Four Vintages Of Penfolds Grange

The week of indulgence continued with a comparative tasting of some Grange vintages. Now, Grange is the opposite of what you would do if you were to design an ultra premium red wine today. You would pick a single vineyard; Grange is not only a blend of vineyards, but even regions. You would focus on one variety; Grange has some Cabernet blended with the Shiraz in most years. You would use French oak; Grange, of course, is matured in American oak. Your label would be more eye-catching. Yet, Grange is Australia's icon wine.

The tasted wines were 1990, 1996, 2001 and 2010 Penfolds Grange, with a 2002 Clarendon Hills Astralis thrown in for good measure. A lot has been written about these wines. Therefore I will just stick to my highlights. The best wines were the 1990 and 1996 Grange.

My wine of the night was the 1996 Grange. It was a little fresher than the 1990, the fruit a bit more generous now - a lot of complexity, smoke and spice and a firm grip (98 points). 

The legendary 1990 still shows this incredible layering of fruit. It has become more delicate, as the tannins have softened. The finish is very long and so is the life ahead (97 points).

The 2001 demonstrates what happens if the fruit is not powerful and weighty. Licorice takes over on the palate, there is a bit of heat, and the mouthfeel is not as round. This is still a good wine, but Grange has quite a lot of vintage variation (92 points).

The 2010 is back to form. This is an inky wine with dark fruit flavours (the 1990 has red fruit, also), firm, but silky tannins. The structure is balanced with a long finish. This wine is too early to drink and should develop more differentiated characteristics (95 points).

Grange is not everybody's favorite. Some find it too powerful and overwhelming. If you are aiming for a top shelf Australian Shiraz, the other choice would be Hill of Grace, for most. But an equally attractive choice could be Clarendon Hills' Astralis wine.

The 2002 Astralis is not as big and powerful as Grange, yet it is a full-bodied wine. The mouthfeel is very harmonious, with great balance and silky tannins. Next to its blackberry and plum fruit, it delivers attractive mocca flavours (96 points).

This was a great tasting and a rare opportunity to taste different Grange vintages side by side. Vertical tastings always deepen one's understanding of a particular wine.

The Standish Wine Company The Schubert Theorem

A week of indulgence kicked off with the 2010 The Standish Wine Company The Schubert Theorem. This wine takes branding to another level. First, the label. You cannot actually read anything. If you use a magnifying glass, you will identify a mathematical formula ( The Schubert Theorem, which is about knot theory and states that every knot can be expressed as the sum of prime (indecomposable) knots).

  

When you look at the back label, it has the regulatory requirements on it, but again, it is very hard to read. I am surprised Dan Standish gets away with it. As to the name, well the fruit comes from a Marananga vineyard which was owned by the Schubert family.

Barossa Shiraz has come under a lot of fire lately because of the wines often being overripe and alcoholic (more by critics than consumers). Dan Standish has largely avoided this criticism, because his wines, while very big, seem balanced and controlled. And so it is with this wine.

As I pour this wine, it looks like I pour black ink. I am worried. On the palate, there is a huge mouthfeel, there is black fruit, mulberry, marmalade, olive, but also vibrant red currant. The fruit is layered, and the wine has drive and acidity. The tannins are firm, and the whole package covers the alcohol well. This is a big wine, no doubt, but it does not feel heavy. The finish is perhaps a little thick.

Those that are skeptical of Barossa Shiraz should try this wine (it is $100/bottle). It is a great example of a well crafted wine in a unique Australian style.

Score: 96/+++  

Goisot Chardonnay

I do not drink much French Chardonnay, and if I do, I try to find good value matched by quality - not easy.

This medium weight wine almost gets me there. The father and son team Guilhelm and Jean-Hugues Goisot make wine near Chablis in the less highly regarded Yonne area. The 2015 Goisot Bourgogne Côtes d'Auxerre Blanc has an attractive profile of citrus, grapefruit and passionfruit flavours. There is a small oak influence on the palate. This wine is perhaps a little broad (2015 was very warm), but it goes well with chicken or salad.

Score: 91/+

Clarendon Hills Romas Vineyard Grenache

Some have said the Romas Vineyard in Blewitt Springs, North-East McLaren Vale, is Australia's greatest Grenache vineyard. The bush vines are now 99 years old. The vineyard is very steep, and the yield a very low 0.5t/acre.

I am tasting the 2012 Clarendon Hills Romas Grenache. The wine has a very dark colour and a deep black fruited aroma.

The very ripe raspberry fruit delivers a big mouthfeel on the palate. There is a sweet core, but it is actually dominated by alcohol and coarse, dry tannins. If you know Torbreck's Les Amis, this is the McLaren Vale equivalent. I find the wine not particularly refined, and the alcohol starts to burn the mouth on the finish.  

