Narrowing down my wineries of the year was no trite operation. Every one of the more than 400 estates featured in Wine Taste Weekly already represents the very best of the best of my weekly tastings, and each deserves recognition.

Inclusion in my Hall of Honour requires at least seven benchmark wines across 100 editions of Wine Taste Weekly, averaging a score of at least 94 points (a gold medal in a wine show). This system is fair and inclusive of both large and small producers (and at least one estate has qualified with just four wines over two vintages). For estates representing particularly good value for money (with strong representation of wines under $25) I’ve relaxed the scoring criterion, and highlighted these estates as representing ‘value’ in the Hall of Honour below.

The result is a hotlist of the finest thirty-five estates in Australia and New Zealand right now. Be sure to raise a glass from at least one of these legendary names this festive season. Wishing you a truly blessed Christmas,

Tyson Stelzer.

The Wine Taste Weekly Australian winery of the year is Penfolds

The runners-up are Cape Mentelle, Tyrrell’s, Vasse Felix and Xanadu

Since the early days of Max Schubert himself, there has never been a more exciting time of experimentation at Penfolds than we are privileged to witness right now. Penfolds has had more than forty wines short-listed for inclusion in Wine Taste Weekly over the past 100 editions and no other estate has hit the mesosphere more often. Line ‘em up: 99 points (twice), 98 points (once), 97 points (an unprecedented six times) and 96 points (seven times). White, red and fortified wines are all represented at 97 or more points, making this not only the most outstanding producer but also one of the most versatile.

The Wine Taste Weekly Australian small winery of the year is Grosset

The runners-up are Oakridge, Primo Estate and Wines by KT

Every label that Jeff Grosset creates has appeared in Wine Taste Weekly, and there are exceedingly few estates of which this can be said. As a result, Grosset should be disadvantaged in the calculation of averages to determine this award. Quite the contrary: his fourteen wines featured have averaged the highest score of any Australian estate in the Wine Taste Weekly Hall of Honour. Across seven varieties and two regions, no wine has scored less than 93 points, four have scored 96 and one legendary 98.

The Wine Taste Weekly New Zealand winery of the year is Felton Road

The runners-up are Auburn and Dog Point

Felton Road has featured nine times in Wine Taste Weekly, with riesling, chardonnay and pinot noir scoring between 94 and 96 points. All three varieties have put forward a 96 pointer, giving this estate the highest overall average score of any winery in the Wine Taste Weekly Hall of Honour.

The Wine Taste Weekly value for money winery of the year is Mike Press Wines

The runners-up are Armchair Critic and Fox Gordon

Mike Press Wines blows all else out of the water when it comes to value this year, with an average price of well under $13, a full $5 less than any other estate in the Wine Taste Weekly Hall of Honour. Order direct and you’ll pay even less. Nine wines take the credit for this result, spanning seven varieties from this sensational single vineyard high in the Adelaide Hills.

The Wine Taste Weekly Hall of Honour

The Armchair Critic – value
Ashton Hills
Auburn
Cape Mentelle
Chapel Hill
Cherubino
Clonakilla
De Bortoli – value
Dog Point
Dutschke
Felton Road
Fox Gordon – value
Grosset
Jacob’s Creek – value
Majella
Mike Press – value
Mount Horrocks
Oakridge
O’Leary Walker – value
Penfolds
Peter Lehmann
Primo Estate
Skillogalee
St Hallett
Teusner
The Lane
Thomas wines
Tim Adams
Tyrrell’s
Vasse Felix
Wines by KT
Wynns Coonawarra Estate
Xanadu
Yabby Lake
Yalumba – value

To read full reviews of all the wines that produced these results, visit the online index of Wine Taste Weekly at http://tysonstelzer.com/?s=.

