27 February 2017
COUNTERPOINT FROM CHUCK HAYWARD
"Been there since 1912," Chuck says, " an absolute classic: oysters, crabs, lots of great commentary from the family behind the bar ... 22 cherished seats ... about 70-90 years old…. many winemakers from the Tasman have been there on my account and the smiles afterwards are priceless…. Should you ever venture here, one of the first places I would take you to."
Chuck, whom I've never met, but admire, was miffed by my recent spray about foreign experts coming to judge Australian wine shows to tell us how to make wine and how much we should expect to be paid for it. Read his response right here.
My original story is here.
As most of my my Stateside friends seem embarrassed and apologetic at the President their countryfolk somehow elected, I understand their prickly response to my piece about locking foreign colonialist winers out when Trump was doing the same to all those Islamic folks who don't drink ethanol. Jesus it's complex. But in my case, that bit was not deliberate.
Just to prove some credentials, which is not at all necessary, here's Chuck, a top honest writer, harder at work (note Royal medal for bravery):
25 February 2017
PEACE IN THE VALLEY: DANNY AT THE EX
The party gully of Rundle Street, East End Adelaide, was actually jam-packed with reveling Fringistes last night but I caught Danny Moody, Exeter Hotel night boss/chatelaine, managing to squeeze in a quiet moment. Not even Bacchus or Pan could count the libations that have flowed from the hands of this cool river to her people ... photo©Philip White
22 February 2017
DROVING ORB SPIDERS WITH COWBOY
Full-bore retro at Maslin Beach
by PHILIP WHITE
It's a good strong vintage for arachnids. The vineyards are full of Golden Orb spiders whose beautiful webs are spun from the toughest silk known in nature.
The vineyard blokes here where
I live fit their quad bikes with a light-weight head-high poly frame in the front to keep the
webs off. They make it from dripper line. Sort of a locomotive cow-catcher for
spiders. Spiders are about as popular as Red-bellied Black Snakes in these
parts. Folks get twitchy.
Sitting in Tim Geddes' Blewett
Springs Seldom Inn winery over the ridge from here, we were discussing this
with the revered stockman, Graham 'Cowboy' Bramley. We were joking that there's no money
being spent on training Golden Orb spiders to lay off eating each other so they
could be farmed in a sort of Orb Spider feedlot to make the type of thread used
in re-entry parachute webbing and bullet-proof vests.
We could be rich.
"You don't have to
farm 'em," Cowboy (above) said, pulling a neat silver plait from his hat band.
"See this? This is the cracker of a stockwhip. It's a spare. When the webs
are thick in the bush we ride through 'em deliberately and get 'em all over us.
Then we roll 'em off our clothes with our palms and rub 'em into thread and
plait it. Best whip crackers you can get."
Sitting there with a red
in a shed talking about spiderwebs and this wizened bloke matter-of-factly
pulls a perfectly-made example from his hat, just like that.
Cowboy's run cattle all
over Australia. His knowledge of the outback country is profound. He is much
sought after for his old bush knowledge. He spins astonishing tales of where
rare birds live in the desert, and all the tricks and difficulties of running
the huge mobs of stock horses required on big cattle droves. It's hard enough
keeping one horse in top fettle in the hard country; sometimes, in his role as
horse tailer Cowboy's tended over a hundred: up at 2:30AM for weeks on end,
find all the mobs out feeding in the dark by the sound of their individual bells,
round them up and have them ready for work at dawn.
He said he only bells the
weak horse in each mob. The others stick around it.
I met him that morning at
Darrel Hunt's cheekily named Le-Fleurie vineyard near Maslin Beach on the Gulf
St Vincent, patron of viticulturers. It's not quite Fleurieu Pensinsula in the
appellation sense, but it sure is closer to that than Beaujolais, where Fleurie
actually is. The Hunt family's been on this land since 1908. Old man Maslin's
original settler's cottage is well-kept in Darrel's zen-tidy back yard.
Embarrassed that generations of heavy tractor work has compacted the ground to a cruel degree, Darrel's run a shallow ripper down the middle of his vinerows to open the hardened earth. He hopes that's the last time he has to do it with the tractor. That clumsy, overweight iron horse is about to be retired while Cowboy and him train the two Clydesdales, Banjo and Malcolm, as full-time vineyard workers. They're already handy pulling a fancy restored barrel-cart; Darrel is scouring the countryside for the other implements he needs to run the vineyard the old gentle way.