This wine clearly makes a statement, and it is far removed from delicate, sometimes sweet Grenache. Some will like it, but this wine is too much on steroids for me.

Score: 92/-

Bass Phillip 2017 Releases

I had an opportunity to taste the highly anticipated 2017 releases from Bass Phillip yesterday, in their first showing. The line-up did not disappoint.

The Chardonnays are quite different from the Australian norm, or any norm for that matter, and it takes a bit of time to get your head around it. The 2017 Estate Chardonnay has its focus on texture. There are nutty characters on the palate, cashew and almond, and if you want to describe fruit, you would pick white peach. There is not much of citrus and the acidity is subdued. It reminds me of a Rhone white (92 points).

The 2017 Premium Chardonnay, from a different vineyard, has similar characteristics, but is more intense, and more elegant at the same time. The 100% new oak in which the wine was matured is only lightly toasted and provides some softening and balance, not really flavour. The wine has a long acid profile along the palate and great energy towards the finish. This is quite an exceptional wine (95 points).

Bass Phillip has two main Pinot Noir vineyards. The  smaller home vineyard, 40 years old, and the Leongatha vineyard, 20 years old. The fruit sourcing has recently changed a little bit. The 2017 Crown Prince Pinot Noir remains the work horse of the Leongatha vineyard. The aromatics on the bouquet are very intense and complex. The complexity continues on the palate and is a major departure from previous years. Dark cherry and forest floor notes dominate. There is also some Asian spice. The wine has more power on the back, and remains strong on its fruit flavours. Silky tannins round out the picture (93 points).

The 2017 Estate Pinot Noir is now a blended wine from the two vineyards mentioned above. Basically, more fruit from the home vineyard goes into the Premium, so the Estate is supplemented with the best fruit from Leongatha. This has not at all diminished the quality of this wine. It has a similar profile to the Crown Prince, with strawberry flavours and olive notes in addition. The purity of this wine is excellent. It is very harmonious and elegant. This wine is quite open now and very long on the finish (97 points).

The 2017 Premium Pinot Noir is more closed now. It seems a bit meaner and leaner, but the fruit intensity is very high, easily covering the 100% new oak. This wine goes on and on. In fact I experienced something most unusual on the finish: the flavours seemed to finish, but suddenly came back. This wine clearly has what is termed a 'peacock's tail', an expanding finish in the mouth found in some Burgundy grand crus. This wine needs to be cellared for at least seven years in order to experience all its components more fully (98 points). 

Mount Mary Pinot Noir

When the 2013 Mount Mary Pinot Noir came on the market, it was hyped a lot, and there was some scramble to get any bottles. I was pleased I was able to secure some. Yesterday, I opened the first of these bottles.

I find this an unusual Pinot Noir. It is big fruited, but not in the dark fruit spectrum of, say, Central Otago. It brims with red cherry fruit on the front palate. It is not sweet and rather elegant, with silky tannins in a support role. Unfortunately, the wine cannot sustain the attack on the front palate. Therefore the structural profile is the opposite of a Burgundy, which is expansive on the finish. This Mount Mary says it all upfront. I guess, this often works with wine judges.

This is still a very good wine, but not my preferred style. If you have any bottles, I suggest to keep them a few more years. The wine still tastes very young and should develop more complexity.

Score: 94/+

PS: The cork closure was perfect 

Wine Masters, Italy

Wine Masters is a very high quality series of films on leading wine families in the best known wine regions of the world. Series 2 portrays five Italian regions. It follows the same format as series 1 on France: a leading family in each region is interviewed interspersed with vineyard and winery photography. Three wine writer experts follow up commentary with some more in-depth information.

As before, the cinematography is stunning. However, films on wine are difficult to make exciting. There is an inevitable repetition of vineyard shots, bunches of grapes, pruning and barrels in the winery. The key interest needs to come from the interviews.

The first one is Angelo Gaja. This is a great choice, because his big ego comes across well on film. It is also fascinating to learn how his daughters set slightly different priorities. There is a good discussion on Barolo vs. Barbaresco. Unfortunately, the differences between his single vineyard Barbarescos are not explored, nor the different Barolo terroirs.

I found the second film on Campania a bit confusing, maybe because I do not know much about it. The main focus is on the Taurasi wine, and the film certainly made me curious. The Antinori family represents Tuscany in the third film. The core wine types and the development of the super Tuscans is explained well. The fourth film on Veneto is also quite informative, with the Masi family describing the components of Valpolicella and the process of making Amarone and Ripasso.

The Sicily film is a bit weaker, the story of Tenuta Regaleali not quite as rich. However, the landscape shots are spectacular.

The link is https://vimeo.com/ondemand/winemastersitaly . The films need to be purchased, either individually or as a series.