How many Queensland wineries could you name? Most locals might have difficulty listing more than a handful. It may come as a surprise that the sunshine state is now home to no less than 177 wineries.
More than two-thirds of Queensland’s vineyards are located in the Granite Belt, high on the plateau that traces the border between Queensland and New South Wales. This is the source of fruit for many Queensland wineries, including some located around Toowoomba, Brisbane, the South Burnett and Sunshine Coast.
The Granite Belt is Queensland’s most celebrated vineyard turf, and for good reason. Glance at a map of the vineyards of the world and you’ll notice an interesting pattern: virtually all of the winegrowing regions in the southern hemisphere lie at latitudes greater than thirty degrees south, and in the northern hemisphere, above than thirty-five degrees north. At just under twenty-nine degrees south, the Granite Belt is an outlier, qualifying thanks to its altitude, rising above Queensland’s humid, subtropical climate thanks to elevations of some 700m above sea level – and in some cases above 1000m, ranking among the highest vineyards in the country.
Symphony Hill Wines sources fruit from the highest vineyard in the region, at an altitude of up to 1050m near the township of Ballandean. According to winemaker Mike Hayes, these sites are up to four degrees cooler than other regions in the district. “That’s equivalent to the difference between Coonawarra and the Riverland in South Australia,” he points out. “And that’s a huge difference!”
It is this diversity that makes the Granite Belt such a dynamic place for grapegrowing. Such is the variation in altitude and orientation that each vineyard could almost be considered its own unique subregion. For this reason, the more than fifty-five wineries of the Granite Belt have nurtured a focus on a diverse selection of less common grape varieties. While the Hunter has semillon, the Barossa is famous for shiraz, Margaret River is known for cabernet and the Clare for riesling, there is no single variety on which the Granite Belt can hang its winemaking hat. And there probably never will be.
Symphony Hill embarked on a monumental experiment of planting forty-seven alternative varieties. Six years and dozens of tiny tanks later, the best results are coming from petit verdot, sangiovese, lagrein, souzão, carménère, montepulciano and nebbiolo. Not far down the same road, Hidden Creek is doing good things with tempranillo and talking about planting saperavi and barbera. Continuing further down the hill, Tobin Wines is pinning its hopes on merlot, while Golden Grove Estate is keen on malbec and has high hopes for nero d’avola.
Further north, toward the town of Stanthorpe, Kominos Wines has a focus on shiraz and hopes to import malvesia. Ridgemill Estate is excited about the prospects for albariño and vermentino. For the Granite Belt’s most famous producer, Robert Channon, the varieties are pinot gris, shiraz, cabernet, chardonnay and petit verdot and, of course, verdelho, the variety showing the most promise across the region.
The Granite Belt launched its Strange Bird Alternate Wine Trail to put the focus on its eclectic range of lesser-known varieties. The initiative has proven to be the most successful stroke of marketing genius in the region’s history, with visitors literally flocking in to discover these “strange birds”. Nonetheless, the mainstream varieties of shiraz, cabernet sauvignon, chardonnay and merlot still comprise almost two-thirds of the Granite Belt’s plantings, and verdelho represents a mere five percent.
The Granite Belt may be Queensland’s most successful viticultural region, but this by no means makes it an easy place to grow grapes. Ewen and Elissa MacPherson established Symphony Hill vineyard as the highest in the district and at such an altitude, the block has at some time recorded a frost in every calendar month of the year, and snow in most winters. Occasionally, like this year, it can even snow well into spring. Bushfires tear through from time to time. The soil is sandy and infertile. It’s wet in summer and dry in winter (and vines would sooner have it the other way). As far as premium grape growing is concerned, it’s a tough game up there.
But Ewen would have it no other way. “In Queensland, you need to get altitude to make great wines,” he explains. Alongside estates like Robert Channon, Boireann and Ballandean, Symphony Hill has played its part in taking Queensland wine to new heights. Ewen is working hard to break down the stigma surrounding Queensland wine. “People down south think that we’ve got pineapples rather than roses at the end of our rows!” he laughs.

A daring new initiative in Victoria’s Yarra Valley has a vision to change the way Australian wine is perceived. The brief of Thousand Candles is to create a landmark wine to raise the profile of Australian fine wine, not with shiraz or pinot noir, but with cabernet.
When an anonymous wealthy Asian investor set out to establish a highly aspirational Australian wine, nothing was done conventionally. Vineyards tended according to principles unmentioned in any textbook, varieties blended in unimagined unions, summonsing winemaking tricks deemed nothing less than crazy, seems hardly the place for massive capital investment in a depressed and heavily oversupplied market.
In just two years, AUD 13.8 millon (USD 14.2 million) has been spent, more than half of which secured the purchase of the second-largest private holding in the Yarra Valley, a unique 1115 acre property gliding off a perfect east-facing slope on the border of the Upper Yarra, planted to just 148 acres of vines.
The choice of young winemaker William Downie was unexpected. A restless renegade with an abhorrence toward the mundane, Downie’s strong reputation has been built pushing the boundaries of pinot noir fermented with large proportions of whole bunches and minimal preservative.
Downie has no aspirations for pinot here. “Ultimately, we chose this site for cabernet,” he says. A puzzling decision. Apart from some waterlogged vines dying in the lowlands, destined for the fire, this site doesn’t even grow cabernet.
“The Yarra’s greatest benchmark wines have always been cabernets,” he defends. “I know all the famous estates of the Yarra and I know without doubt that we can do better in viticulture and therefore make a better cabernet.”
He planted cabernet on the slopes late last year, at a whopping 7,000 vines per hectare (2,800 vines per acre) in the hope of creating a European-style tannin maturity, structure and savoury character.
The dream is to make a small volume of 3500-5000 cases of just one wine, a cabernet, likely blended with malbec (which does not yet exist on the property, and never has). Downie’s past experience making pinot from this site gives him confidence that it might be suited to cabernet malbec.
“We have been granted the greatest sense of freedom to pursue ideas!” he exclaimed. “This is an opportunity to completely deconstruct and reconstruct the way wine is made.”
Viticulture is conducted using a regime Downie refers to as “enhanced biodynamics.” Fearful that the biodynamic procedure of brewing ‘500 preparation’ might introduce harmful organisms to the vineyard, he instead measures active counts of soil microbial life under the microscope, creating healthier soils by applying compost and naturally occurring chemicals. This allowed the fast-track recovery of the run-down and disease-ridden vineyard to full health in just twelve months.
Winemaking is even more unusual. With no cabernet or malbec yet to speak of, the first wine is about to be launched into the market, just 700 cases of an unheard of blend of shiraz, tweaked with pinot noir and sauvignon blanc, with a structure Downie describes as “the pinot noir I’ve never made.”
The unusually cool and wet 2011 vintage was not the season to ripen stalks, but Downie radically opted for one hundred percent whole bunch fermentation. “Philosophically I’ve always said that shiraz in the Yarra valley should be 100% whole bunch and I almost chickened out this year but I stuck to it,” he said.
Without a winery on site yet, he made the wine in borrowed space, without temperature control, punch downs, pump overs, acid addition or sulphur dioxide until bottling. “It’s going even further than I have ever gone with pinot noir. I’d wander around the winery because there was nothing I had to do and everyone would think I’m a f***** idiot and the wine was going to be spoilt!”
Ambitious plans are afoot for the construction of an aspirational winery “that changes the way everyone thinks about how wine is made.” Downie has a vision “to bring in an engineer of genuine intellect who doesn’t know wine, show them a destemmer, a press, a fermenter, which haven’t changed in 100 years, and have them redesign the whole process without any stainless steel or concrete.” He is currently commissioning the construction of upside down egg-shaped fermenters, not of terra cotta or concrete but of fired ceramic. “I’ve always felt egg fermenters are upside down!” he said.
The imminent launch of Thousand Candles Yarra Valley 2011 is a bright light in a difficult era for Australian wine. A high dollar, increasing labour costs and rising international competition have forced the country to focus its attention away from low-priced bulk wines and toward the premium sector of the market. The courage of Thousand Candles to push the boundaries is a leading light in the kind of daring that has the potential to define a new era for Australian wine.

