‘Although alcohol does not have a taste’, writes Professor A. Dinsmoor Webb (Oenologist, UC Davis, retired), ‘it has an effect, not just on the human nervous system, but on how a wine tastes. The alcohol content in a perfectly balanced wine should be unfathomable, but wines that are slightly too high in alcohol can have a hot aftertaste. As a general rule, wines described as ‘full bodied’ are high in alcohol, while those described as ‘light’ are low in alcohol.’

Professor Webb’s words imply that there’s an optimum alcohol content for each wine. Indeed, over the last few years, many Australian wines, reds in particular, have copped criticism for going over the top.
And last week at the Australian Wine Industry Outlook Conference, Dan Jago, director of beer, wine and spirits for giant UK retailer, Tesco, warned Aussie makers of a swing towards lighter red styles.

It’s a topic widely discussed amongst winemakers, partly in response to perceived consumer resistance to reds weighing in at fifteen per cent or more alcohol by volume. The alcohol is quite often accompanied by masses of sweet fruit, mountains of tannin and enough oak to rebuild the ark.

The issue is not limited to reds, nor solely to Aussie wines. I once tasted, for instance, a sherry-like Californian chardonnay bottled at a breathalyser blowing 16.5 per cent alcohol. It was awful.

And it’s not only consumers driving the alcohol discussion. Many winemakers and wine show judges question the drinkability of excessively big wines. A couple of years back, for example, Jim Brayne, McWilliams chief winemaker told me, ‘The wheel seems to be turning. High quality shiraz and chardonnay seems to be coming down in alcohol as winemakers seek finesse and palate structure rather than just volume’. ‘Wine judges are rewarding the finer wines, too’, he added.

To understand the relationship between flavour and sugar (and, hence, alcohol), it’s worth looking at wine grapes through a vigneron’s eyes. The vigneron approaches grapes with a wine style in mind. Two of the key parameters in deciding when to harvest grapes to achieve the desired style are sugar ripeness and flavour ripeness. These are related but not in a linear way.

Now, sugar ripeness determines the alcohol content of a dry wine and in most Australian growing regions achieving sufficient sugar levels is not a problem. However, as winemakers tend to harvest for a particular flavour profile, it’s not uncommon, especially in warmer areas, for sugar levels (and therefore alcohol potential) to climb very high before flavour ripeness is achieved.

So, let’s look at the Hunter examples. Jim Brayne says that semillon in the lower Hunter develops ripe fruit flavours when the alcohol potential is around ten to eleven per cent. Indeed, the better Hunter semillons today continue to be made at about this level. In contrast, says Jim, semillon grown in the much warmer Griffith area, develops ripe fruit flavours at much higher sugar levels and therefore the wines are more alcoholic

Now, with Hunter shiraz, things have changed. Jim says that in the old days the Hunter’s lousy vintage weather often left shiraz stranded on about 11 per cent alcohol. These wines were light, thin and green. Improved viticulture, says Jim, means that even in poor seasons today’s Hunter shiraz reaches respectable sugar and flavour ripeness levels.

Some makers, however, boost alcohol in poor seasons by running off juice, concentrating it by removing water, then adding the concentrated juice back for fermentation.

Interestingly, in good seasons, sugar levels achieved in the Hunter shiraz today are similar to those achieved in good seasons in the old days.

While there is evidence that some modern yeasts extract more alcohol than older strains, it seems the ultimate alcohol content of any given wine is dependent on the grape variety, the region, the season and winemaker decisions about time of harvest.

If, indeed, we experience a wider swing to elegance and finesse, we’ll see subtle declines in alcohol content because winemaker in any given region still have to harvest within the fairly narrow flavour ripeness spectrum. I don’t think we’ll see again, for example, the thin, green 11 per cent alcohol Coonawarras peddled about in the early eighties.

For those seeking elegant, comparatively low alcohol wines, the answer may be found in cool areas, or in regions where through some peculiarity or another, a particular variety (like Hunter semillon or Clare riesling) achieve flavour ripeness before the sugar level explodes.

That said, wines of comparatively high alcohol content are not unique to Australia and can be just as easily found in France, Italy, Spain or pretty well anywhere you look. Whether nature provides or humans add the sugar that ultimately becomes alcohol matters less than the impact that the alcohol has on a wine’s flavour.

As the good professor said above ‘the alcohol content in a perfectly balanced wine should be unfathomable.’ I’ve had beautifully balanced, elegant, Aussie reds weighing in at 15 per cent alcohol and hot, hollow ones of only 13 to 14 per cent.

What that means, of course, is that alcohol content on its own tells you little about the overall quality of a wine. And given our growing export success it suggests that in working towards lower alcohol content, we shouldn’t sacrifice the ripe, fruity flavours that people love.

Copyright © Chris Shanahan 2007

The wine regions that stick in our minds are those with a specialty. Think of the Barossa and shiraz, Clare Valley and riesling, Coonawarra and cabernet sauvignon, Marlborough and sauvignon blanc, Burgundy and pinot noir and chardonnay or Champagne with its incomparable pinot-chardonnay bubbly blends. The list is long.

