Canberra District, NSW
$28
Helm’s ninth vintage of half-dry demonstrates how a little bit of sugar helps the riesling go down. To be precise, 18 grams of residual grape sugar in every litre of wine provides a delicate counter to the eight grams of acid. The sugar adds a juicy richness to the wine’s mid palate, while the acidity provides vitality and freshness. The modest sugar level remains well short of dessert-wine sweetness and, indeed, this style goes really well with highly spiced food.

1853 vineyard Aussie mourvedre, viognier’s new face and Aldi’s Mosel bargain

9 August 2015People, Vineyard, Wine reviewChris Shanahan

Barossa Valley Mourvedre vines, planted in1853

Hewitson Old Garden Barossa Valley Mourvedre 2012 $88
“In 1853 Friedrich Koch planted this mourvedre vineyard in the heart of the Barossa Valley in the area now known as Rowland Flat. Nurtured in deep sand over a bed of limestone the vines flourished. By the 1880s the local vignerons had already acknowledged the vineyard as the Old Garden”, writes winemaker Dean Hewitson. In 2012 those venerable159-year-olds provided the fruit for Hewitson’s timeless red. Hewitson’s fine tuning since 1998 – the year he rescued the fruit from the blending vat – gives us in 2012 a limpid, elegant red. It glows with spice and fruit flavours, suspended in taut, silky tannins, reminiscent in a structural sense, of high-quality pinot.

Clonakilla Canberra District Viognier Nouveau 2015 $24–$28
Clonakilla 2015 portrays the fresh and fruity face of a variety deeply woven into Clonakilla’s global success. At the suggestion of son Jeremy, John Kirk planted the then little-appreciated variety in 1986, punting it might give Clonakilla a point of difference over larger competitors. But in 1991, another son, Tim, returned from France inspired by Marcel Guigal’s northern Rhone shiraz–viognier blends. He emulated the style, and it became the benchmark for new-world versions of the Rhone model. But the Kirks also make two straight viogniers: a serious oak-fermented style, and this bright, fresh wine that pulses with juicy, apricot- and ginger-like varietal flavour.

Peter Mertes Mosel Riesling 2013 $9.99
Aldi’s semi-dry riesling comes from the vicinity of Kues, the village opposite Bernkastel on Germany’s Mosel River. These days the area carries the name Bernkastel-Kues, and the hyphen is perhaps symbolic of the bridge joining the two villages. The middle Mosel produces some of the world’s great rieslings bearing both the name of an individual vineyard and the nearest village. Bernkastler Doctor wines, for example, come from the Doctor vineyard at Bernkastel. Aldi’s wine bears only the Mosel name. It’s an impressive regional style at this price: full flavoured but delicate, low in alcohol and with high acidity nicely balancing the grapey sweetness.