‘Would sparkling wine be as popular without the pop?’ was a question posed at the launch of the world’s first high pressure sparkling wine under screw cap in Sydney today.
With a look and feel much like a traditional aluminium screw cap, the new heavy duty ‘Viiva™’ closure has been engineered for high pressure sparkling wine bottles. Until now, screw caps have been deemed reliable only for very lightly carbonated sparkling wines.
Five years of development between Guala Closures Australia and glass manufacturer O-I has culminated in a closure rated to withstand five atmospheres of sparkling pressure.
Convenience was cited as the primary motive for the innovation, in contrast to the shift to screw caps on Australian still wines over the past decade, prompted largely by complaints surrounding cork taint and random oxidation.
“This closure system is perfectly suited to sparkling wines which are popular among women who often report difficulties in opening cork-closures and resealing a bottle with alternative closures,” said Simon Yudelvich, Sales and Marketing Manager for Guala Closures Australia.
Yudelvich highlights safety of opening and an ability to maintain carbonation days after resealing as key advantages of the closure. “This technology appeals to on-premise customers because it reduces time staff spend opening sparkling wines,” he added.
Internal testing has reported promising results in pressure retention after twelve months storage, ability to withstand ten atmospheres of pressure and resilience under extreme temperature conditions. A liner similar to that of a traditional screw cap promises a reliable seal and consistent oxygen barrier.
While sparkling wine drinkers may rejoice in any progress toward eradicating cork taint and bottle variation, don’t expect to be unscrewing your favourite champagne any time soon.
Sparkling wine is a particularly challenging sector of the market in which to launch an alternative closure. The romance of the ‘pop’ is a powerful motivator, and the winemaking technical considerations are complex.
Viiva™ made its debut appearance today on De Bortoli Wines’ retail ‘Trevi’ range and on-premise ‘Willowglen’ line, entry-level wines bottled under four atmospheres of pressure. The Charmat process of bulk sparkling winemaking is employed, in which the second fermentation takes place in a pressure tank.
This is a necessary first evolution of sparkling wine screw caps, which are not yet engineered to the challenge of Méthode Traditionnelle sparkling wines bottled at around six atmospheres. The disgorgement process of ejection of the lees of bottle-fermented sparkling wines currently relies upon the easy removal and resealing of a crown seal or cork.
“ViivaTM has been proven to ten atmospheres of pressure but the bottle hasn’t yet been tested for wines beyond five atmospheres,” explained Yudelvich. “Even if we were to produce a closure and glass combination for seven atmosphere sparkling wines, we are yet to figure out how it would work for the disgorgement process.” These questions are expected to be targeted in the next stage of development of the closure.
In the meantime, it is yet to be seen how the public responds to a closure restricted to tank-fermented sparkling wines.
Screw caps failed on still wines in Australia thirty years ago after a consumer backlash attributed to associations with cheap wines. The same technology gained favour ten years ago, driven by leading winemakers prepared to commit premium wines to the closure.
“With continued improvement of the bottle, I would expect that we will be able to introduce Viiva™ on our more premium sparkling wines in the future,” suggested De Bortoli Chief Winemaker, Steve Webber.
More than eighty-five percent of Australian wine is now sealed with screw cap, a percentage tipped to increase if a screw cap were developed for Méthode Traditionnelle sparkling wines.

