Hickinbotham Mornington
Peninsula Aligoté 2012
$29; 12% alcohol; screw
cap; 92+++ points
A
few weeks back, whilst drinking the Trentham Estate Verdejo 2013, the first
example of that Portuguese white variety grown and made in Australia, I was
tempted to mention the Vino Verde made by Lindemans to combat the invasion of
Mateus in the early 'eighties. Last week,
whilst communicating with the venerable Ian Hickinbotham, who'd written since
to remind me that as Penfolds state manager he'd introduced Grange to Victoria
long before it reached the retail shelves of Sydney, I enquired about the
Aligoté his son Andrew Hickinbotham and partner Terryn pioneered since 1988 at
Dromana on the Mornington Peninsula.
Regular readers will recall my constant bemoaning of the fact that
there's a much wider range of flavours in your average deli fridge than you'll
find in the biggest Australian wine shops.
So I like it when folks like Trentham and the Hickinbothams bother to
extend that terribly narrow menu with new stuff that doesn't end in O. Contrary to the common belief that Burgundy
grows only Chardonnay and Pinot noir, Aligoté is that region's second biggest
white, with somewhere around 1,700 ha planted.
Aligoté, say its few passionate fans, lost out to Chardonnay in Burgundy
(and Australia) because Chardonnay grows like weeds in comparison.
This brisk, austere Aligoté smells a little
like fresh meadow grass, like you may find in Sauvignon blanc, but has a racy
slash of Bartlett and Bosc pears, and maybe the exotic cherimoya and sapodilla fruits,
which I rarely see in Savvy-B. Acid-wise,
it's closer to really good Chenin blanc.
Typical of the Aligoté, it has enough dusty tannin and dry natural acid
to trigger a wince, along with a pressing hunger. It's a delightful and unusual flavour for
Australia, and one which should be pursued with more vigour than we're showing
the broad, soft "orange" varieties like the sweaty Mediterranean
whites. Regardless of the suitability of
their terroir, these may be suddenly faddish amongst our cargo-panted school of
winemakers, but have yet to prove their favour amongst your actual
drinkers. In a country this hot, surely
we need higher natural acid, not more sweat and grease. Try this with bottom-feeding fishies:
flounder, scallops and prawns. Go get.
Hickinbotham Mornington
Peninsula Coffee Rock Merlot 2010
$37; 13.5% alcohol;
screw cap; 94+++ points
Contrary
to the common bullshit about Merlot being mellow - the pronunciation of both
words is nearly identical in the USA - the grape is dead serious, beautifully
perfumed, properly tannic red, as you'd expect of a Bordeaux type. Consider Petrus of Pomerol, for which you'll
pay around $3000 per bottle and wait a decade or two to drink at perfection. The 1945 aside, Petrus is hardly mellow.
Mornington's fairly close to Bordeaux in
climate, if a little cooler in the higher spots, so it's a lot more likely to
produce proper Merlot than the poor buggers who torture it in our irrigated deserts. This wine is not Petrus. But rather than being mellow, it's a beautifully
delicate, quietly authoritative drink with pretty meadow bloom topnotes over a base
of expensive "fragrance-free" face cream. It also has the slightly threatening darkness
of the blackberry briar, and maybe the Deadly Nightshade. Its palate is slender and serpentine,
sublimely elegant and poised, with long, extremely fine-grained tannins.
If you
need a hint of its potential, consider the 2004, which I have now in my
glass. This older one is more oaky in
that mocha sort of manner, but is a sublimely elegant, refined beauty approaching
its optimum. For the obsessive, I should
point out that its headspace - the amount of air between the wine and the
screwcap - is about thrice that of this 2010, so this new one will probably
take longer. Sacrifice your best lamb.
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