I couldn't help recalling
Max Schubert as I watched these blokes kit up the Clydies. Max's first job at
Penfolds Nuriootpa Winery was stable lad as much as cellar messenger: he was
responsible for the winery horses. Turn, turn, turn ...
Malcolm, Darrel,
Banjo, Cowboy and Tim ... photos©Philip White
(When asked about the first tractors, my neighbour, Bernard Smart flashes his wry grin and rasps: "Bloody tractor? Kept getting bogged. Bloody tractor. Had to pull it out with a horse" ... Bernard planted the Yangarra High Sands Grenache vineyard in 1946.)
(When asked about the first tractors, my neighbour, Bernard Smart flashes his wry grin and rasps: "Bloody tractor? Kept getting bogged. Bloody tractor. Had to pull it out with a horse" ... Bernard planted the Yangarra High Sands Grenache vineyard in 1946.)
Anyway, we ended up touring the Le-Fleurie vines in Darrel's 1930 Chev ragtop. Bright blinking summer sunlight: perfect vintage cool. Sitting behind Cowboy, without even imagining what it was made from, or what it could be for, I'd photographed that neat spiderweb plait amongst the colours of the Aboriginal flag on his hat.
Which brings me to the
wine. Tim Geddes first took me to Le-Fleurie years ago to kick rocks. The neighbourhood has a ferruginous pebbly sandstone cap on the deep Maslin Sands deposit
below, with irony-sandy clays and on Le-Fleurie, rises of the fossiliferous limestone of the Port
Willunga Formation.
In other words, one of the
various spots around McLaren Vale where the rootzone profile very closely
resembles Coonawarra's best in its red-dirt-on-limestone centre.
The big difference at
Maslin is that its limestone has a hundred metres of loose coarse sand deep below
it.
Ferruginous Terra
rossa over limestone at Coonawarra ... photo©Milton Wordley
But the wines are similar:
perhaps the constant maritime humidity of Maslin giving Le-Fleurie softer tannins. It was too
easy to spot Tim's entry from this site in the recent McLaren Vale DistrictsTasting: I reported before about the wines from the various calcareous grounds being
very distinctive in the 2016 Shiraz. With all due respect, the 2016s from old
seabeds were like Coonawarra.
Tim's been buying Darrel's
fruit for years. It's an essential part of his soulful but sharp suite of Geddes
Seldom Inn reds. Darrel also makes wine from some of his fruit next door in
Alan Dyson's shed at Maslin. These are not for sale, but Darrel's pretty quick
to share one if you're lucky enough to visit.
While Cowboy sat in the
barrelhouse draping its cool shade with his beautifully-turned anecdotes, Tim
opened a line of wines that were composed mainly of Le-Fleurie fruit, or were
the full 100 per cent.
2007 was a totally skronky
mess of a year: the Petit verdot that survived sure lives up to its little
green name: it looks about six minutes old. It's really impossibly tight and
raw. Uncomfortably so. On the other hand, the Shiraz from that same year seemed
like the very fresh ghost of the Zema Coonawarra 2013 I'd tasted at about four
o'clock that morning. The Seldom Inn 2008 trod the same path. More spooky: the silk-and-velvet
2012 model whizzed me back to the legendary Mildara Coonawarra Peppermint
Pattie Cabernet Sauvignon of 1963. That was nearly twenty years old when I
first tasted it, but the connection was fast.
Very clean. Minty. Amazing.
The biggest stretch of my
skill set came with the 2009 60-40 blend of Petit verdot and Cabernet. This
incredibly intense raven beauty could hide easily amongst a row of the best
Penfolds Coonawarra bin numbers. Like several other offerings there on Tim's
bench this will soon be released as a Geddes reserve wine. Start savin' up.
He's got PV form, of
course, Mr. Geddes (above). He helped Wayne Thomas win the 2004 Bushing Trophy with a
cracker. Did it again a few years later with a Shiraz.
Funny, though: Earlier
that day Darrel waved his farmer's fist at his Petit verdot as the Chev purred
along the rows. "Bloody stuff! Crop? Does it bloody crop!?! Jeez it bloody
crops. Talk about crop ... "
Tim says it's the number
of bunches that bedazzles. Darrel's Petit verdot usually chugs along at a
modest one or two tonnes to the acre.
