The Auswine Forum

For the wine tasting I'm hosting this weekend, I have a choice of two, both 2001 vintage: Annie's Lane and Leasingham Bin 61. Which do my august friends here think is the better representative of Clare Valley taste and style? I suspect you'll vote for the Leasingham....

Jenise,

For my perspective you guessed right.

Thanks--I know our palates are well-calibrated, so I guess I know which one I'd likelier prefer, too.

And there's some history and consistency to it as well - Bin 61's been around for 25 years at least, surely?

cheers,
Graeme

Bin 61 is one of th best value for money wines around. Drinks nicely when its young and lives 10+ years. The 94 is superb right now (I think its as good as the Classic Clare JWT winner of the same year).

Graeme, Mike--thanks. Just the arguments I needed. But my other question, what qualities would you say typify Clare Valley fruit and differentiate Clare Valley shirazes from other Australian wine regions?

Jenise wrote:Graeme, Mike--thanks. Just the arguments I needed. But my other question, what qualities would you say typify Clare Valley fruit and differentiate Clare Valley shirazes from other Australian wine regions?

Yikes, Jenise, I've not done in depth analysis of the specific qualities of Clare shiraz - and of course within the region there are a range of styles as well. In terms of comparisons, perhaps it's less extreme than what we consider the other 'typical' styles of Shiraz - so less of the 'fruit-cake' quality than marks much output from Barossa and McLaren Vale. Neither does it veer particularly to the pepperyness that often distinguishes cool climate / central Victorian wines. Perhaps Clare show more minty-type notes. Saying 'neither one thing nor the other' is very much damning with faint praise - perhaps calling it 'less polarising' is a better expression. Trouble is, there are likely to be plenty of exceptions to the generalisations - Wendouree tends to be a menthol experience, whereas Barry's Armagh seems a lot more in the Barossa mold...

cheers,
Graeme

edited for some adventurous spelling/typing

I know this sounds contradictory but I find them big but at the same time with a certain elegant flavour profile. Somewhere between cool climate and Clare make sense? Aaaah, I don't know what I'm talking about

cheers,

Jenise,
Typicity doesnt exist, it depends on yield, growing condition, different winemaking style. Those who pick earlier are more elegant & minty.
At the very top of the hierachy is the Armargh, now this is a serious wine. The '98 knocked the '96 Grange off during one of our blind tasting and everyone tot the Armagh was the Grange.
For a decent Clare, u can't go wrong with the Bin61 & Taylor's.
The Reily's is V.Good too, alternatively u can check out Kilikanoon Oracle(peppery) which is excellent.
A lot rave about Tim Adams Affebeldy. The 2001 a lil' too ripe(residue sweetness) for my liking.

Martin, thanks for mentioning the Oracle. I haven't bought the Bin 61 yet, and the Oracle has surfaced as a possibility. I didn't know anything about the wine and was going to ask about it--now I don't have to. Btw, I like Reilly's, met the good doctor over here about a year ago. Unfortunately, I don't have time to order stuff in from out of town so I have to choose from what's locally available (in three bottle quantity), and Reilly's isn't.

Sevenhills, sorry but this is an old fashioned Clare. This is what the Roly Burkes' Wendouree used to be like.

More modern, perhaps elegant, are the newer styles from the higher parts of the valley. I agree that Clare wines are hard to say ... this is typical ... however, the (marginally), cooler climate seemsto give more definition to the fruit and less of the jammy characters so beloved of our trans-pac cousins (and Torb). They can be monsters however.

Pike's Polish Hill rarely disappoints, though the standards of my youth have now all been protistuted by big companies.

Good luck.

I'll quote you in the little "lecture" I'll deliver about the wines tonight.

The Grey Ghost wrote:Sevenhills, sorry but this is an old fashioned Clare. This is what the Roly Burkes' Wendouree used to be like..

Grey Ghost,

That used to be true but its no longer quite the case. For example the 98 is already in its peak drinking window and its not old fashioned. Big yes, huge no! The tannins are there but they are ripe and that makes them more in the modern style and very easy to consume young. That was not the case with the wines pre 1994 which took a lot longer for the wines to soften and come together.

The Grey Ghost wrote:More modern, perhaps elegant, are the newer styles from the higher parts of the valley. I agree that Clare wines are hard to say ... this is typical ... however, the (marginally), cooler climate seemsto give more definition to the fruit and less of the jammy characters so beloved of our trans-pac cousins (and Torb). They can be monsters however.

Not quite right! I am generally not mad about jammy characters, hate stewed characters, dead fruit and wines that are so ripe they are in the prune spectrum. I also dislike wines (except Sparkling Shiraz) that taste of residual sugar. I love peppery cool climate Coonawarra Shiraz and the wines from GW and Shiraz from the Pyrenees like Dalwhinnie, Bests, Seppelts, Langi etc.

as you know, there is a difference between rich and lush which I like and jammy which I don't!

The Grey Ghost wrote:Pike's Polish Hill rarely disappoints, though the standards of my youth have now all been protistuted by big companies.

True, Pikes can be very good but the 2000 Pikes sure disappointed.

As to the standards having been "prostituted" by the big companies not sure thats the case. The value of many of these wines may no longer be as good but overall the quality of the wine over the decades has improved. Some individual brands have declined in quality, Rosemount Diamond Label being a perfect example but then the quality of wines like the lean and green Cabs of the early 80's are now ripe and better.

I was taking the mickey Torb. However you have brought up some good points, I agree with almost all of them.

I suspect the greeness of the tannins in the 1980s was due to the influx of technically trained winemakers who based picking decisions on the lab' analyses. It takes time, the French say it takes five years for a new winemaker to learn his vineyard and they have much more restricted areas to deal with than Australian winemakers. Another aspect that I find concerning with modern winemaking in Aust. is the use of added tannins to build structure.

We drift from the thread. Roly Burkes was still alive when I was at college, still making wines in the same way. A friend shared one of these with me in 2000, a wine then 30+. It had stood the test of time.

Jenise ... try some of Neil Paulette's wines, like some of Pike's they have epitomised the new generation and have a concentration, without jamminess and a refined structure that ages into elegance.

The "standards" ... Queltaller ... the way that Leasingham faded (fortunately now being revived), Seppelt's ... the list is endless. Yes, sometimes the wines were not up to scratch and there was a need to consolidate in a disparate industry. However I am still drinking wines from the 70s ... a Mildara (classic plain-white label) Coonawarra Cabernet sauvignon ... that have aged gracefully. It is not just nostalgia.

P.S.

Dalwhinnie ...... that's a Malt, Torb!

The Grey Ghost wrote:P.S.

Dalwhinnie ...... that's a Malt, Torb!

...and one I am not particularly fond of either! I like The Macallan, especially the 18 YO and most of the Islay malts with the exception of the Laugavulin. I loved doing the whisky trail almost as much as most red bigot tours. But as you say, we digress.

If the point you are making is that many of the Oz wines made today (especially by the majors) wont age gracefully for decades then you wont get much disagreement, at least from me.

But does that necessarily make them better wines? Possibly but you also have to examine the other side of the coin. Instant gratification is rampant and 90%+ of wine lovers want wine to drink now and thats why the wineries are making wines that are designed to be drunk younger than in days gone by.

I would raise a glass of Malt to your health but its only 9.30 am here so have one for me.