The $168,000 bottle
The race is on to create the most expensive wine in Australia.
2012 is the year when Australian winemakers shot for the stratosphere. It seems every second winery is launching a new prestige wine at $100 or more this year, and not every one is worthy of its price. But for some, the sky is the limit.
The trigger came in November last year when Penfolds released its most expensive luxury drop in Shanghai, Special Bin 620 Coonawarra Cabernet Shiraz 2008 at a cool $1,000 a bottle. Compared with escalating prices of France’s Bordeaux First Growths, it looks like a positive bargain. Penfolds’ has more than a fifty year heritage with this blend and its latest rendition will be history-defining in its time. Wines of such calibre are crucial for Australian wine at every level, and with less than 1000 cases released, all reports are that it’s selling very well.
Just to outdo Bin 620, Parawa Estate Ingalalla Grand Reserve 2007 was launched in China earlier this year at $1,100 a bottle. Far from a wine of pedigree, this is the first release from an unknown seven-year-old vineyard on South Australia’s Fleurieu Peninsula. Australian commentators, myself included, were denied samples on the basis that the wine will only be released in Singapore, Hong Kong and Beijing.
The ultimate luxury Australian wine collector’s piece of all time was unveiled last month in Moscow, a hand-blown glass ampoule containing 750mL of Penfolds Kalimna Block 42 Cabernet Sauvignon, housed in a sleek glass plumb-bob, suspended within a hand crafted Jarrah cabinet. Just twelve of these works of art have been made. The $168,000 price tag includes a Penfolds winemaker to open the ampoule for you, whenever and wherever in the world you happen to be.
At the top end, there’s no limit to what you could spend of a bottle of wine. The good news for the rest of us is that Australia’s grape glut means there’s still plenty of bargain wine to be enjoyed. And there will be for a long time to come.

 
Tyson’s Picks
Mike Press Wine Adelaide Hills Single Vineyard Shiraz 2011, $13
Here’s glorious proof that single vineyard, hand crafted wines in limited supply don’t have to be priced into the gods!
Wynns Coonawarra Estate John Riddoch Cabernet Sauvignon 2009, $130
One of the greatest wines to emerge from Coonawarra in the past quarter-century will live at least that long again.
Penfolds Bin 169 Coonawarra Cabernet Sauvignon 2008, $250
This is baby Bin 620, masterminded simultaneously, from the same region, in the same vintage, from just two prized Penfolds blocks.
Penfolds Bin 620 Coonawarra Cabernet Shiraz 2008, $1,000
With a forty year life ahead of it, Bin 620 is destined to become one of Australia’s history-making prestige wines.

