TN: Hunter River wines at dinner
Posted: Tue Feb 09, 2010 8:38 am
The February 2010 Noble Rotters’ dinner sees a return to the well-overdue Hunter Valley theme. There were a bunch of vintage restrictions too – not noted here. Remarkably, Rotters bring more whites than reds, and the earth shifts a little in its orbit…
1993 Pol Roger Champagne Cuvée Sir Winston Churchill Brut - France, Champagne
[12%, cork] An aged nose, smelling of a boutique bakery. Toast, sourdough, roasted nuts. Super stuff. A dry, full-bodied palate doesn’t quite deliver the sophistication that was promised, however. Strongly yeast-influenced notes give a medium-long finish, but the bead is on the coarse side a bit, which seems to cost the wine some finesse. So, big and a bit brutal – and if the palate lacks the complexity of the nose, it tastes younger too, so perhaps a few more years’ aging wouldn’t go amiss.
1994 The Rothbury Estate Chardonnay - Australia, New South Wales, Hunter Valley
[11%, cork] Actually labelled 'Unwooded'. A rather urinary gold colour. The nose is of sweet old apricotty fruits, very much aged and desiccated. The palate is predictably faded, with a spirity feel to the texture (not alcohol, though), and no acid at all. There is almost no flavour at all on the palate; it’s quite transparent in every way. Had it seen oak, it might have had some taste (or been technically undrinkable). As it is, it’s Alzheimers in a glass; the wine is long gone, and has taken its memory with it.
1994 Tyrrell's Chardonnay Vat 47 - Australia, New South Wales, Hunter Valley
[12.5%, cork] Huge contrast with the same-vintage Rothbury. Three shades of gold lighter, this is a deep yellow. Grand old chardonnay nose; developed grapefruit and stoney fruit aromas framed with faint oak aromas, spice and sandalwood. The palate is rich and full, a thickish texture carried by still-present acid, the warm-climate fruit flavours all pitching in to the medium-length finish. Great effort and a terrific wine for which no excuses need be made.
2000 Tyrrell's Chardonnay Vat 47 - Australia, New South Wales, Hunter Valley
[13.9%, cork] This is a clear generation younger than the 94, despite being ten years old itself. Warm buttery nose, although far from one-dimensional. Restrained and developing, it promises great things. The palate delivers. Spicy oak, stoned fruits, mineral aspects are all present. It’s rich and voluptuous, still with enough acid for freshness. Medium-full bodied, with a solid medium-length finish and respectable length of flavour along the tongue. A big enjoyable wine in the prime of life. Ought to see another 5 years easily – should do at least as well as the 94 has.
1996 Mount Pleasant Wines Sémillon Elizabeth - Australia, New South Wales, Hunter Valley
[10.5%, cork] Quite a dark mid-gold, but still with a luminous green tinge to it. Aged oak-like nose, with sawdust aromas, and that developed straw-turned-honey note of old semillon. The palate is bone dry, is honestly only light-medium in weight but seems bigger due to the sheer intensity of flavours of lemon-butter on toast. Beautifully even along the palate, with medium acid still; it presents a fascinating mix of rich and honeyed flavours with a delicate weight and bone-dry finish. Remarkable, and the best Elizabeth I’ve tasted for 10 years.
2002 Mount Pleasant Wines Sémillon Elizabeth - Australia, New South Wales, Hunter Valley
[10.5%, cork] Mid yellow. Somewhat developing nose of lemon, lanolin and generally waxy aromas. The palate is rather youthful, full of lemon-citric fruits, but still with a grassy strawlike accent to it that is distinguishes it from, say, a typical riesling. The palate is comparatively weighty, and nicely balanced too; it has the same persistent finish despite its general lightness as the 96, and should follow the same path.
