Winemaker Notes
Professional Ratings
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Robert Parker's Wine Advocate
Pale ruby colored, the 2013 Cottage Block Pinot Noir offers a stunning perfume of rose petals, potpourri and kirsch with a core of raspberry leaves and cranberries plus a waft of cinnamon stick. Light to medium-bodied, the palate is lithe, elegant and silky soft, yet certainly doesn't skimp on the finish! Just beautiful!!
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Wine & Spirits
Peter Caldwell selected this wine from two blocks at Dalrymple’s home vineyard in Pipers River, in the north of Tasmania. The cold waters of the Tasman Sea give it a crisp and refreshing brightness, its color completely transparent ruby. The fruit tannins are crunchy, even if the wine is a little stinky at first, needing a day of air to gain elegance. A zesty, cold-climate pinot, this ends on a note of tarragon. For duck rillettes.
Thin-skinned, finicky and temperamental, Pinot Noir is also one of the most rewarding grapes to grow and remains a labor of love for some of the greatest vignerons in Burgundy. Fairly adaptable but highly reflective of the environment in which it is grown, Pinot Noir prefers a cool climate and requires low yields to achieve high quality. Outside of France, outstanding examples come from in Oregon, California and throughout specific locations in wine-producing world. Somm Secret—André Tchelistcheff, California’s most influential post-Prohibition winemaker decidedly stayed away from the grape, claiming “God made Cabernet. The Devil made Pinot Noir.”
Directly south of the city of Melbourne and the Mornington Peninsula wine region, the cool-climate island of Tasmania has earned an honorable reputation as the country’s finest producer of Sparkling Wine. Naturally the region also excels in top quality still wines from Pinot Noir, Chardonnay and Riesling, all distinguished because of a high natural acidity. Most of the Tasmania vineyards cluster around the eastern side of the island from north to south.