With semillon taking the lead, the 2021 ‘Lemon Krush’ is an essay in citrus, from a lemon-scented fragrance to the refreshingly drying pucker of lemon barley water gifted by Wardlaw’s masterly hand with skin contact.
The ‘Fresh Prince’ marshals a quartet of red varieties with decent crossover on a Venn diagram but are rarely all seen together, offering a fragrantly floral and spicy nose, with earthy notes, red and dark fruits and a palate of chewy, grapey tannins and fresh zip.
A textural, flavour-intense but light-footed wine, this is loaded with orchard fruits, smoky minerals and waxy notes.
Earthy and mineral, bristling with spice, dried flowers and sour cherries, this is supple and savoury in equal measure – an utterly distinctive expression.
A tangle of wild berries, spice and minerals are supported by assertive tannins that are a distinctive signature of the Swinney vineyard site.
Picked ultra-fresh, this rendition of the great Friulian grape is alive with citrus, apple and herb flavours borne along an electric rail of acidity.
Red fruits matched with spicy, earthy complexity – easy to love, but with detail for those that care to look.
This is bursting with spice and wild fruits, with an underlying signature of regional minerality.
Layers of citrus, spice and orchard fruit, overlaid with chalky, savoury accents.
A riot of spice, wild berries and floral notes on a slippery but taut midweight frame.
A joyous mix of muscat and riesling, full of pink grapefruit and rosewater with softly textured generosity matched with exuberant freshness.
An Adelaide Hills pioneer at the top of their game. Intense stone fruit, complex smoky barrel notes and minerals take the lead.
A great example of why grenache is so hot right now. Savoury, aromatic, refined and with a commanding web of tannin, this is compelling stuff.
A field blend leaning on Rhône white varieties, this is all barrel fermented, then raised on lees to build texture and harmonise the varieties into a seamless whole of orchard fruits, granitic minerals and nutty winemaking notes.
An exercise in spice and leathery savouriness, buoyed by plump red fruits, which are clutched firmly by assertive grapey tannins through the finish.
One of very few wines made from grillo in the country, this is loaded with orchard fruits and a sea spray tang, with texture and bright freshness defining the palate.
Subtle orchard fruits and dryly savoury. Light on its feet, with a fine, lightly textural and grippy feel.
Sweet, but cut through with salted nut and smoky notes, and alcohol spirit lending it shape and line. Crittenden Estate’s take on the Macvin of France’s Jura region, with flor-aged savagnin combined with unfermented new-vintage juice, then fortified.
Matured under flor yeast, this is a Mornington Peninsula version of Vin Jaune, loaded with preserved lemon and nutty sherry-like notes, with explosive power and a dryly saline umami carry.
A unique sparkling wine drawn solely from a solera started in 2003 – think artisan Champagne, shot through with nutty sherry-like notes, but built on fruit intensity.
Light and bright, this is a pure riot of berries and grapey scents, with a fine freshness and gentle spritz – take it as it comes, or chill it down.
A red-fruited rosé pét-nat, bright and crunchy with a chalky, dry and ultra-refreshing palate.
Flinty, white peach and lemon curd, gently textural – this has all the trappings of complex chardonnay, with generosity of flavour and winemaking detail perfectly poised and pitched.
This is laden with stone fruit and grapefruit notes, with textural flex on the palate that is straightened by trademark freshness.
Juicy and dark, but floral and bright at the same time, this is red wine built for drinking not sipping.
Vanya Cullen’s ‘Supernatural’ journey into skin-contact whites continues, with the 2019 ‘Amber’ a spicy, fragrant and gently grippy expression of sauvignon blanc.
Supple and silky, this is a seductively delicious take on cabernet franc by Brad Hickey.
From the Yarra Valley’s legendary Willowlake Vineyard, and the equally legendary Dave Mackintosh, this is a pinot noir of real detail and depth, but you can also ignore all that and just focus on its charming drinkability.
Carignan usually gets lost in blends, but a wine like this makes you wonder why – packed with spice and dark-fruited flavour, this finishes ultra-fresh and racy.
