Winemaker Notes
Intense aromas of blueberries, plum skins, spice, earthy beets and defining red cherries. Concentration of flavors from the low cropping vintage are evident immediately. With a sweet fruit entry complexed by spice from French barriques and whole bunch component this finishes with fine acidity and lingering dark fruits. FOOD MATCH : Sauteed beef and potato latkes with oven roasted baby carrots or a mushroom, potato, tomato and roast beetroot pizza.
Professional Ratings
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James Suckling
There's a greater sense of construct with more oak and spices. However, the fruit is up to the task. It needs a little time. Darker cherries, sappy berries and undergrowthy allure. The palate has a smooth, dense and ripe core of cherry plums. It is right at the limit of ripeness. Give this another two to three years to settle.
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Vinous
Limpid red. Assertive, mineral-tinged red berry and incense aromas, along with suggestions of exotic spices, cola and woodsmoke. Spicy and focused on the palate, offering raspberry, bitter cherry and spicecake flavors that turn sweeter on the back half. Shows impressive energy and spicy lift on the persistent finish, which is given shape by smooth, even tannins.
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Robert Parker's Wine Advocate
Whole-bunch, stemmy aromas mark the nose of the embryonic 2015 Cottage Block Pinot Noir. Cherry and rhubarb notes support those herbal-vegetal nuances, making this medium-bodied wine palatable now, although it will no doubt be more integrated and complete in a few years. By then, the stemminess should evolve into scents of tea and roses, and the tannins should be smoother and silkier than their current state.
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.