Winemaker Notes
Professional Ratings
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Wine Enthusiast
Less effusive on the nose than the Mort's Block, this boasts notes of tangerine zest and lemon. This dry, medium-bodied Riesling hints at riper fruit flavors yet stays resolutely citrusy through the long, electric finish.
Editor's Choice -
Wine & Spirits
Earthy and austere, this is a dry white with playful tension to the flavors, a buzz of acidity stinging the scents of honeycomb and lime. Tight for now, this will develop richer lime flavors with five years in the cellar.
Best Buy -
Robert Parker's Wine Advocate
The 2014 Killerman's Run Riesling begins with aromas of white pepper, lemon juice, apples and, aniseed then moves to an open and approachable palate that has wonderfully crisp acidity and very good fruit intensity. It finishes long and zesty.
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.
The Clare Valley is actually a series of narrow north to south valleys, each with a different soil type and slightly different weather patterns along their stretch. In the southern heartland between Watervale and Auburn, there is mainly a crumbled, red clay loam soil called terra rossa and cool breezes come in from Gulf St. Vincent. A few miles north, in Polish Hill, is soft, red loam over clay; westerlies blowing in from the Spencer Gulf influece this area's climate.
The differences in soil, elevation, degree of slope and weather enable the region to produce some of Australia’s finest, aromatic, spicy and lime-pithy Rieslings, as well as excellent Shiraz, Cabernet Sauvignon and Malbec with ripe plummy fruit, good acid and big structure.
Clare Valley is an isolated farming country with a continental climate known for its warm and sunny days, followed by cool nights—perfect for wine grapes’ development of sugar and phenolic ripeness in conjunction with notable acidity levels.