The Auswine Forum

I don't know. I just don't get it. Perhaps I should ask the question are there any Clare Valley red wines liked by the fanatical detractors of Wendouree ?

JamieBahrain wrote:I don't know. I just don't get it. Perhaps I should ask the question are there any Clare Valley red wines liked by the fanatical detractors of Wendouree ?

Chris H wrote:Jamie said :

I don't know. I just don't get it. Perhaps I should ask the question are there any Clare Valley red wines liked by the fanatical detractors of Wendouree ?

Interesting question Jamie. Personally I think Clare is too warm for quality Cabernet. Hence I sold the rest of my mid-nineties Wendouree Cab-Malbecs in the past MW auction (buyers would have got a bargain though if they like that style as they have been coolly cellared since their release and delivery from Birks many years ago). Shiraz is their best wine I think by a margin.

I used to be on their list but found the wines relatively uninteresting more often than not so stopped buying. Each to their own. Quite a few label drinkers in China though - hence the passion for label counterfeiting, former love of Lafite, current love of any big name in Burgundy and investing in Bordeaux Chateaux.

Ian S wrote:FWIW I used to see Starforum as slightly more open to European wines than this forum was. That said, there is definitely much more interest in them here these days.

rooman wrote:
Auswine on the other hand has retained a better balance. There is as much discussion around entry point wines as there is around expensive Barolos and Burgundies. To my way of thinking that is the sign of a healthy forum. I enjoy reading other forumites experiences with wines that are often out of my price range but it needs to be balanced with an active discussion around less expensive wines.

Mark

Rossco wrote:
Ashbrook Chardonnay 2013 -
WOW.... from the first whiff this was all class. Massive complex wine with everything going on. Long length, mouthfeel was silky
and oh that lenght.... went on and on and on. Stock up on this

Dang wrote:A friend came over and brought from his trip to France a bottle to share. That was Les Darons 2014 from Languedoc. The winemaker Jeff Carrel, a pure garagiste, crafted his wine from his own Grenache, Carignan and Syrah. A pleasant wine full of red fruit and spice and with fresh acidity. What is interesting is the tannins are soft and non obtrusive.

THEME: Wendouree Tasting
Postby Lincoln » Thu Mar 17, 2005 7:10 pm

Like a lot of Australia wine enthusiasts from the 90’s, I was weaned on the Robin Bradley “Gold Book”. I would trawl his guide, finding the treasured wines with 5 Gold Stars, believing they were the best Australia had to offer. I would buy the ones I could source locally and try them and decide which were the ones for me and which were the ones that weren’t.

From there I graduated to the Halliday Guide and I was fascinated by the entry for Wendouree. Five stars and summary that reads so: “The iron fist in the velvet glove best describes these extraordinary wines. They are fashioned with passion and yet precision from very old vineyards with its unique terroir by Tony and Lita Brady, who rightly see themselves as custodians of a priceless treasure.” The recommended cellaring for these gems was 20+ years, and I had never seen them in a retail outlet in Brisbane. Luckily, I found some from the 80’s and bought as many as I could. My memory, hazy though it is, was that I liked them, and I decided to buy more. And I was patient.

I have my first Halliday Guide in front of me now. I’ve looked at the well-thumbed pages, the notes scrawled at the edges of the pages, the telephone numbers, and co-incidentally I found a receipt from Wendouree. On the 24th of June 1996, I bought my first wines from the winery direct; a mixed case of 1994 Shiraz Mataro and 1994 Shiraz Malbec. The Shiraz Mataro was $16 per bottle, and the Shiraz Malbec was $17.50 per bottle. Freight and insurance came to $16.70.

And I’ve been buying whatever I could since then, sometimes from auction.

Eight years have passed, and I’ve had one or so bottle a year, but now it was time to be put the “collector” inside me aside away, and make a decision about whether or not I would continue to buy them year-in, year-out. So I went into the cellar, found 2 bottles of each of the Shiraz- and Cabernet-based wines, and over the past 3 weeks I’ve
tasted them. Admittedly, most of them were young, especially by Wendouree standards, but all the wines were decanted before tasting, and tasted on the next day if possible. Here are the notes:

Shiraz 1995: Dark red. Black fruits and a touch of mint on the nose. The palate shows red cherries and blackberries, with some silky and huge tannins, like a giant in a wedding dress. There was also some charry notes, but not a lot of finesse, but maybe some more time in the bottle might see it soften. 88 points. Drink 2007-2015