Tyson Stelzer

With a bellowed expletive, Steve Webber ripped a scorched pizza from his wood-fired oven and in a single Olympian motion, flung it Frisbee-like over his organic vegetable garden, to crash-land in the vineyard beyond. There was once a time when the Chief Winemaker and Manager of De Bortoli Yarra Valley was less particular about what he made. No longer. For the past twelve years, the steep trajectory of ascent of this estate has been largely thanks to the daring of one man. His influence has been infectious like no other in one of the country’s most progressive wine regions.
Steve came to the Yarra in 1989 and immediately married “the boss”, Leanne De Bortoli. He arrived with a self-confessed feeling of “total self-confidence” after seven years at Lindemans. “There was a feeling of confidence in Australian wine in general,” he recalls. “Everything we did was terrific and we thought we knew a lot more than we did.” For the first decade he carried on making wines, as he always had, with a “show focus”.
Then in 1998 Steve Webber had an epiphany. “Leanne got a bout of cancer and we wondered what life and wine were about,” he says. A move to organic and biological produce prompted the same philosophies in the vineyard. But their real inspiration came from travel. While exploring France, Steve and Leanne discovered that fine wine was made by understanding the land. “We realised we didn’t have an amazing understanding of what fine wine was. We discovered an interesting plethora of wine and for the first time we realised what wine was all about. That was a revolution! We did a lot of soul searching in what fine wine was and what the Yarra could do.”
Blocks were evaluated to identify A-grade sites, vineyard practices were changed, a biological approach to viticulture was adopted, sites were ripped out and replanted, harvest dates were brought forward, old barrels were favoured to new, and back labels were rewritten: “Winemaking: It’s harder to do nothing”. A concerted move away from fruit-driven styles toward more textural wines with a strong sense of place proved to be more than a little controversial, with accusations of leanness from some quarters.
“Finesse is important in fine Australian wine,” Steve defends. “We’re getting closer to making wine that tastes of this place. Yarra wine isn’t loaded with intense character and a lot of sunshine. It’s more subtle. Some people appreciate finesse and probably an equal number like a mouthful of fruit and oak. Personally, I’m not worried if only half the people in the world like the style!”
To Steve, overt varietal expression is not the goal, but variety is merely a vehicle to carry a sense of place. “In fine wine, I don’t think anyone is interested in a mouthful of peaches, gooseberries or strawberries, but rather a link between variety and place. Variety is just one component, alongside texture, feel, minerality and the flavour of the soil. If it’s too dominant we miss some of the other things.” His aspiration is to craft wines that express their place, “wines that are calm and have poise, really interesting drinks that are just delicious!”
Steve and Leanne’s travels continue to inspire new labels and styles. A trip to Sardinia precipitated Bella Riva Pinot Grigio Vermentino, while a week in Bandol led to more pale and textured rosé. But perhaps their most influential bottles are those opened at home. Interesting wines are shared every Friday afternoon at De Bortoli. And not just at the pointy end. “If I can buy a delicious wine for $15 I can afford to buy a carton. We’ve got to do more of that. We’ll vacuum three bottles of cheap Chianti with pizza or pasta! Delicious, medium bodied, slightly savoury – giddy up! It’s not posh! The Italians know something we don’t sometimes!” It’s this down-to earth attitude that has enabled Steve to increase production from 2,600 cases to more than 400,000 in two decades.
The winemaking team at De Bortoli dreams up new wines and styles by lining up the international benchmarks. It’s a feast of inspiration for any palate, and particularly a young one. It’s here that Steve Webber’s courage has been most daring. Some would call him foolish for putting the young Bill Downie fully in charge of pinot noir before he was even qualified as a winemaker (in hindsight, it was genius). Or Paul Bridgeman in charge of shiraz and cabernet, or Sarah Fagan with white wines. Or Dave Bicknell, Timo Mayer, Mark O’Callaghan, or Luke Lambert. De Bortoli is a veritable hotbed for the breeding of some of the Yarra’s finest winemakers.
As nonsensical as it may seem from a business perspective, Steve’s bold approach in not simply blessing his Padawan learners into their own labels but actively encouraging them to leave – even at times helping to finance their projects – has proven to ignite an initiative of progress and experimentation which has characterised Yarra’s new generation.
And this is no one-way street. “In encouraging our young people to give things a go, explore and have some fun, I’ve learnt a lot,” Steve admits. “No single person has all the answers but it’s about having a go together.”
This is a philosophy that informs all of his interactions, and he is constantly on the lookout for other “like-minded people” in the Yarra or the wider industry whom he can generously encourage, show warm hospitality, mentor or support. “I don’t think wine is necessarily about banding together with similar sized companies, but with people with the same mindset and philosophy. In the Yarra, a lot of like-minded people have got together and styles have developed with sauvignon, chardonnay and syrah, and now with nebbiolo, gamay and even pinot blanc.”
“Everyone is drinking a lot more international wine now and a lot of winemakers are doing things differently with lots of whole bunch and pushing the boundaries with different varieties. It’s been a real growing up in the industry and I’d like to think that we contributed something to that.”
He praises what he calls “interesting clusters of energy” that have emerged in the last twenty years, Steve Pannell, Larry Cherubino and Rob Mann at Hardys, the Yarra cluster, Ian Riggs, PJ Charteris and the Hunter crew, and more recently the progressive makers, young and old, in the Mornington, Barossa and Adelaide Hills. “There’s no question the Australian industry is heading in the right direction!” he exclaims.
“But it’s not an easy place to sell wine out there and we’ve got to complete. You’ve got to make great wine at realistic prices. And at the top end there are terrific advances in many regions in identifying the great vineyards. But there’s not enough interesting expensive wine made and we need to work harder at that. It’s about nurturing the finest sites, finding the parts of the vineyard that are pulling down the real quality of the blend. That comes down to understanding the soil you’re cultivating.”
“More and more people want to know where things come from and want to associate a region with a particular style of wine.” This has prompted him to move his entry-level Windy Peak range to single region wines this year, representing one of the best value brands on the shelves.
Steve’s influence came to the wine show circuit in 2008 when he was appointed Chairman of The Royal Melbourne Wine Show. Never one to hold back, he boldly introduced classes of “Character, charm and interest” in place of commercial classes, contentiously (and rightly) opened up The Jimmy Watson Trophy to include two-year-old wines and abolished medals for unfinished wines. “Look for beautiful wines with charm, not just technical correctness,” he briefed the judges before the show. “Prize detail and beauty, seek out wines that taste of a place.”
When Steve and Leanne aren’t at the winery or busy changing the wine world, they can be found walking the beaches around their recently completed beach house on the Mornington Peninsula. “I’m never very far from a glass of wine!” Steve admits. “We enjoy food – when there is a crisis or a celebration, Italians eat their way out of it! And our other real love is travel. I can’t think of travel without thinking of wine. Immersing myself in beautiful parts of the world changes my mind about wine.”

