Winemaker Notes
Pale straw with green tinges. Lime minerals and powder. Citrus, especially lime predominates the flavour profile, while carrying the trademark minerality that Gun Metal is renowned for.
Professional Ratings
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Robert Parker's Wine Advocate
Zesty lime notes jump from the glass on the nose of the Hewitson 2017 Gun Metal Riesling. This is classically lean and streamlined on the palate, offering little more at this point than racy lime juice over a bed of crushed stone, but pair it with Coffin Bay oysters (or any raw oysters for that matter) and it will prove the perfect match. It's not the most concentrated example of Eden Valley Riesling, so I'd opt for drinking it young rather than aging it.
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Wine Enthusiast
This is a steely, flinty Riesling set for the long haul, hence the name. At the moment, it's showing a good deal of fruit: lemons, apples and orange peel, on the nose. But the palate is all about the flinty minerality. You could drink this now, but you'd be rewarded for cellaring it for at least 10 years. Cellar Selection
Riesling possesses a remarkable ability to reflect the character of wherever it is grown while still maintaining its identity. A regal variety of incredible purity and precision, this versatile grape can be just as enjoyable dry or sweet, young or old, still or sparkling and can age longer than nearly any other white variety. Somm Secret—Given how difficult it is to discern the level of sweetness in a Riesling from the label, here are some clues to find the dry ones. First, look for the world “trocken.” (“Halbtrocken” or “feinherb” mean off-dry.) Also a higher abv usually indicates a drier Riesling.
Higher in elevation and topographically more dramatic than the Barossa Valley floor, Eden Valley abuts it to its south and east. While it is a bit of an extension of Barossa, Eden Valley is topographically different than the pastoral Barossa Valley, and is composed of rocky hills and eucalyptus groves.
Recognizing Eden Valley’s potential with Riesling in the 1960s and 70s, producers started to move their Riesling production from Barossa to these better sites where schist soils on hilltops would produce more steely, tart and age-worthy examples. A most famous site, planted by Colin Gramp, called Steingarten, today produces one of the most outstanding Australian Rieslings. Youthful Eden Valley Rieslings express floral, grapefruit and mineral, while with time in the bottle, they become increasingly toasty and complex.
Riesling isn’t the only grape the region can grow; undeniably at lower altitudes Shiraz does very well. Mount Edelstone is a notable vineyard as well as the Hill of Grace, which boasts healthy Shiraz vines well over 100 years old. This is the only Australian region where Merlot has a made a name for itself and Chardonnay can be spectacular, particularly from the High Eden subregion in the southern valley.