Vintage Update 2011

I’d say we are running about four weeks later than the average for the last decade.  Last year we harvested our best Sauvignon Blanc on 18 February.  This year, we picked the first parcel of Sauvignon Blanc on 17 March and it could well be early April before we have it all in the winery.
The cooler weather creates different challenges; both positive and negative.  Dams which filled up over winter have stayed full – no irrigation required this year!  And the extended ripening generally gifts us fruit with greater intensity of flavour, and the wines will naturally be fresher and zippier.

The difficulty will be in getting late reds such as Cabernet and Shiraz ripe. There are ways we can deal with this – already on one of our favourite blocks of Shiraz Vineyard Manager of Upton Run, Rick Milland, has made three passes to reduce the crop load and knock off green bunches to give us the best chance of making great wine.
We have a couple of exciting projects on the boil this year.  The long slow ripening will give us crazy high levels of natural acid if we pick fruit early enough…  We might make a low alcohol Semillon with the acid to let it live
for decades.  

We’ll also get a first crop off a new variety for us, Arneis – a white variety native to Piedmont in north west Italy.  The variety is known as ‘little rascal’ because it has a reputation of being difficult to grow.  From what I can see it should be called ‘little rippa’ – it has great flavour (citrus and spice), clean fruit and wants to give us a nice crop.  Let’s have a competition (prize is a case of our first Arneis) to the first person to call or email in with an Italian translation for ‘little rippa’ – it might even make it onto
the label!!!

Cheers, Sam