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• White Wine

  2014 The Florita Riesling, Jim Barry – Magnum

  £5995

  There is nothing quite like a magnum for sharing and this iconic 2014 ‘The Florita’ Riesling from Jim Barry is just the ticket.

  This magnificent wine opens in the glass with delicate floral aromas of citrus blossom, rose water, lime citrus and hints of green pear.  A wine of immense drive and purity.  It shows the
  hallmarks of a youthful but restrained Florita with a promise of more to come. Lime citrus is dominant with elements of pear and rose water with long lingering acidity.
  A magnificent benchmark dry Riesling to be enjoyed now or with careful cellaring for the next ten years.

  The Florita Story – It starts in 1946, just after the war, when Leo Buring bought land at Watervale and planted Pedro Ximénez for sherry – the preferred wine of Australians at the time. He named the vineyard Florita, which is Spanish for ‘little flower’ – a reference to the sherry flor (or flower), the film of yeast that covers the dry flor sherry as it matures in its ullaged casks.
  Public tastes shifted, table wine became fashionable, and in 1962 Buring’s winemaker John Vickery began to remove PX and plant Riesling. “He started to make Riesling (wine), which began to be seen as the future of Australian white wine,” says Barry. Indeed, Vickery and the Leo Buring brand became almost synonymous with Riesling.

  “In 1986 Philip Morris (the tobacco company which owned the Leo Buring brand at the time) had six years supply of Riesling in its cellars, and no-one was drinking it – Chardonnay was the new fashion. They decided to sell the Florita vineyard.   My brothers and I went to the auction. I was 24.  Mum said ‘You’re not allowed to buy it’. She said we already had plenty of vineyards. We told Dad he’d better buy it, and that would let us off the hook.  Southcorp owned the Florita trademark at the time, and although the Barrys began using the grapes immediately, they couldn’t use the name.
  “I had to wait eight years until the registration period was up, but then Southcorp renewed it for another 10 years, so I had to wait 18 years all told, and I registered the name Florita two days after it lapsed.

  Eighteen years is a long time to wait for a drink.”

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• Red Wine

  2002 Shiraz, Charles Melton – Magnum

  £15000

  Charlie Melton makes great Shiraz, one that combines the attributes of Barossa grown dry-farmed Shiraz; richness and intensity of flavour which, when combined with Charlie’s winemaking skills is balanced by perfume and elegance. These wines will then possess that essential grace and balance when young that, after many years of cellaring will translate into complexity and smoothness.

  This 2002 is made from gnarled old Shiraz vines of up to 100+ years old.  In the glass, the wine displays aromas of ripe dark plum, blackberry, some meaty earth like characters, liquorice and spice showing good complexity and intensity. Rich and opulently textured the palate delivers mouth-filling flavours of ripe blackberry, liquorice and spice with a light earthy leather-like overlay. Velvet smooth tannins with long blackberry, liquorice, leather and spice aftertaste.

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• Red Wine

  2012 ‘The Caley’ Cabernet & Shiraz, Yalumba – Magnum

  £47500

  This is the first vintage of Yalumba’s Cabernet/Shiraz-based flagship wine, The Caley.  Named after Fred Caley Smith, grandson of Yalumba founder Samuel Smith, who was a horticulturist that had a profound impact on the development of Yalumba’s vineyards. In the early 1890’s he spent 18 months trekking across the USA, Britain, Europe, the Middle East, India and Sri Lanka, observing and reporting on scientific and horticultural developments. His detailed letters, sent home every few days, underpinned the way the vineyards were managed and laid the foundations of sustainable viticulture at Yalumba today.

  At the time of blending, the winemaking team made the following tasting notes … Deep garnet red in colour, fruit is at the core of the bouquet, all red and black currants – overlaid with savoury herbs, green spices, cedar and pipe tobacco. The palate is of sophisticated precision with a refined line. Long and textured it captures the concentrated flavours and presents them with a silken grace. Under all that supple, fleshy muscle, the wine has a strong spine, structured to last and last.

  The Caley has been sourced from three outstanding vineyards of the Coonawarra and Barossa regions. The Ming D block of the Yalumba Coonawarra vineyard provides 52% of the Cabernet Sauvignon of the blend. This 2.7ha plot was planted in 1992 with two clones of Cabernet Sauvignon selected for structure and depth of flavour. This block differs from the ubiquitous Coonawarra terroir, with a higher content of clay than the other blocks on The Menzies Estate. The Shiraz is sourced from the Burgemeister “Linke Block” between Nuriootpa and Angaston. Planted in 1901, these Shiraz vines run east-west and are on a single wire trellis. The soil is a red-brown earth in the Light Pass loamy fine sand family. There is also a component that comes from the 1971 Yalumba Horseshoe Block in Eden Valley.

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