Shiraz 1996: Dark red. Initially subdued, but opened up to be quite interesting: black fruit pastilles, butter, some dusty oak and a dash of camphor/menthol. The palate was true to the nose, with a fair swag of acid too. Quite a rustic wine really, and I cannot see it declining for any years. 91 points. Drink 2008-2016

Cabernet Sauvignon 1993: Red with tawny notes. Tomato leaf, a touch of menthol, but really dominated by tomato leaf. The palate shows red currants, capsicum and candied red fruits. Quite a silky smooth palate, with red currants, fine tannins, and strangely is fruity more than tannic. Quite a revelation really: not a rustic wine at all. 90 points. Drink 2004-2007

Cabernet Sauvignon 1996: Medium red. Mint, camphor, red currants, blackberries, and green capsicum. On the palate, thin and green, with green olives, some smokiness, and finishes characteristically with grippy tannins. It filled out with time, developing some confectionary notes and adding some breath to the palate. 86 points. Drink 2006-2012+

Cabernet Malbec 1995: Medium red. Black fruits, liqueuered cherries, some VA, but smells of power. Red cherries and blackberries on the palate, some liquorice and finishes with huge and drying tannins. Really, a wine that is unfortunately swamped by tannins which only got worse with time in the glass. 83 points. Drink 2006-2010

Cabernet Malbec 1996: Medium/dark red. A complex nose: liqueuered cherries, some dark fruits, warm balsa wood, dry spices, VA, liquorice and camphor. The palate is quite extracted, not overly fruity, with lots of acid and tannin. Very good with food. 89 points. Drink 2006-2011+

Shiraz Malbec 1994: Red with some bricking. Some VA and red berries. Dusty wood, red cherries, red currants, mixed with leathery notes. Lemony oak, liquorice, warm and mellow, rounded and cuddly. 87 points. Drink 2004-2008

Shiraz Malbec 1996: Red purple. Creaminess, butter, red berries, plummy, very very young with some spice. Tannic on the palate, showing acid and cedary oak, but excellent structure and definition. The best Wendouree I tried, and I would like to try it in a few more years. 92 points. Drink 2007-2012

Shiraz Mataro 1994: Red with some bricking. Red berries, sweat and VA. Quite a tannic palate, with secondary leathery characters, varnishy notes and fruit that is missing-in-action. 83 points. Drink Now.

Shiraz Mataro 1996: Brick red. Rusty savoury characters: camphor, fondant, confectionary notes, menthol and spice. Deep seated leathery fruit that made it seem older than the other 96’s. 85 points. Drink Now.

The verdict: I suppose the notes speak for themselves. It would have been easy to pump them up with expressions like “iron fist in the velvet glove”, but by the time the last bottle came around I must say I was a little tired of drinking wines made in this style. They are just so tannic, and disturbingly, tannins that in most cases I think will never integrate or soften in sufficient time to make a good drinking wine. As a whole, they also seemed to exhibit camphor aromas, and occasionally mint. And somewhere in the background was the fruit. Initially I was attracted to Wendouree because they were an icon wine, but I’ve come to the conclusion that they’re just not my cup of tea. Luckily, they are still icons so they shouldn’t be too hard to dispose of.

Postby Baby Chickpea » Fri Mar 18, 2005 8:46 am

Thanks for that. Good stuff. About 6 years ago I did my own vertical with vintages from 1976-1990. But this was before i took TNs and wrote notes. I must admit I too was underwhelmed (except for the superb 1986 vintage). Most were ordinary. So I stopped buying from vintages 1991-1997. Back to buying for a second chance, but I must admit that I too do not believe these wines will ever come into balance and the tannin is quite wild. I do not subscribe to the theory that these wines need 20 years to show their best; if they are so unbalanced when young, I doubt they will ever find harmony down the track. Indeed, I have tasted a few 15- 20 year olds and nothing had changes - hard, tannic shell remained. Stylistically, they are also "strange" in their fruit spectrum (too much herbal stuff like rosemary/thyme/coriander/basil) - such that I know many people who buy this year-in year-out and who have never tatsted one! Many will be in for a shock for the wrong reasons!

Like the Mount Mary and Bass Phillips, this was the 3rd "icon" Aussie wine that, to me, just never lived up to its reputation.

Postby David Lole » Fri Mar 18, 2005 9:34 am

I, too, have given up with the Wendouree "style". Nothing purchased direct from the winery since the 1991 vintage. 2 bottles of the 1990 Cabernet Malbec (served blind by others in the last few years) reinforced my viewpoint.

