Shaw Vineyard was a producer I wasn’t familiar with, but to be honest I’m pretty unfamiliar with a lot of wines from New South Wales. The Canberra area is one of the states most premium wine-producing regions, so I was intrigued to look at the Shaw Vineyard wines. Here are my thoughts.
I’ve been familiar with the Coonawarra producer Rymill since my days as a wine buyer for a Melbourne independent wine store, though it’s been at least five years since I’ve tasted any of their wines. I was very interested to look at two of their cabernet sauvignon wines that I received as samples, here are my impressions.
I was joined by a very special guest on this edition of Let’s Taste, Piero Fonseca, who as an Italian sommelier and wine wholesaler is an expert in Italian varieties. We looked at a bottle from my cellar, the 2010 Giaconda Nebbiolo. Giaconda is one of Australia’s most cult producers, it’s Beechworth vineyard producing one of the finest chardonnays in the country. I was fascinated to see what their interpretation of the noble nebbiolo grape would be.
As mentioned before here on Let’s Taste and on my podcast The Vincast, Yeringberg is a very special winery for me as they produced my epiphany wine that led me to follow my career path. For a period of time I would try to find older bottles of Yeringberg wines, and this was the last one I had. The bottle unfortunately wasn’t in great condition, but the wine still looked pretty good. Let me know what you think in the comments below!
Not the first time I’ve tasted Toppers Mountain wines on the channel, but the first time I’ve tasted some of their red wines. Toppers Mountain – located in the northern New South Wales region of New England – are known for their use of alternative varieties. They do however produce some more prominent international varieties, so here I can compare their approach to two grapes!
Increasing the volume of fruit for this vintage meant a lot more pressing. Luckily that was largely automated thanks to the pneumatic press, but there was quite a lot of manual labour required, bucketing solids into the press. Six separate skin-contact ferments were all press at different times, and every time the press needed to be cleaned. The pressing program was as follows;
– One of two tonnes of Riverland Vermentino were fermented on skins in two separate ferments. One was pressed immediately after the completion of fermentation, spending a total of nine days on skins. The other was pressed twelve days later, spending a total of three weeks on skins. Both were transferred to neutral white barriques for ageing.
– One tonne of Mildura Nero d’Avola was de-stemmed and split into two fermenters. After only two days of fermentation one half-tonne was pressed and completed fermentation in a stainless steel tank, whilst the other half-tonne completed fermentation on skins but was pressed soon after, a total of 10 days on skins. Each press went to a 300L mature hogshead barrel for ageing.
– Two tonnes of Pyrenees nebbiolo were de-stemmed and split in half. Both finished fermenting on skins. Nothing was added or removed from these ferments. One tonne was pressed after 15 days on skins, the other spent 56 days on skins. They were split between 2010 and 2012 vintage barriques.
Vino Intrepido is a (soon to be launched) brand that combines great Italian grape varieties with great Australian wine regions and growers, experimenting with different winemaking techniques to bring you delicious wine! If you are interested in finding out more, please get in touch via email on vinointrepido@gmail.com
The 2017 vintage was very prolonged, and each of the three varieties finished fermenting before the next one arrived. The fermentations were as follows;
– Two tonnes Riverland Vermentino were split in half – one tonne was pressed and one tonne de-stemmed for skin-contact fermentation. Half of the pressed juice was transferred to neutral barriques for barrel-fermentation, the rest fermented in stainless steel. The two skin-contact ferments had a neutral commercial yeast added to help them through ferment.
– One tonne of Mildura Nero d’Avola was de-stemmed and split into two fermenters. After only two days of fermentation one half-tonne was pressed and completed fermentation in a stainless steel tank, whilst the other half-tonne completed fermentation on skins. Due to the low acids and high pH, tartaric acid was added to help balance the wine.
– Two tonnes of Pyrenees nebbiolo were de-stemmed and split in half. Both finished fermenting on skins. Nothing was added or removed from these ferments.
Vino Intrepido is a (soon to be launched) brand that combines great Italian grape varieties with great Australian wine regions and growers, experimenting with different winemaking techniques to bring you delicious wine! If you are interested in finding out more, please get in touch via email on vinointrepido@gmail.com
Whilst the D’Aloisio family have been involved with agriculture in the Yarra Valley since the 1960s, it wasn’t until 1994 that they planted their own vineyards. Starting with the most important varieties for the region (Cabernet Sauvignon, Shiraz, Merlot, Pinot Noir, Chardonnay and Sauvignon Blanc), they have since diversified with alternative varieties. Barbera is one of those grapes, and I was excited to try a bottle of their 2013 vintage. Let me know what you think in the comments below!
Heggies Vineyard is part of Hill-Smith Family Vineyards, planted at high elevations in the Eden Valley region of South Australia. Much of the wine is sold through major retailers or exported. The focus is on white wine, particularly chardonnay. These samples were submitted for my impressions, let me know what you think in the comments below.
I’ve been friends with Sam Jorgensen (aka Old Mate Wine) on social media for a few years, and was thrilled to finally meet him in person over in Perth two years ago. He’s been working in the industry for a while and gave me a bottle of his first wine to taste. Two years later his approach to riesling has changed a bit, and while he and his partner were over for dinner I thought I would open his 2016 riesling with him, to discuss how he made it last year. Let me know what your thoughts are in the comments below.
The Vincast - a Wine Podcast with The Intrepid Wino
A podcast about wine, wine culture and wine people. Every week a different guest from the wine industry joins host The Intrepid Wino (aka James Scarcebrook) for a casual chat about the world of wine.
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