Adelaide Hills Distillery founder, Sacha La Forgia started making alcoholic beverages somewhat on the early side, with a pre-legal career in fashioning garden-shed beer, cider, wine and spirits with his father. This was no illicit hooch operation, but rather an extension of his Italian heritage and a means to bond with his dad. When La Forgia was 16, he worked a vintage with Samantha Connew at Wirra Wirra, and that was that. Winemaking at university followed, but being somewhat restless, he embarked on a global winemaking blitz, even hitting seven vintages in two years – almost eight, but the last one, in Burgundy, fell through at the last minute.
While indulging his wanderlust in Friuli, La Forgia had a bit of an epiphany making grappa with his mentor there, Bruno. Clearly obsessed by turning the fermented into the distilled, Bruno questioned why he didn’t set up a distillery back home, in Adelaide. The lights went on, and La Forgia returned home, submitted a license application and, clearly being the eager sort, set about making his own still before said license had been fully processed. His still, named Fleur, was fashioned out of recycled materials, random bits of cooper and the like that could be acquired with the frugal resources at his disposal. And thus, Adelaide Hills Distillery was born. Fleur’s handmade seals weren’t quite up to the job, springing more than a few leaks when in action, but nonetheless, she was responsible for some of La Forgia’s breakthrough distillates, winning many accolades.
Combining his love for wine with his distilling obsession, La Forgia has branched out into the intricate world of vermouth. In the search for beneficial matches, he carefully balances local base wines with herbs, fruits, flowers and roots, employing native ingredients in harmony with a retro supply of 1960s vermouth spicing imported from Torino. Grenache informs the base for the Rosso Vermouth, while chenin blanc supports the botanicals for the Dry and Rosé Vermouths, with the latter supplemented by a little McLaren Vale grenache and shiraz to add both blush and flavour.
A viticulturist is a bit like the drummer in a band. They’re a key foundation, but usually kept well out of the limelight, letting the winemaker talk about how “wine is made in the vineyard” and somehow taking all the glory at the same time. Stuart Proud is a farmer first and foremost, and one…
Will Gilbert is a sixth-generation winemaker, with his great-great-great-grandfather Joseph Gilbert responsible for planting some of the first vines in the Eden Valley in 1842. That legacy is honoured under the Gilbert label today, with a range of Eden Valley rieslings, but the core of the Gilbert operation is in Mudgee and the frosty climes of Orange, New South Wales, with a focus on riesling, pinot noir, chardonnay and shiraz with several bottlings of each, and made in a way that highlights purity and elegance.
Ditching a career as one of this country’s most decorated sommeliers, James Erskine began crafting pithy, natural-leaning McLaren Vale Grenache in 2010. Since then, his Jauma label has become something of a touchstone for natural wines done well, and his soon to be planted Adelaide Hills vineyard promises to be profoundly exciting in the years…
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