Tyson Stelzer

Alice Springs may seem an unlikely place to produce one of Australia’s more important red winemakers. But if the Red Centre hadn’t been home to Sue Hodder, she would likely have never ended up in Coonawarra. And she would certainly have never had the spirit to transform the most fabled and historic estate of Australia’s other red centre, as Chief Winemaker at Wynns Coonawarra Estate.

On the eve of her twentieth vintage in this viticultural outpost, Sue feels right at home. “Coonawarra would be a difficult place to make wine if you were set on being in a big city,” she admits. Growing up in a small, isolated community, she has no desire to be anywhere else.

Agriculture has always flowed in Sue’s blood. Like many who grew up in Alice Springs, agricultural college in South Australia beckoned after she graduated from school, and it was here that she was inspired to take on a vintage job in the Barossa – largely because the wine students at Roseworthy appeared to be having such a good time!

From the outset, Sue’s focus was resolutely fixed on the vineyards and growers. It was the early 1980s, the height of the vine pull scheme, and things were tough. Even before she embarked upon her winemaking studies, Sue took on a role with Penfolds, assessing vineyards and tasting and analysing maturing grapes. “Penfolds had fantastic Barossa growers that they didn’t know much about, so they set about getting to know their growers better,” she recalls. Little did she know that two decades later, this viticultural grounding would equip her to completely transform the largest vineyard holder in Coonawarra.

It was just prior to the 1993 vintage that Sue arrived at Wynns. “It was a different place then,” she reflects. “We’ve always had a large vineyard resource, and with climate change and warmer vintages it was pretty tight to get all the fruit into the winery. We didn’t have a lot of new equipment until 2000.” Procedures in the winery weren’t nearly as stringent then. “If there was a little VA in one parcel or bitter tannins in another, we’d let them through – but we wouldn’t let that happen now!”

Sue was appointed Chief Winemaker in 1998 and courageously ushered in a new era at Wynns, the full results of which are only now becoming fully apparent in its wines. “We knew for a long time in the 1990s that our vineyards were building up too much dead wood, that trellis wires were rusting and we needed to rejuvenate our old vines,” she admits. The crux came in 2002. “The vines were so low yielding that they were hard to pick. It was not our finest hour.” Vineyard manager Allen Jenkins was appointed in that year and, in Sue’s words, “he was just horrified”.

Sue and Allen immediately embarked upon a ruthless regime of vineyard rejuvenation, together convincing then owners Foster’s Group to make a huge investment in a vineyard overhaul of extraordinary proportions, challenging the very fundamentals of viticulture in Coonawarra. 800 hectares of drip irrigation was installed for careful management of tannin production (ultimately saving some 380 mega litres of water annually), 450 hectares was retrellised (severed with chainsaws at knee height), and a further 95 hectares was replanted, with additional replanting ongoing to this day. Better clones have been planted on rootstocks matched to soil types, while rigorous and detailed scientific and technical data has been utilised to monitor yields, facilitating targeted composting and canopy management.

Sue describes the result as “brighter” wines, thanks to development of genuine ripe flavours without long hang times that produce higher sugar levels. Better light exposure in the canopies produces more even ripeness, without the need to delay harvest to wait for greener berries to catch up. This has returned Wynns to more medium-bodied, textural wines. “We are working hard to keep alcohol levels down, although it has been a challenge in recent years,” says Sue, who would like to keep every wine around thirteen percent alcohol.

The Wynns revolution has followed a regime of intricate attention to detail as much in the winery as the vineyard. Sue acknowledges that oak presence was more apparent in Wynns wines during the 1990s, accentuated by higher acid levels. “In the past, charry oak helped to mask green fruit, but we’ve been able to address this problem in the vineyard,” she says. With much better oak available, Sue and her team have been working closely with coopers on rigorous and longstanding oak trials. “It’s crucial to get the right oak to suit a particular parcel of fruit,” she explains. “Certain vineyards suit one kind of oak more than another.” Trials remain ongoing because the results aren’t obvious quickly.

In her characteristically modest way, Sue is quietly proud of the air of finesse that these initiatives have brought to her flagship wines, John Riddoch Cabernet Sauvignon and Michael Shiraz. But with more supple fruit, less bitter tannins, no green characters and less apparent oak, will these wines carry the longevity that made these labels famous? “Sometimes we wonder if there is enough oak in the wines now,” she says; “if our drinkers are looking for big oak impact.” But she has no doubt the wines will live just as long. “They have just as much tannin but it’s finer-grained.” She points to the inspiration of the Wynns wines of the 1960s. “Fruity, medium-bodied, never big, and many of them are still beautiful to this day. Those wines which have aged slowly can still be made today.”

Further refinement came with the completion of a new shed in time for the 2008 vintage. The addition of twenty-four small fermenters allowed small parcels from key vineyards to be kept separate for the first time. This has enabled Sue to further hone a focus on small volumes of single vineyard and single subregion wines to showcase the diversity of Coonawarra terra rossa. “I made a wine from the Harold Vineyard in 2001 and took it to the Fosters marketing team with a request to bottle it. The response came back, ‘You can’t call it Harold – that’s a terrible name!’ But that was the name of the vineyard, so that’s what we called it.” Since then Sue has bottled the estate’s most expressive single vineyards each year, capturing a compelling detail never before bottled in the history of Coonawarra’s most historic winery. Further, single subregion wines have been released, from vineyards along V&A Lane, the axis of Coonawarra, renowned for its finely-structured and silky style.

