As reported last week, David Farmer, co-founder of former Canberra-based Farmer Bros, is about to re-enter the wine trade via a cellar door mail order operation –glug.com.au — in the Barossa Valley. While setting up the business, though, David’s been applying the disciplines of his old trade, geology, to the Barossa. This work when published … Continue reading Geologist David Farmer defines Barossa land surfaces
Yalumba Eden Valley Viognier 2004 $19.95 to $22.95 Yalumba offers three viogniers, each outstanding at its price – and little wonder. Since establishing Australia’s first significant plantings in the Eden Valley in 1980, they’ve worked hard to tame and bottle what winemaker Louisa Rose calls an ‘incredibly challenging’ and ‘unpredictable’ variety. The amazingly plush, complex … Continue reading Wine review — Yalumba & Peter Lehmann
A long winemaking history, varied landscapes, large area under vine and sheer numbers of winemakers underlie the Barossa Valley’s ability to make so many wine styles so well. Riesling, semillon, chardonnay, viognier, shiraz, grenache, grenache-mourvedre-shiraz blends, cabernet sauvignon and a range of sublime fortifieds all earned gongs at last week’s Barossa Wine Show. This tasty … Continue reading Barossa show turns on a treat
Grosset Watervale Riesling 2005 $33 & Polish Hill Riesling 2005 $39 Jeffrey Grosset’s Clare rieslings, from the subregions of Watervale and Polish Hill, rank consistently amongst the best of the style in Australia. The Watervale (for the first time in 2005 entirely from Grosset’s own vineyard) is almost unbelievably pure and delicate with a racy, … Continue reading Wine review — Grosset, Mount Majura & Leo Buring
After a hot, flavour-sapping 2004 vintage, the milder 2005 season seems to have produced rieslings of subtle perfume, delicious flavour and, in the better examples, the classic intensity and acid structure for long-term cellaring. As these flow into an increasingly competitive market over the next few months, it’ll pay to stock up – provided, of … Continue reading Aussie 2005 rieslings looking good
‘You’ve never heard of a champion race horse with a bad name’. Attributed to viticulturist Vic Patrick during a prolonged, and at times rancorous, debate over the naming of Wrattonbully wine region. Wrattonbully, the biggest of several new wine regions on South Australia’s Limestone Coast, sprawls for forty kilometres along the Naracoorte Tableland, touching Padthaway … Continue reading The rise of Wrattonbully — unique new Aussie wine region
In the wine industry the lead-time from vision to realisation can be twenty years. It takes that long for vines and winemaking skills to mature. Indeed, in some cases, it may be even longer before consumers perceive the benefit of a visionary decision made decades earlier. For example, when Karl Seppelt established vineyards at Drumborg, … Continue reading Rich, luscious viognier, straight or blended
By April this year, Clare and Eden Valley riesling makers could hardly believe their own good luck. They’d barely finished crowing about 2002 — the best vintage in twenty years, they said — even better than the excellent 2001s. And, here were the barely fermented 2003s looking every bit as good as the 2002s, perhaps … Continue reading Vintage 2003 — outstanding for Aussie rieslings
As a Johnnie-come-lately of the wine world, Australia boasts some remarkably old wine dynasties. We can’t equal the 600 years of Italy’s Antinori family; nor the 952 years claimed by my old mate Ferdinando Guicciardini of Poppiano, Florence. Considering the comparative recency of our own industry — and the lack of a popular wine-drinking culture … Continue reading Saltram celebrates 140 years
Twenty years ago Australia’s chardonnay plantings were too small to be noted in official statistics. In 1988 we harvested 21,800 (1.5 million dozen bottles) tonnes of chardonnay — just one eighth of 1998’s record 173,000 tonnes (12.1 million cases). 1988’s chardonnay harvest accounted for just five per cent of Australia’s wine grape production; 1998’s represented … Continue reading Chardonnay a perennial favourite. But beware the unoaked versions