1998 Mount Pleasant Wines Sémillon Lovedale - Australia, New South Wales, Hunter Valley
[11.5%, cork] Three bottles of my stash I’ve drunk over 5 years, and they were all compromised by staleness and premature oxidation. With this final bottle, the least ullaged of the four (don’t you just love cork), the jackpot is finally hit. The palest white of the night, this is barely darker than mid-straw. Steely, machine-oil –like nose, earth and toast and a certain limelike quality. The palate is a veritable acidbath. Still spritzy, in fact, so strong is the acid component. Almost medium weight, despite its seeming transparency of flavour (citric, starfruit, wisp of honey); it’s poised between primary and developmental stages at present. The faintly oily texture continues all along the palate, and finishes long, dry and acidic. Depending on the cork, a keeper.
1994 Lindemans Shiraz Bin 8803 - Australia, New South Wales, Hunter Valley
[13%, cork] This dates from an era when Lindemans Hunter River was in terminal decline, but before it bottomed out and disappeared into oblivion. Musty, earthy, old-barn aromas. Yes, it’s very old style Hunter. On the palate, it’s getting a bit volatile, with warm, spirity red fruits, gentle tannins, and a generally soft mouthfeel. All very secondary flavours, and with nowhere to go. OK to drink – although not exciting, and the front-palate balance and short finish tell you it was never a very great wine, whatever the age it was drunk.
2003 Scarborough Shiraz - Australia, New South Wales, Hunter Valley
[13%, cork] Despite some development of the nose – a little burnishing of the aromas, this still offers a pretty bright and lifted cherry fruit nose. Standard modern red, with red fruit/warmly spicy shiraz flavours, some oaky flavours, generally softer tannins, medium-bodied weight but a shortish, front-palate finish. No great pretention, but a fairly decent, if not exciting, mid-range red, whose best feature is its general lack of bombast.
1996 Tyrrell's Shiraz Vat 9 - Australia, New South Wales, Hunter Valley, Lower Hunter Valley
[13%, cork] This wine evokes nothing less than a First World War field hospital. The smell of used bandages, frightened & exhausted horses bringing in casualties, the moans of the dying. O, the humanity! If you take characteristic Hunter earthiness, and overlay it with near-toxic levels of brettanomyces, you’ll have this wine. An absolute festival of contamination; Tyrrell’s ought to hang their heads in shame. The wine was decanted early too, not that laying out a corpse in the coffin will restore it to life. True, it did change a little in the glass, but at best you’d call it moving from the mortuary back to the palliative ward. How did the Hunter’s reputation sink from its height in the 1950s & 60s to the depth of the 90s? Exhibit A…
1999 Mount Pleasant Wines Shiraz Rosehill - Australia, New South Wales, Hunter Valley, Lower Hunter Valley
[14%, cork] Another regular under-performer. At eleven, this has a sort of coarse development to its aromas, with macerated mulberry & stewed fruit aromas mixing with the smells of old fence posts and musty barns. Ripe fruit meets cheap oak. It’s dry, with plenty of powdery tannins. Smoky, earthy developed flavours on the palate, a sort of glassiness to the texture. Less good than it should be, with a weak mid-palate, and a simple vanillan finish. Just doesn’t quite make it, somehow. Not getting better, either.
1994 Domaine de Fenouillet Muscat de Beaumes-de-Venise - France, Rhône, Southern Rhône, Muscat de Beaumes-de-Venise
[15%, cork] Nougat-marmalade nose. Warm and spirity, with marmalade and clean apricotty fruit flavours. Somewhat developed, giving a kind of bitter-sweet aspect to the taste. Alcohol seems more present as a glycerol-like textural element, rather than as merely heat. Manages a sort of translucent austerity to the texture as well. Not overly sweet, but grapey and pure. For all that, not exactly a thrilling experience either, although I’m no connoisseur of this style of wine.