Maybe him and Cowboy could
train Banjo and Malcolm to do a spot of bunch-counting and leaf-plucking. You
can't train a tractor to do that with the sort of deeply soulful pondering
common to Clydesdales.
You could harvest the
spider silk from their mighty chests.
Only joking. But between
you and me, I wouldn't put anything past the wizard Cowboy. Darrel sure knows how to pick his
mentors.
photos©Philip
White ... here's Tim deep in red dreaming
20 February 2017
DESIGN AND GENIUS 50 YEARS ON
Having been given the job and the opportunity, not to mention a 20-day deadline, Gandini's effort reminds me of the attitudes shown to Å“nology, the science of wine, by great South Australians like Dr Ray Beckwith, Ian Hickinbotham and Max Schubert. These remarkable blokes were working at their creative peak when the Miura hit. It was immediately dubbed the world's first supercar. Just as it could be argued that wines made by those three were already the world's first superwines.
And Max, at least was a petrolhead. Until a new owner - AdSteam - of Penfolds restricted him to a four-cylinder Volvo two-door brick, Max's work car was a Rambler Matador. He said its was good for 140mph on his regular drives from Adelaide to the Upper Hunter and back:
Are there any real Beckwiths, Schuberts, Hickinbothams or vinous Gandinis out there now?
And Max, at least was a petrolhead. Until a new owner - AdSteam - of Penfolds restricted him to a four-cylinder Volvo two-door brick, Max's work car was a Rambler Matador. He said its was good for 140mph on his regular drives from Adelaide to the Upper Hunter and back:
Are there any real Beckwiths, Schuberts, Hickinbothams or vinous Gandinis out there now? How will we know?
DONNING THE VEIL FOR VINTAGE '17
No veils, but it was certainly on at Yangarra boss Peter Fraser's recent marriage to Tessa Hume. We had a fine old time. This is Nick Stock's shot of their arrival at the reception:
19 February 2017
AKHMATOVA'S LAST TOAST
18 February 2017
SOME FRIENDS TOOK ME TO DINNER
I first wrote memorable luxury but it is in fact a drink. Even the perfidious miasma of over-peated whisky from Tasmania that woke me with this morning's first exhalations fell to the memory of this dream all over my mouth.
Certain the end of time was nigh, some friends took me to dinner last evening. Aged steak from Ian at Ellis the butcher on the charcoal. Sit back. Drink. Remember to eat. Chew.
The Chardonnay was as fresh as a lemon; the red ones with a Big House on the front became a sensuous swoon through the high cirrus of Bordeaux, with very deep soul. The one in the middle with the gold ink took the cake. Was the cake. Nearly impossible. Totally Bordolating.
Sorry if it's not gold. I'm colourblind.
In cheeky contrast to these was the thinking man's stubby. The Pinot despatched after the Chardonnay was a totally rakish brat of a thing from barrels which musta been made by a mathematician. Black snake. Astonishing. Whip me.
In the morning the whole goddam world was still there. But it has a better tint. So I made a photograph of the empties before my morning toast.
Just plain dry toast with nuthin' thanks.
17 February 2017
ZOOMIN IN ON COONAWARRA: ZEMA
Zema Estate Coonawarra Shiraz 2013
$25; 14.5% alcohol; screw cap
One is tempted to revert to the standard back label descriptors of the 'eighties to review this lovely traditional Coonawarra red. They'd have a few trite lines about red berry and cherry fruit and something about oak and the wine being great for cellaring and perfect with all foods.
On the other hand, tasting barrels with Dimitrio "Black Duck" Zema was always a little more basic. He had two tasting terms: "No good? All bugger?" and "Boom-boom!"
The longer I contemplate this Zema, the more I think that its style and quality fits those hazy, heady days. I'm not being condescending in any way: good wine had a certain, almost naïve honesty that was devoid of sophistry: a feeling missing from most of the over-polished or pick-your-nose feral extremities of today.
The only thing missing is that acrid barky whiff of a dodgy cork.
It does indeed reek of those bitter cherries, with the simple seductive ooze of ripe raspberry conserve, the woodfire stove and a crackled old chesterfield. But there's fresh-bathed flesh, too: you're not alone.
