Alquimie Edition 7 is out now, featuring a profile on the emerging Jarad Curwood of Chapter Wine, who was amongst the Young Gun of Wine Top 12 in 2015.
We were quite tickled by the punchline to the tale of how Curwood had a local woodworker fashion some 2,000 litre vats from reclaimed 100 year old oak. Here’s the extract:
Curwood has made a 2,000 litre vat from some old oak. As he showed his prototype, he recounts the story of how it came about with another tenant in the Woollen Mill: “Hugh Makin, who makes furniture from recycled timbers, he was making this table one day, and I walked in one day and said, ‘Whoa, that looks amazing. Is that Oak?’
“‘Yeah, it’s French oak I got. I came across some old oak vats.’
“And I was like, ‘What do you mean, old oak vats?’
“‘About 80 to 100 years old.’
“‘OK… Stop making a fucking table out of it!’
“And he said, ‘don’t worry, there’s heaps more.’
“‘What do you mean heaps more?’
“‘Shitloads of them!’
“‘Alright, well let’s have a look at it…’”
Pointing to his vat, Curwood talks about the old oak, “It starts about 40-60 mm thick; and it’s almost 100 year old; seasoned in Australian wine. We just took off the inside layer, less than one millimeter. I thought they would impart a lot more flavor then they have, which was good that they haven’t, which was the intention.”
It was a big, tricky job. You can tell just by looking at the finished piece, which, bound with an iron rope-like girdle, has a charm to it. “I can’t believe they came together and worked. I said to him, ‘I think there’s a huge market in this if you want it.’
“He built that one and said, “nah, I think I’m just going to stick to my furniture.”
Alquimie Edition 7 also features 10 years of Young Gun of Wine; and journeys far and wide, to Scotland’s ghost distilleries; Switzerland, and the white chasselas grape; Italy’s island of Sant’Erasmo; London’s fine dining tables; and the terroir of California’s Wilamette Valley, to name a few of the places this latest edition of the magazine takes you.
Available throughout Australia in select newsagents and specialty stockists. For the eastern-seaboard, Alquimie recommend seeking out Books For Cooks (Vic), Beautiful Pages (NSW) or Scrumptious Reads (QLD).
The Joy of Wine is an event full of discovery, empowering a whole generation to enjoy wine unburdened by inhibition.
History was made at the 2023 Young Gun of Wine Awards, which were awarded at a ceremony on Monday night. Six trophies were presented, but for the first time in the 17 years of the awards, which champions emerging winemaking talent, an employee of a wine business took out the top trophy, the Young Gun of Wine, from a field of 50 finalists.
Like many of us, Ravensworth’s Brian Martyn had a pretty crap year in 2020. First the bushfire smoked out his crop and a big slice of income, then COVID did its thing. That’s enough to get anyone down, but the wine (and beer – read on) community’s a resourceful one, and with a little help from his friends, he’s stitched together a dazzlingly silky purse from one hell of a sow’s (y)ear.
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