But when I judged at the Mudgee regional show a few years back, and again on a recent visit to the region, I found a diversity of styles but not one that I’d identify with the region. So, what is Mudgee wine? Does it have a specialty?

You sometimes still hear of ‘Mudgee mud’, a tag coined for a local beer during post world war two rationing. Somehow, undeservedly, the name attached itself to the area’s distinctly un-mud-like wines.

One interpretation of the Mudgee name, ‘nest in the hills’, captures the feeling of this elevated, mountain-ringed area on the Cudgegong River. Its mild growing season tends to produce good grape yields and medium bodied wines.

From Craigmoor’s founding in 1858 until the late eighties, the regional reputation grew from the efforts of small to medium makers like Craigmoor, Hill of Gold, Huntington Estate, Miramar and Montrose.

But the benign climate, availability of water from the Cudgegong and proximity to the Hunter region attracted a new wave of investors during the nineties. Small maker numbers increased, but these were dwarfed by broad acre plantings driven by the mid to late nineties grape shortages.

In this period, Goree Park, famous for its Mudgee horse stud, the Paspaley pearling family, Hunter-based Rosemount Estate and others, established very large vineyards. With the exception of Rosemount, which had planted to meet demand for its own brand, much of the new production went to large companies, notably Southcorp and Orlando-Wyndham.

For a period, then, Mudgee performed much the same function, albeit on a smaller scale, as South Australia’s Langhorne Creek – as a source of significant volumes of grapes for middle priced wines.

Mudgee’s wine identity continued to be carved largely by small makers, with some exceptions – notably Orlando’s Montrose, Poet’s Corner and Craigmoor brands and Rosemount’s Mountain Blue, a top-shelf red made from very old vines.

But for all of the good wines made from the seventies onwards only a few seemed memorable. Bob Roberts made some terrific reds at Huntington Estate and Carlo Corino and then Robert Paul at Montrose showed that the Italian varieties, sangiovese and barbera, had potential.

Then judging at the 2003 Mudgee a regional show a couple of impressively fresh, older chardonnays, including Miramar 1984, sparked memories – of a delicious Carl Corino Montrose Chardonnay tasted on my first visit there in 1979, some lovely early eighties Craigmoor chardonnays and the superb Montrose Stony Creek Chardonnay. Could this, perhaps be Mudgee’s specialty?

I had the question in mind on a visit to Mudgee three weeks ago. Just as it had been back in 1979, Montrose was the first stop. In the late seventies it was shiny new and impressive – having been founded by two Italians, Carlo Salteri and Franco Belgiorno-Nettis in 1974.

About twenty years later, ownership passed to Orlando-Wyndham. Then, in December 2006, the Oatley family (founders of Rosemount Estate, by now a Foster’s brand) purchased Orlando’s Mudgee interests.

The purchase included the Poet’s Corner Winery (now back to its original name, Montrose), the historic Craigmoor cellars (founded 1858) and an impressive suite of vineyards, including a lovely plot of Italian varieties planted on Montrose’s Stony Creek Vineyard by Carlo Corino in the 1970s.

As well, the Oatley’s maintained ownership of the Mudgee vineyards originally planted for Rosemount – although the plum Mountain Blue Vineyard remains with Foster’s, presumably to feed Rosemount Mount Blue red.

The Oatleys recruited James Manners as winemaker and pretty smartly planned a roll out of its Wild Oats, Robert Oatley, Montrose and Craigmoor brands.

Like the Rosemount brand before it, the new venture will rely on driving volume with its multi-regional value range – in this case the Wild Oats label. These are already in the market and moving well.

But the Mudgee regional focus is going to be important, too, James Manners told me. All of the chardonnays have been from Mudgee from day one, most of the flagship Robert Oatley wines will come from Mudgee and all of the Montrose and Craigmoor wines be regional.

He’s not sure why chardonnay does so well in the region. Judged on climate alone – mild rather than cool or cold – you’d expect tasty, early maturing styles. Instead, and especially from the slightly higher, cooler Stony Creek vineyard, the chardonnays tend to be fine, complex and extraordinarily long lived – like the Miramar 1984 that won a trophy at the 2003 show.

The sangiovese and barbera planting at Stony Creek are to be extended – vindicating Carlo Corino’s judgment back in the seventies. The 2006s, now in tank, look terrific and will be released under the Montrose label next year.

But there’s work to be done on the cabernets and shirazes. Both grow well in the area but the flavours tend to fade quickly as very firm tannins take over on the palate. James believes that the solution lies partly in vineyard practice – modifying vine canopies to encourage equal ripening of tannins and fruit flavours – and partly in winemaking.

For Mudgee, the arrival of the Oatleys is nothing but good news. These guys are proven performers. They made Rosemount a household word in the US. And they have the drive, ability and resources to take Mudgee to the world. Finally, the word from Chris Hancock, Bob Oatley’s right hand man, is that the US market loves the name Mudgee and see it as pure Aussie.

Copyright © Chris Shanahan 2007