Postby Hacker » Sun Mar 20, 2005 8:22 pm

We have a friend who, in the mid 1990's, bought along a Wendouree to some of the many dinner parties we shared. I think they were 1984 Cab Malbec on a few occasions, and a 1987 (I'm not sure what) on a couple of others. On each of the occasions we were collectively blown away by these wines: full, complete, smooth with luscious fruit and enviable complexity. Every time. Each dinner party we asked with great anticipation if he brought along a Wendouree. They never let us down, and these experiences motivated me on to the mailing list, luckily before it got too popular.

But so far, with my Wendourees, from the 1991 vintage onwards, they have not yet reached those heights. They have been opened with my wife and myself at home in a more analytical way, as opposed to in a dinner party environment where the good company and delicious food we had would make most wines taste great.

The next time I try a Wendouree I will attempt to capture the mood we had with the earlier Wendourees; to see if the missing ingredient is simply to enjoy wine in good company with no great expectations.

Just in case things have changed with the making of Wendourees, has anything changed in the making of them from the mid 1980's to the 1990's? Did Steven George stop his influence at any time? Is there any other factor that has changed in the wine making process over this time that may help to explain the collective disappointment that many have had with some of the wines of the last decade?

cheers,

David M.

Wendouree Shiraz Mataro 1975-2006 Vertical 6/9/10
Postby n4sir » Mon Sep 20, 2010 9:14 am

It’s not often a you see a sizeable vertical of a Wendouree label, but I was lucky enough to try these at a wine club’s member’s only event. The venue (a room in a private college) had its distractions though – at one stage in the distance we could hear a group of girls singing Bon Jovi’s “You Give Love a Bad Name” over and over again, followed later by a trombone solo of “Smoke on the Water”!

To be honest I’ve never really been blown away by Wendouree (apart from the 1975 Vintage Port at Andrew Jefford’s farewell dinner earlier this year), and this tasting lacked the “wow” factor of say the aged Coonawarra cabernet tasting a few months ago. That said, by the end of this tasting I came to the conclusion that maybe I’m expecting the wrong thing. The wines are uniformly very “Clare” in being only light to medium weight, so going in with the frame of mind of expecting something more like burgundy in weight, style and structure may be the way to go. The tannins are always prominent on the finish, chalky in the youngest wines before becoming tea-like and eventually silky, but by that stage inevitably the fruit’s gone or at best the characters are predominantly secondary. All of the following wines were (apart from the last three) served in flights of four, and all were bottled under natural cork:


2006 Wendouree Shiraz Mataro, Clare Valley: Medium to very dark red/purple. Very closed nose, gradually revealing some dusty cherry stones, inky berries with a hint of cocoa, becoming slightly jammy with breathing; a jammy/tarry entry leads to a slightly yeasty palate of sweet and sour cherries, finishing chalky and grippy. Has the appearance of being bottled recently despite being four years from vintage!

2005 Wendouree Shiraz Mataro, Clare Valley: Medium to dark garnet/red. Cheesy nose with some bacon at first, then black cherries, becoming more minty with some air; the palate opens with cherries leading to a whack of bright acid/alcohol heat mid-palate, finishing very minty with some heat and a chalky, tannic rebound. Really looked awkward, and I had my suspicions it may have been an advanced/heat-effected bottle.

2004 Wendouree Shiraz Mataro, Clare Valley: Medium to very dark blood red. The nose is very cool and always in the herbal spectrum, minty, menthol then eucalyptus, then peppermint and cocoa; the palate’s riper and darker, chocolate and cocoa, black cherries, and tea-like tannins throughout.

2003 Wendouree Shiraz Mataro, Clare Valley: Medium to very dark red. Lots oak attractive oak on the nose with inky cherries, creamy vanilla, bacon and toast/char, becoming mineraly with breathing; inky, dark cherries, a little warmth mid-palate, and tight, tea-like tannins on the long finish. I think someone mentioned the fill level of this bottle was down to the base of the neck, but it was drinking the best of the first four in my opinion.


2002 Wendouree Shiraz Mataro, Clare Valley: Medium to almost dark blood red. Very reminiscent of the 2006 vintage, very stony/mineraly with inky cherries; the palate’s slightly more open and developed, cherries with meaty/liquorice nuances, but the tea-like tannins are still massive and dominating.