Not a great night for the few red wines that made it to the table, it must be said. Even the customary Lakes Folly was missing in action (too many Rotters are once bitten, twice shy, it seems). Generally the whites saved the day – where else in Australia could you randomly pick 6 wines aged 8 to 16 years, from two grape varieties, and get five first class experiences?
cheers,
Graeme
1993 Pol Roger Champagne Cuvée Sir Winston Churchill Brut - France, Champagne
[12%, cork] An aged nose, smelling of a boutique bakery. Toast, sourdough, roasted nuts. Super stuff. A dry, full-bodied palate doesn’t quite deliver the sophistication that was promised, however. Strongly yeast-influenced notes give a medium-long finish, but the bead is on the coarse side a bit, which seems to cost the wine some finesse. So, big and a bit brutal – and if the palate lacks the complexity of the nose, it tastes younger too, so perhaps a few more years’ aging wouldn’t go amiss.
1994 The Rothbury Estate Chardonnay - Australia, New South Wales, Hunter Valley
[11%, cork] Actually labelled 'Unwooded'. A rather urinary gold colour. The nose is of sweet old apricotty fruits, very much aged and desiccated. The palate is predictably faded, with a spirity feel to the texture (not alcohol, though), and no acid at all. There is almost no flavour at all on the palate; it’s quite transparent in every way. Had it seen oak, it might have had some taste (or been technically undrinkable). As it is, it’s Alzheimers in a glass; the wine is long gone, and has taken its memory with it.
1994 Tyrrell's Chardonnay Vat 47 - Australia, New South Wales, Hunter Valley
[12.5%, cork] Huge contrast with the same-vintage Rothbury. Three shades of gold lighter, this is a deep yellow. Grand old chardonnay nose; developed grapefruit and stoney fruit aromas framed with faint oak aromas, spice and sandalwood. The palate is rich and full, a thickish texture carried by still-present acid, the warm-climate fruit flavours all pitching in to the medium-length finish. Great effort and a terrific wine for which no excuses need be made.
2000 Tyrrell's Chardonnay Vat 47 - Australia, New South Wales, Hunter Valley
[13.9%, cork] This is a clear generation younger than the 94, despite being ten years old itself. Warm buttery nose, although far from one-dimensional. Restrained and developing, it promises great things. The palate delivers. Spicy oak, stoned fruits, mineral aspects are all present. It’s rich and voluptuous, still with enough acid for freshness. Medium-full bodied, with a solid medium-length finish and respectable length of flavour along the tongue. A big enjoyable wine in the prime of life. Ought to see another 5 years easily – should do at least as well as the 94 has.
1996 Mount Pleasant Wines Sémillon Elizabeth - Australia, New South Wales, Hunter Valley
[10.5%, cork] Quite a dark mid-gold, but still with a luminous green tinge to it. Aged oak-like nose, with sawdust aromas, and that developed straw-turned-honey note of old semillon. The palate is bone dry, is honestly only light-medium in weight but seems bigger due to the sheer intensity of flavours of lemon-butter on toast. Beautifully even along the palate, with medium acid still; it presents a fascinating mix of rich and honeyed flavours with a delicate weight and bone-dry finish. Remarkable, and the best Elizabeth I’ve tasted for 10 years.
2002 Mount Pleasant Wines Sémillon Elizabeth - Australia, New South Wales, Hunter Valley
[10.5%, cork] Mid yellow. Somewhat developing nose of lemon, lanolin and generally waxy aromas. The palate is rather youthful, full of lemon-citric fruits, but still with a grassy strawlike accent to it that is distinguishes it from, say, a typical riesling. The palate is comparatively weighty, and nicely balanced too; it has the same persistent finish despite its general lightness as the 96, and should follow the same path.