It's generous of flavour and those traditional Coonawarra tannins put their warming fur over you whilst also drawing the finish out into a long dry reverie that triggers much contemplation and nostalgia, and then hunger.
It spins me back to the hearty tomato and olive pasta Mrs Zema would shovel into me after that long, flat drive south. Don't hold the parmigiana. Or the pepper.
Zema Estate Coonawarra Cabernet Sauvignon 2013
$29; 14.5% alcohol; screw cap
After the mighty stack of pasta came the game. I recall being served two pigeons and a duck on one big white plate. I was scolded when I tried to pass it round the table: I thought it was to be shared. But all, all for me.
And then, with great pride, came the Cabernet.
Like this: teases of coffee, tobacco, blackcurrant and whole blackberry bushes, with all their brambly prickles, dark leaves and ripe, almost dripping fruit. It is precise Coonawarra Cabernet from an exceptional vintage.
The flavours and form take the shape of what was called claret. Claret was usually more lineal, less fleshy and tighter of form than what was called burgundy. But then, after a few days of air, the wine is edging more towards the fleshy opulence of a Rubensian Aussie burgundy.
It is indeed a lovely Coonawarra of the old school: perfectly reflective of the Zema family's constant rustic faith in their practice in both vineyard and winery.
If you didn't grate all the parmigiano onto that spaghetti, finish it with this lovely.
Zema Estate Family Selection Coonawarra Cabernet Sauvignon 2012
$46; 14% alcohol; screw cap
Vino famiglia. The title often given to the odd barrel of house wine for grandpa in this instance goes to the best, finest assemblage in the family chais. More precise fruit and barrel selection, and an extra year in good French oak almost erases the rustic allure of the two 2013 reds. But not quite. This is the Zema Lambo.
The best Coonawarra Cabernet is one thing. Really posh French oak, like we rarely saw in the 'eighties, is another. In this case that wood adds lemon and a hint of wintergreen and mint to the already wildly alluring mess of hedgerow berries soaking in crème de cassis, drawing the whole glorious dish into precise focus.
While the 2013 wines will glow with a few more years' cellar, this extra refinement will carry this baby for well over a decade. In the meantime, I'd have it with a juicy, lemony saltimbocca.
16 February 2017
15 February 2017
McLAREN VALE TASTES ITS DIRT
all tasting photos©Philip White
Licking the 2016 rocks for science
by PHILIP WHITE
While its maceration still
confounds me as it growls around my mind, the McLaren Vale Districts Tasting
of barrels of one-year-old Shiraz left a few prominent, and I reckon fairly trustworthy, presumptions.
That's probably
presumptuous. Let's forget that. We'll call 'em suspicions worth pursuit.
This annual event is where
a group of bright McLaren Vale winemakers sit around examining flights of
Shiraz deliberately made according to their source terroirs, stored in neutral
aged oak for a year, decanted into a bottle and presented.
This is a full-bore
forensic tasting conducted by local experts fluent in the most complex aspects
of their region's unique terroir and history. I had a couple of years away from
the table and it was a delight to be back there in that fruity-yet-crisp
intellectual and organoleptic atmosphere. The table bristles like a chess
championship, or a Miles Davis rehearsal.
Everyone gets their solo.
The trick is not to go
fault-hunting. The appraisal nerves here are most useful wrapped entirely
around the matter of whether or not the wines in each subgroup share component
factors. If they do, what are they? If they don't, why not? What else do they
offer?
Every year, the collective
findings of these tasters vary. Some vintages I've seen one geological group or
another dominate in individual character or quality; some years it seems almost
every geology shows unique distinction, for better or worse.
The individual shards of
memory and notes of this tasting won't be of much use scientifically until
they're added to the database built from all these vintages of annual
appraisals and countless hours of discussion through each year.
Wes Pearson, who slides
comfortably down the razor blade between the Dodgy Brothers, his winemaking
partnership, and his other life as a scientist at the Wine Research Institute
ran the tasting in a methodical and reassuring way. In an operation which can suddenly
seem overwhelmingly complex, it's good to feel reassured as you progress.
First, all the wines were
brought in by makers who pin-pointed their source on the Geology of the McLaren Vale Wine Region* map of 2010. A committee,
including some of these expert tasters, has been working to establish a series
of sub-regional compartments based on geology and often a more complex
discussion of aspect and climate and other critical influences on the tricky
bits.
