Winemaker Notes
Delicate, fragrant, light to medium bodied but with deceptive power, silky tannins and medium term ageing potential. The 2018 vintage has a concentrated core of red berry fruits including raspberries and cherries. It is vibrant and more opulent than other years.
Enjoy in a large red wine glass, with some charcuterie.
Professional Ratings
-
James Suckling
The dried-strawberry and orange-peel character here is so enticing and energetic with hints of walnuts and dried flowers. Medium body, light and fine tannins and a crisp finish. Drink now or hold.
-
Wine Enthusiast
This vintage reveals a heady combo of wild blueberry, current, flowers, anise, nutmeg and woodsy, forest floor aromas. The palate is quietly powerful, the silky fruit and lifted acidity wound in savory, highly textural tannins and a lingering finish. This is a finessed, multifaceted bottling that could cellar a decade.
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.”
A narrow band of hills and valleys east of the city of Adelaide, the Adelaide Hills region is a diverse landscape featuring a variety of microclimates. In general it is moderate with high-altitude areas cooler and wetter compared to its warmer, lower areas.
Piccadilly Valley, the part of Adelaide Hills closest to the city, was first staked out by a grower named Brian Croser, in the 1970s for a cool spot to grow Chardonnay, then uncommon in Australia. Today a good amount of the Chardonnay goes to winemakers outside of the region.
Producers here experiment with other cool-climate loving aromatic varieties like Pinot Gris, Viognier and Riesling. Charming sparkling wine is also possible. On its north side, lower, west-facing slopes make full-bodied Shiraz.