While these new bottlings have become an increasingly important chapter in the Wynns story, Sue’s key focus remains resolutely on her larger volume wines. “I always loved Wynns because they were good wines that I could afford – and that hasn’t changed,” she declares, adding that she’s loving the 2010 red stripe blend at the moment. “It’s important that our commercial wines remain representative of Coonawarra, from good, mature vineyards.”

Wynns Black Label Cabernet has long been a mainstay of wine cellars across the country and Sue maintains that it’s still the most important wine in Wynn’s portfolio. A perpetual cellaring special, it remains affordable in spite of a price hike to $40 this vintage (which seemingly did nothing to dissuade aggressive discounting, with advertised prices recently dipping below $19). Blended from some eighty separate batches, Sue describes Black Label as “a genuine endeavour to maintain the heritage of the label” and this is why the volume varies significantly to reflect the yields of each vintage. There’s no question it’s in the best form it’s been in years.

All things considered, the wines of Wynns have never been stronger than they are right now. “When everyone in Australian wine was flying high in the late 1990s, it didn’t feel like that for us,” Sue confesses. “But I feel like Wynns is doing better than it was fifteen years ago – the reverse of everyone else.” In spite of this, these wines don’t carry the fanfare of, say, Penfolds or Wolf Blass. Wynns is something of a quiet achiever in the Treasury Wine Estates trove, and that seems to suit Sue’s reserved and no-fuss approach. Her name may not be flashed around as often as some of our other women winemaking superstars, but the transformation that she has effected is the equal of any in the modern era. In her characteristically gracious yet determined manner, she is quick to share any credit with Allen and their vineyard and winemaking teams.

In her dignified way, Sue would rather be considered a custodian of great winemaking tradition than a celebrity winemaker. “We need to make sure that we capture out history,” she emphasises, “not just anecdotes but the real history of our winemaking. Not simply romantic inspiration but real practice, because we’re still working with many of the same historic vineyards of the estate. We haven’t fully captured this yet, we still need to explore what is important in our winemaking heritage that we should be embracing today, in the context of innovation, research and local and international trends. We need to maintain both with equal enthusiasm.

“It’s all about making the most of what we have here with our vineyards, our history and our wines and to tell our stories through the wines. It’s a fine line between being fondly remembered and being old fashioned.”

Sue expresses her amazement at the affectionate sentiment shown toward Wynns, thanks to so many memories of drinking great Wynns wines. It’s an affection shared all the way to her home town of Alice Springs, where her friends show their support every year by purchasing the Wynns barrel in the annual Coonawarra auction. It’s a fitting tribute to the girl from Alice who transformed Wynns Coonawarra Estate.

Why does one bottle of wine cost $5 and another $168,000?

The race is on to make the most expensive bottle of wine in Australia. First came Penfolds Grange
($625) and Henschke Hill of Grace ($620) before Torbreck trumped in with The Laird ($725). Penfolds
then launched its Bin 620 Coonawarra Cabernet Shiraz in Shanghai at a cool $1000 a bottle. Its reign
was to be short-lived before Parawa Estate Ingalalla Grand Reserve swooped in out of nowhere at
$1100. Then Penfolds obliterated all before it and made history with Ampoule, the most expensive
wine release in the world, at $168,000.

What makes a bottle worth such a figure? What does it really cost to make? If you set out to create
the most expensive bottle in the country, what is the most you could pay for raw materials? The
answer this year is $26 per bottle. Purchase the most expensive grapes in Australia and spare no cost
on any detail, including the very finest French oak barrels and the best bottles, corks and labels that
money can buy, and $26 is the most you could spend. Add tax and a margin for the retailer and your
bottle will land on the shelves around $55.

Why should any bottle sell for more than this? For the same reason a Bugatti Veyron Grand Sport
Vitesse roadster has a price tag of $2.4M and a Chanel Diamond Forever bag fetches $260,000. In
the rarefied air of the world of prestige, the most exclusive products are worth whatever price their
makers can dream up.

The secret is scarcity. Just eleven hand-blown Penfolds Ampoules were released, each holding
750mL of wine from what are believed to be the oldest cabernet vines in the world, cradled in a
bespoke glass plum-bob, suspended within a handcrafted cabinet. All eleven sold quickly after their
release in Moscow in June.

Carrying on the lineage of six decades of Penfolds Special Bin Wines, Ampoule and Bin 620 make a
vital statement of the calibre of Australian wine in a world where the price of excellence continues
to spiral. Bordeaux’s First Growths, the most famous and most traded wines on the planet, sell in
considerable volumes at ever escalating four-figure sums. Australia would risk being left behind if its
top end didn’t keep pace with the great wines of the world.

