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Producer
Lark Hill -
Region
Canberra District
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RRP
$45
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Vintage
2023
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Variety/Varieties
Grüner Veltliner
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Alc./Vol.
12.5%
Golden kiwifruit, pear and yellow apple skin, with a dash of white pepper and something faintly nutty underneath. Rich on the nose, but bright and light-footed on the palate — a genuinely different kind of white.
Lark Hill’s Chris Carpenter made Australia’s first commercial grüner veltliner from the 2009 vintage, after a visit from Jancis Robinson in 2002 convinced the family their cold, high-altitude Bungendore site — 860 metres above sea level — was made for the variety. Vines went into the ground in 2004, propagated from cuttings sourced via Tasmania’s Joe Holyman, which had themselves come from a CSIRO trial planting dating back to the 1960s. That same period saw Lark Hill convert to biodynamic farming, certified in 2008, and Carpenter’s pioneering work with the grape later earned him the Danger Zone trophy at the Young Gun of Wine Awards.
This 2023 release draws on two sites: the Lark Hill home vineyard in Bungendore, at 860 metres with vines now 18 years old, and the Dark Horse Vineyard in nearby Murrumbateman, at a lower, warmer 600 metres, with six-year-old vines. It’s the first vintage to fold in fruit from Dark Horse, whose slightly riper character complements the more taut, high-altitude fruit from home. The season itself ran cool and slow, with regular rain and high disease pressure that demanded careful canopy and yield management — but the extended ripening window paid off, building real flavour at modest sugar levels while keeping natural acidity intact. Both vineyards are organic, biodynamic and vegan certified.
The winemaking leans into texture over aromatics. Fruit from both sites is crushed and left on skins for three days before pressing to seasoned French oak, where it finishes fermentation and matures on lees for twelve months. It’s a deliberately savoury, structural approach — one that pulls this grüner away from the more overtly perfumed, riesling-like expressions the variety can lean toward, and closer to something with real textural weight and grip.
Tasting note
A more subtle and nuanced take on a variety that’s often pushed toward aromatic intensity — where many makers chase something riesling-like, this leans closer to chardonnay. A honeyed tone on the nose signals its bottle age, worn gracefully: golden kiwifruit, Beurre Bosc pear and yellow apple skin, accented by white pepper, gently toasted caraway and finely chopped chervil or dill. Placid and gently reductive on opening, it’s coaxed into motion with each swirl — white grapefruit and cut nashi pear, some white button mushrooms, along with a faint dusting of white pepper and snapped snow pea and curry leaf beneath, combine wit a texture of pithy phenolics lending a delicate, faintly docile edge. Despite the richer tones on the nose, the palate is sprightly and light in body, with brisk, rippling acidity driving the flavour down the tongue and a grippy, savoury finish that lingers.
When to drink
This feels like a wine for sitting still with, not one to crack at a party — pour it over a lazy afternoon with someone you like talking to. If white asparagus is in season, serve it with a buttery sauce or hollandaise and let this wine’s acid do the heavy lifting; it’s got enough firepower to stand up to something as rich as Schnitzel Holstein, too. Or go the other way entirely: a Thai chicken salad, or a classic schnitzel with a crunchy Brussels sprout slaw, on a balmy night on the back deck. It’s a wine built for high-definition flavours either way — contemplative or lively, your call.
Themes of this wine
Grüner Veltliner
Grüner veltliner is Austria’s most planted and most emblematic grape, capable of everything from lean, riesling-like wines to rich, almost chardonnay-style expressions, though it rarely takes well to heavy oak at either end of that spectrum. Its classic signature runs through yellow grapefruit, white pepper and spice, often joined by orchard fruit and, in some examples, notes reminiscent of radish, dill or gherkin. Australia has become the grape’s leading outpost outside Austria over the past decade and a half, led by the Adelaide Hills, with pioneering pockets in the Canberra District, Tasmania and beyond.
Canberra District
The Canberra District is a cool, high-altitude, continental wine region scattered across several distinct subregions rather than one contiguous strip of vineyards — Bungendore, Murrumbateman, Lake George and more, each with its own particular exposure and elevation. That altitude and inland climate deliver cold nights and generous growing-season sunshine, a combination that tends to produce wines of real brightness and energy, and has made the region a magnet for cool-climate and alternative varieties beyond its traditional riesling and shiraz plantings.
Biodynamic farming
Biodynamic viticulture goes a step further than organics, treating the vineyard as a single living system and working with composts, herbal preparations and the lunar and cosmic calendar rather than synthetic sprays and fertilisers. It remains a minority practice in Australia, but one that’s steadily gaining ground among growers chasing a clearer, more textural expression of their site — Lark Hill among the earliest and most committed converts, certified since 2008.
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