2001 Wendouree Shiraz Mataro, Clare Valley: Medium red. Cheesy/rubbery nose and palate, with some stalky and cocoa characters to go with the cherry fruit; the mid-palate is minty, and the finish is rather short. It’s not a pretty wine, and I doubt it ever will be.

2000 Wendouree Shiraz Mataro, Clare Valley: Medium to dark red/garnet. Developed nose of liquorice, mint and mineral; the palate’s slightly porty with characters of wintergreen and liquorice along with cherries and mint, lighter in weight than the previous wine but much better balanced and longer.

1999 Wendouree Shiraz Mataro, Clare Valley: Medium garnet. Very developed nose, very leathery/stocky with coffee and vegemite; the palate’s as developed, light to medium weight, leathery and porty but very long and lingering. Not bad, but considering how good 1999 was in Clare a little disappointing.


1998 Wendouree Shiraz Mataro, Clare Valley (cork): Medium brick/red. Porty, leathery nose full of cherry jam; the palate’s just as porty (like a Touriga minus the alcohol), full of sour cherries, wintergreen and black liquorice, finishing with dry, tea-like tannins. A little disappointing considering it should have been a great vintage.

1997 Wendouree Shiraz Mataro, Clare Valley (cork): Damp, dusty nose, some cherry stones buried deep underneath; while the palate has some sweet cherries it’s short and is lacking in weight and spice. While the dampness could be attributed to either old barrels or taint, the scalped nature seems to point to the latter – Phill mentioned that all of the 1997 Wendouree’s with the exception of the straight shiraz suffer a high incidence of cork taint.

1996 Wendouree Shiraz Mataro, Clare Valley: Medium red. Very attractive nose of creamy/biscuity oak and dark cherries, some leather and a lick of caramel; the palate’s easily the ripest and freshest of this group, cherry stones, blackcurrant and mint, finishing mineraly and very long. This was my second favourite wine of the whole tasting.

1995 Wendouree Shiraz Mataro, Clare Valley: Medium garnet. Metallic nose with some dried herbs, sour cherries and cocoa – the Mataro seems much more obvious. The palate’s spicy and herbal with attractive hints of chocolate and cocoa, but it does pull up short.


1993 Wendouree Shiraz Mataro, Clare Valley: Medium to dark brick red. The most complex and complete of the wines tonight, smoky and sweet, cherries with caramel, melted liquorice, herbs and cocoa, just a touch metallic but nothing disturbing. The palate’s soft and soupy, the sweet choc-cherry fruit dusted in cocoa, finishing long and silky. This unheralded vintage is at its peak, but was also the best wine tonight.

1992 Wendouree Shiraz Mataro, Clare Valley: Medium to dark red. Inky and dark cherries on the nose, a touch jammy too, something more like the 2006 and 2002 vintages; the palate’s younger, sweeter and cooler than the 1993, there’s some herbs and it’s not as plush and round. Compared to the previous wine it maybe needs a few more years to show its best.

1991 Wendouree Shiraz Mataro, Clare Valley: A meaty/soupy nose with sour cherries, very heavily developed but attractive; liquorice on the entry leads to a soft, soupy/meaty palate that’s reminiscent of something from Corton in Burgundy, finishing long and silky. Drinking well, but I wouldn’t hold this any longer.

1990 Wendouree Shiraz Mataro, Clare Valley: Medium brick. Very mousy and leathery, some mineral with breathing; the palate structure is soft and silky, but the fruit’s basically gone, a bare trace of liquorice in the background. Disappointing.


1988 Wendouree Shiraz Mataro, Clare Valley: Horribly corked.

1987 Wendouree Shiraz Mataro, Clare Valley: Light to medium brick. A medicinal nose, and a mineraly soft palate, the fruit’s faded but it fits the mould better than the following wine.

1975 Wendouree ‘Claret’, Clare Valley: Medium to dark brick. It’s still alive, but only barely, the nose full of gunpowder, tomato skin and roasted onions; the palate’s a bit better but still smoky, with a weird sweet banana (oak?) finish. I’ve tried a good bottle of this wine once, and this isn’t it.


Cheers,
Ian

Hacker wrote:

Rory wrote:

Hacker wrote:1996 Penfolds Bin 389. Birth year wine for our youngest, Evie. Tired with little fruit to excite. It was hard to impress following the Wendouree. Difficult to pick actual faults, but there was little fruit or tannin structure.

Hacker, I'd believe the 389 was perhaps TCA tainted at a low level. Stripped. That wine should be outstanding.

Hi Rory, you could be right. It just wasn't obvious on the night. And we were having too much fun to worry about it.