Lesser known Italian varieties are muscling into the limelight right now, and this wine captures why. Packed full of flavour, this has grip and race to keep things fresh – killer with spicy salami pizza.
A flavour bomb of classic gewürz, with Turkish delight, talc and lychees, but with a dry zip to the palate that keeps it super fresh and vibrant.
Perfectly pitched chardonnay from Dave Mackintosh, with flavour and elegance in equal measure.
A ‘naturally’ styled skin-contact white from a Beechworth master better known for classic styles.
One of the greats in top form – complex, smoky and nutty, this is chardonnay on a grand and impressive scale.
A savoury, textured and mineral chardonnay from 2020’s Young Gun of Wine.
Cloudy, wildly aromatic and delightfully left-of-centre orange wine – just what you expect from Yoko and Andries Mostert.
A classic dry rosé of bright and pure red fruits, but also with a bit more substance and grip – it doesn’t need food, but it’s built with it in mind.
A Malbec-dominant red from the Mangan Vineyard, across the road from Cullen’s home site, this is brim full of spice and dark fruits with a refined finish – it makes a pretty compelling case for the grape.
A new wine from a new endeavour led by De Bortoli’s ever-restless Steve Webber, this is an earthy, mineral grenache coloured by the ancient soils of Heathcote.
Such a new Australian perspective on Sicily’s most important red grape. Light, vibrant, cherry scented and detailed, pitched to take a chill, or not – this is required drinking.
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In Australia, the spotlight is often swung to McLaren Vale when the Grenache renaissance is discussed, but the revolution is no less vibrant in the Barossa. So much so that a Deep Dive was in order.
Tempranillo is unarguably Spain’s most recognisable variety. In Australia, it has made a modest but meaningful mark, but with limited genetic vine material, the potential for the grape is exponentially bigger, and with new clones now online, a Deep Dive into Australian tempranillo is called for.
The top 50 finalists have been selected based on the pursuit of fruit and wine quality, vine health, innovation, and sustainability – encompassing environmental, social and economic sustainability.
“By focusing on the vineyards, on the places where wine comes from, and on the practices of sustainable grape growing, these awards can help recalibrate how we think about wine, shifting our perception of it from a liquid commodity in a glass to a cultural product of the country it’s from,” said awards panellist Max Allen.
“It was thrilling to visit each of these vineyards, albeit vicariously,” continued Allen, “and learn about all the hard work going into looking after the land, nurturing the health of the vines, and – most importantly – continually improving wine quality.”
See the list here
These awards are a celebration of viticulture, and it is through the championing of all the top vineyards and their growers, that we can elevate the awareness of the grower in the wines we love. This collective industry benefit is the great outcome of these awards, and the path forward is through participation. So, we’re calling all winegrowers to step forward.
Sustainability is a hot word right now. And one that is hard to pin down. It’s easy for people to talk about being sustainable; it’s another thing to actually live by such principles. Lieke van der Hulst takes us inside a community of winegrowers in McLaren Vale who are making changes from the ground up.
A few Australian winemakers are freewheeling with a unique biological method of maturing wine in barrel, inspired by some of the wines of Jura in France and Jerez in Spain, to bring a whole new flavour profile to wine. But the conditions have to be just right in the cellar for this little wonder of nature…
Young Gun of Wine has announced the trophy winners for their 15th annual winemaker awards.
Since 2007, the awards have expanded and grown. Beginning with two trophies, then growing to five, 2021 sees a new accolade added in a natural evolution of the awards. Here are the results of the 15th annual edition.
Starting out is not always easy for a new wine project, with some makers taking years before taking the solo leap, while others tumble in headfirst with limited experience but a firm vision and a whole lot of chutzpah. Amongst the new labels in the YGOW Awards 2021 Top 50, Château Comme Ci, Comme Ça, Worlds Apart Wines, Sven Joschke, Tillie J and Cavedon. Tasting notes appear at the end of the article.
“If we went back 10 years, the relationship between sugar and acidity would be a lot more obvious – all over the shop. There’d be sugar here, acid there, and things would not be anywhere near as in balance as a lot of the wines we saw today.”