But who defines the top end? Pedigree, history and brand respect are surely prerequisites for
sustaining lofty price tags? Yet Parawa Ingalalla appeared this year from a little known, seven year
old vineyard on South Australia’s Fleurieu Peninsula. What if the standard of a wine doesn’t meet
the expectation of its price?

It seems 2012 is the year of the launch of the $100 flagship. Wineries across the country, many of
which have never sold wines for more than $50, are announcing new single vineyard and icon wines
with three digit price tags. An admirable pursuit if the wine is worthy, but often the $50 offering
from the same estate is a better wine, after decades of refinement. If the production run is small, an
icon wine will likely sell out regardless, but large volumes all too often land in clearance houses at
discounted prices.

Qantas – The Australian Way | Wine Feature| Tyson Stelzer | November 2012

Ultimately, the auction market decides the true worth of a bottle of wine. For decades, Robert
O’Callaghan has sold his Rockford Basket Press Shiraz to his mailing list in strictly allocated volumes
for around $55 per bottle. It’s difficult to find in retail stores or auctions for less than twice the price.

On the other hand, it’s unfortunate that expensive wines are made that are not worth a fraction of
the price that an eager marketer might aspire to. Many of us will never afford them, anyway. The
good news for us is that there are inexpensive wines of impressive pedigree awaiting discovery. One
particularly characterful single vineyard cabernet sauvignon from a tiny estate sells for $10 a bottle.
Its maker tells me it costs him less than $3 a bottle to produce, and he’s more than satisfied with the
margin. I’ll drink to that.

Mike Press Wines Adelaide Hills Single Vineyard Shiraz 2011, $12.50

From high in the Adelaide Hills, Mike Press Shiraz is Australia’s most age-worthy bargain red. The
cool 2011 vintage has nurtured its most restrained personality ever; a wine laced with intense
cracked black pepper and aromas of violets and cloves.

Tyrrell’s Wines Stevens Hunter Valley Shiraz 2010, $35

With vines dating from 1867, Stevens may be the oldest vineyard still in production in the Hunter. Its
wines deserve icon status, making this quite a bargain. Calm restraint allows the savoury character
of its red earth soils to be expressed.

Peter Lehmann Stonewell Barossa Valley Shiraz 2008, $100

Stonewell is far from the most famous Barossa shiraz but its consistency across more than two
decades and its profound longevity are without parallel, making this the finest Barossa shiraz of the
modern era.

Mount Mary Quintet Yarra Valley 2010, $145

A flagship of the Yarra Valley for four decades, Mount Mary Quintet is a blend of cabernet and
friends that makes a statement not by power or impact but by effortless, harmonious, silky, graceful
refinement.

Tyson Stelzer is a multi-award winning wine writer with an annual readership of four million
worldwide. He is the author of thirteen wine books including The Champagne Guide 2012-2013.

The march of refinement in Australian white wines has left no variety untouched, but in the wake
of the rise of new varieties there’s no question the quartet of chardonnay, sauvignon, riesling and
semillon retain their monopoly on the upper echelons.

O’Leary Walker Adelaide Hills Sauvignon Blanc 2012, $16

The new age of sauvignon is one of elegant refinement and it’s refreshing to find a rendition as
sophisticated as this at such a teeny price. Farewell pungent gooseberries and passionfruit, hello
perfumed apple blossoms and lemon zest! O’Leary Walker’s mature vines capture the cool climate
energy and chalky mineral air of their home high in the Adelaide Hills.

Grosset Polish Hill Clare Valley Riesling 2012, $50

I cannot recall an Australian riesling of such breathtaking poise, utter calm, magnificent
concentration and devastating purity. The subsoil slate of Polish Hill surges through the palate in
a cascade of mineral texture that propels a haunting granny smith apple blossom perfume. The
benchmark riesling from the best vintage in at least a decade.

Tyrrell’s Vat 1 Hunter Valley Semillon 2006, $60

Hunter locals said Bruce Tyrrell was mad to pick his semillon so early in 2006. The recent release of
his flagship proved otherwise, capturing wonderfully ripe lemon zest within a shell of classic Vat 1
stamina and high-tensile acidity. Six years old, it’s unravelling incrementally to reveal nuances of
roast nuts and preserved lemons.

Penfolds Reserve Bin 10A Adelaide Hills Chardonnay 2010, $95

No Australian chardonnay has ascended as convincingly as Reserve Bin A in recent years, carving
out a sure foothold among the finest expressions of the most noble white grape in the country. The
true magic of this wine comes in its seamless juxtaposition of ultra-fine Adelaide Hills fruit purity its
mesmerising complexity of flint and gunsmoke.

Champagne Pol Roger Brut Vintage 2002, $130

Pol 1996 was a legendary champagne, and the grandest vintage since has just hit our shores. All the
tension of the remarkable 2002 vintage is on parade, capturing inherent concentration of yellow
fruits, within the Pol Roger house style of supreme refinement. A decade in cold cellars has built
magnificent tension between subtle complexity and exacting purity.