Winemaker Notes
Vermentino on skins offering notes of peach and iced tea. A super refreshing wine.
Professional Ratings
-
Robert Parker's Wine Advocate
The 2021 Pigato spent 20 days on skins, was highly plunged twice a day, then pressed to stainless steel where it was matured on the fine lees until September. This and the Rolle were picked on the same day, from the same vineyard, but they are treated differently in the winery to draw out two different styles. It is cloudy in the glass, with spring florals, orange zest, fine white pepper spice, peach ice tea and a skein of jasmine tea through the finish. As with the Leko Blanc, it is textural, grippy and layered. Detailed and delicious! 10.8% alcohol.
A fantastic, aromatic white grape that grows with great success in Sardinia, Tuscany and in lesser proportions on the island of Corsica. Somm Secret—Vermentino is thought to be genetically identical to Liguria’s Pigato grape and Peidmont’s Favorita. It comprises a large proportion of the whites in southern France where it is called Rolle.
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.