Winemaker Notes
This is a typical cool climate Yarra Valley Pinot Noir with aromas of cherries and summer berries and hints of spice and oak. The palate is bright with red fruits and soft tannin.
This is a versatile wine that will match well with many foods; try it with a charcuterie platter, pizza/pasta and porcini mushrooms or barbecued meats.
Professional Ratings
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Wine Spectator
This starts off a little reductively but opens after some swirling in glass to reveal plump bright cherries and strawberries, soy sauce and leafy earthy undertones. It's light bodied, with great acidity that lifts and brightens the red fruit and savory notes. There's a long herb-flecked finish. Tannins are soft but supportive. Drink young, and, considering its affordability, any day of the week.
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.”
As the most important area of wine production in Victoria today, the Yarra Valley is most popular for Pinot Noir and Chardonnay, which account for over half of vineyard acreage. A gentle, rolling and rural region alongside the Margaret River, the Yarra Valley has a cool maritime climate with a lengthy growing season, perfect for these cool-climate varieties.
Two styles of Pinot Noir are possible here. The warmer Lower Yarra Valley with sandy, loam soils, produces plush and fruity Pinot Noir while the cooler, higher-elevation Upper Yarra Valley with soils of young red basalt, produces more angular and mineral-driven Pinot Noir.
Yarra Valley Chardonnay is among the best in Australia. To preserve the floral aromatics and fresh citrus flavors for which this area’s Chardonnay is so appreciated, time in barrel is restrained (though barrel fermentation is common). The best Yarra Valley Chardonnays display brilliant acidity, leesy characteristics, citrus, stone fruit and flavors of ginger and spice.
Shiraz and Cabernet find success in parts of this region as well.