1998 Mount Pleasant Wines Sémillon Lovedale - Australia, New South Wales, Hunter Valley
[11.5%, cork] Three bottles of my stash I’ve drunk over 5 years, and they were all compromised by staleness and premature oxidation. With this final bottle, the least ullaged of the four (don’t you just love cork), the jackpot is finally hit. The palest white of the night, this is barely darker than mid-straw. Steely, machine-oil –like nose, earth and toast and a certain limelike quality. The palate is a veritable acidbath. Still spritzy, in fact, so strong is the acid component. Almost medium weight, despite its seeming transparency of flavour (citric, starfruit, wisp of honey); it’s poised between primary and developmental stages at present. The faintly oily texture continues all along the palate, and finishes long, dry and acidic. Depending on the cork, a keeper.
1994 Lindemans Shiraz Bin 8803 - Australia, New South Wales, Hunter Valley
[13%, cork] This dates from an era when Lindemans Hunter River was in terminal decline, but before it bottomed out and disappeared into oblivion. Musty, earthy, old-barn aromas. Yes, it’s very old style Hunter. On the palate, it’s getting a bit volatile, with warm, spirity red fruits, gentle tannins, and a generally soft mouthfeel. All very secondary flavours, and with nowhere to go. OK to drink – although not exciting, and the front-palate balance and short finish tell you it was never a very great wine, whatever the age it was drunk.
2003 Scarborough Shiraz - Australia, New South Wales, Hunter Valley
[13%, cork] Despite some development of the nose – a little burnishing of the aromas, this still offers a pretty bright and lifted cherry fruit nose. Standard modern red, with red fruit/warmly spicy shiraz flavours, some oaky flavours, generally softer tannins, medium-bodied weight but a shortish, front-palate finish. No great pretention, but a fairly decent, if not exciting, mid-range red, whose best feature is its general lack of bombast.
1996 Tyrrell's Shiraz Vat 9 - Australia, New South Wales, Hunter Valley, Lower Hunter Valley
[13%, cork] This wine evokes nothing less than a First World War field hospital. The smell of used bandages, frightened & exhausted horses bringing in casualties, the moans of the dying. O, the humanity! If you take characteristic Hunter earthiness, and overlay it with near-toxic levels of brettanomyces, you’ll have this wine. An absolute festival of contamination; Tyrrell’s ought to hang their heads in shame. The wine was decanted early too, not that laying out a corpse in the coffin will restore it to life. True, it did change a little in the glass, but at best you’d call it moving from the mortuary back to the palliative ward. How did the Hunter’s reputation sink from its height in the 1950s & 60s to the depth of the 90s? Exhibit A…
1999 Mount Pleasant Wines Shiraz Rosehill - Australia, New South Wales, Hunter Valley, Lower Hunter Valley
[14%, cork] Another regular under-performer. At eleven, this has a sort of coarse development to its aromas, with macerated mulberry & stewed fruit aromas mixing with the smells of old fence posts and musty barns. Ripe fruit meets cheap oak. It’s dry, with plenty of powdery tannins. Smoky, earthy developed flavours on the palate, a sort of glassiness to the texture. Less good than it should be, with a weak mid-palate, and a simple vanillan finish. Just doesn’t quite make it, somehow. Not getting better, either.
1994 Domaine de Fenouillet Muscat de Beaumes-de-Venise - France, Rhône, Southern Rhône, Muscat de Beaumes-de-Venise
[15%, cork] Nougat-marmalade nose. Warm and spirity, with marmalade and clean apricotty fruit flavours. Somewhat developed, giving a kind of bitter-sweet aspect to the taste. Alcohol seems more present as a glycerol-like textural element, rather than as merely heat. Manages a sort of translucent austerity to the texture as well. Not overly sweet, but grapey and pure. For all that, not exactly a thrilling experience either, although I’m no connoisseur of this style of wine.
Not a great night for the few red wines that made it to the table, it must be said. Even the customary Lakes Folly was missing in action (too many Rotters are once bitten, twice shy, it seems). Generally the whites saved the day – where else in Australia could you randomly pick 6 wines aged 8 to 16 years, from two grape varieties, and get five first class experiences?
cheers,
Graeme