De Salis St EM M

Some time ago I was quite impressed when I drank Pinot Noir from De Salis, an Orange based winery. Today I am reviewing the strangely named Bordeaux blend, which is predominantly Merlot with some Cabernet Sauvignon and Cabernet Franc.

The 2012 De Salis St EM M is a medium-bodied wine. Cherry and redcurrant fruit is a bit simple on the palate. The pluses are this is a lighter wine, quite harmonious with some savoury notes. The wine fizzles out on the finish.  

Score: 89/+

A. Rodda Chardonnay

Adrian Rodda is not quite the household name, he perhaps deserves to be. His label is a bit downbeat, reflecting the hard vineyard work, but his wine is certainly not.

The 2017 A. Rodda Willow Lake Chardonnay comes from a well regarded vineyard in the Yarra Valley. His former employer, Oakridge, makes a wine from there. This wine is a fuller expression of grapefruit, passionfruit, and white peach. The wine is elegant and smooth, with a firm acidic backbone and a balanced finish.

This is a modern take on Chardonnay, but not of the wimpish kind which tends to be so popular right now.

Score: 95/+++

Barossa Wine Tasting

An in-going strategy makes sense to get the most out of a large scale tasting event. So for this Barossa tasting I decided to focus on Grenache and Shiraz (obviously), and to taste mid-level wines rather than the most expensive ones. The reasons were one, to see if I could find an outstanding wine in this price category, and two, to avoid the highly extracted wines, which tend to be the expensive ones.

The best wine from this approach turned out to be the 2016 Spinifex Bête Noir. This is an elegant wine, smooth, and at peace with itself (94 points).  

But then I deviated from my strategy, as I saw high end favorites, mid level was not available from certain producers, and top wines were simply put in my glass. So the best wines from this tasting ended up being expensive wines.

When it comes to Grenache, Cirillo is probably Australia's best producer, year after year. The 2013 Cirillo Ancestor Vine Grenache delivers the perfect mix of fruit weight, black fruit flavours over red and savoury notes (95 points). This old vineyard comes from the sandy floor of Vine Vale. It also delivers for Yalumba, who is next door. The 2017 Yalumba Carriage Block Grenache is much brighter, quite light and lifted, but not sweet (93 points).

Rolf Binder has needed many years to sort out his various brands and focus on the Rolf Binder label. Also detracted from his quality may have been the fact that he operated a contract operation for cheap blended wine at his winery. However, he has an outstanding vineyard behind the winery, and his best wines are never over extracted. His 2015 Heysen Shiraz is still quite closed, with its blackberry flavours leading to an elegant finish (94 points). The 2015 Hanisch is a bit more intense, yet still elegant with a long finish (95 points). This was my wine of the tasting.

Other wines I quite enjoyed at this tasting were the 2017 Hentley Farm Old Legend Grenache with smart oak treatment, and the 2015 Poonawatta 1880 Eden Valley Shiraz.  Many other wines were close behind, as the focus has shifted from high alcohol and ripeness to elegance.

Elio Grasso Ginestra Casa Maté

The typical Barolo descriptors of tar and roses, and firm dry tannins do not apply in the first instance to the 2010 Elio Grasso Ginestra Casa Maté. Elio Grasso is sometimes referred to as a super star of the region without having this label. And the fact he makes good wine is certainly helped by the terroir he owns.The Ginestra subregion of Monforte is its most famous, and the Casa Maté vineyard highly regarded within.

This wine shows more dark fruit than is typical for Barolo. The wine is elegant as opposed to overly powerful, and the tannins have softened with time. There are lifted aromas as well, and the overall package is very harmonious. The wine has a long and persistent finish.

One peculiar aspect were the little clear crystals, which showed up in the last glass of the bottle. This is tartrate acid, a harmless compound, which can form as part of the winemaking process. Sometimes you see them sticking to the bottom of a cork.

Score: 96/+++   

Torbreck The Sporran

In a bad vintage year, many wineries declassify their best fruit and add it to their more basic wines. Their base wines are than marketed as a great opportunity to purchase best vineyard fruit at a reasonable price. Does it work or is the overall fruit composition just not that great? In my experience, it is about 50/50. Sometimes the result is good, sometimes not so much.

With the challenging 2011 vintage, Torbreck did something a little different. It did not make the top wines, but instead of dropping the fruit into, say, the Woodcutter's Red, it created a new brand, The Sporran. I kept it back until now, to give it a good test.

The 2011 Torbreck The Sporran has elements of the typical Torbreck style; there is the sweet plum and blackberry core, there is the high alcohol. But there are also characteristics of this vintage; the fruit weight is less than typical for the Barossa, and certainly Torbreck, and the acidity is higher.

Overall, this is not a bad wine, while not necessarily typical Torbreck. The wine has some freshness, and the structure is good. However, the alcohol is too high for this fruit.

Score: 91/+