They call these
sub-regions Districts. They are not recognised in any law, but are tentative
sub-regional boundaries for agricultural, geological, organoleptic, Å“nological and
viticultural study. It's about science, not marketing. It's nascent science.
First up, whilst the
60-odd entries were poured in 11 flights, we first tasted blends of all the
wines from each district. These we discussed intensely. Equal proportions of
each entrant from a particular district would be blended and poured, then pored
over.
Next, district by
district, we examined the individual components, always then reflecting on the
vineyard's geology and site. If, say, one component turned out to dominate its district's assemblage, the tasters can form an idea of that spot's general trend by removing the dominator. Sometimes there were only three or four wines, so
one treads with great sensitivity. Other districts had many more entries.
There are a couple of
possible trends that fascinate me most this early in the piece.
First, I felt the 2016
vintage may have been outstanding for the way in which the year and its
conditions overwhelmed many abiding suspicions and presumptions I'd had about
geology. The boundaries were a little smudged this year. Like overall, these
were elegant, racy wines without so much of the fat the local runners can put
on so easily.
I certainly had my
favourites, but to me, the lithe style of the year seemed to overwhelm a lot of
the geological hints I'd expected.
Otherwise, there could be
a shot of subconscious industrial psychological stuff going here where the
winemakers quietly and probably independently decide to show a bit more
attention to letting their grounds speak by pursuing a more elegant style for
the barrel they set aside for this remarkable exercise.
You get a fashion drift
like that now and then.
If in this instance, the
vintage has magnified their focus, making the goal closer and more easily
attained, that's very cool.
If it's only a
viticultural fashion or accounting thing, I hope there's some science to it.
To my burnished saxaphone,
one geological base totally distinctive in 2016 was the calcereous Eocene (young at
56-34 million years) geology of the Blanche Point formation, which reappears in
various locations spread kilometres apart. These old seabeds almost invariably
dinged up a tab of descriptors more akin to a ripe and juicy young Coonawarra.
In this case, geology seems to overwhelm vintage.
Please don't begin to
think these reflections of mine will suddenly change your eventual bottle of
McLaren Vale: this was merely 60 trial barrels out of the region's 3,218
hectares of Shiraz. There will be many more woody, and probably many a bit like
this eventually assembled from each cellar's stack. But there's plenty of time left
for polishing. The blenders have not touched these wines.
Which is what makes them
special.
Neither does this tasting
have anything to do with the so-called Scarce Earths Shiraz marketing scheme,
which obviously causes great confusion to those being introduced to this
project.
Consider the unpronouncable
Scarce Earths, which in China translates to Rare Earths, which are a set of
glowing beauties on the Periodic Table. They're used in stuff like warheads, TV screens and
phone batteries and China's probably got most of it waiting to be mined. See
how easy I get off the track ... but his is really very confusing, especially to the Chinese!
I set out to say that until they hire a poet or writer to come up with a better name than this smart-arsed Rare Earths/Scarce Earths nonsense Chester Osborne invented, the committees of good folk
who've spent years on these studies could help individual local growers confirm
their geology so they could sell that vineyard's wine under the region's
special seal to guarantee that geology is exactly what the label claims, whatever the variety.
Then we'll learn stuff. And growers will learn to name their geology, rather than revert to the dumb District numbers currently used by those not fluent in the names of the numerous geological groups. I'm tired of hearing well-intentioned growers say stuff like "I'm in the corner of eleven, but I've got some thirteen and six."
Then we'll learn stuff. And growers will learn to name their geology, rather than revert to the dumb District numbers currently used by those not fluent in the names of the numerous geological groups. I'm tired of hearing well-intentioned growers say stuff like "I'm in the corner of eleven, but I've got some thirteen and six."
If such an advancement could be made, our map would make a lot more sense to many more people, including savvy customers. There'd also be a more
inclusive and varied stable presented from across the vignoble: one which
includes all the new varieties being planted by pioneers and adventurers who
deserve as much recognition as the old couch potaters.
*Geology of the McLaren Vale Wine Region, PIRSAMinerals and Energy Resources South Australia Publishing Services©Government of
South Australia June 2010
I'd love to see an overlay on our geology map, indicating the price grapes bring per hectare ... this would immediately begin to indicate the geologies winemakers prefer, and maybe begin to discourage vignerons from planting in the less-appropriate districts.
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