2016 Louis Jadot Côte de Nuits Villages Le Vaucrain

Apart from the odd Bourgogne, there’s been little Burgundy buying around here since the 2005 vintage when already high prices started to get just daft. When a normally sensible wine buying friend returned from a frenzy of a wholesaler’s warehouse clearance sale buried under a mountain of bottles with a average price of about $15, it would have been rude not to accept an offer to split the spoils, just not sure where to put it all? Always had a soft spot for Jadot, who make something like 240 different wines each year without seeming to resort to much rationalist blending and industrial safety. Le Vaucrain is a single vineyard holding in Comblanchien where the Nuits Saint Georges vines give way to limestone quarries. Bit of reduction and lift to start which clear quickly. Then there’s a dark stony edge here that maybe reflects those NSG preconceptions. Dark dried cherries, over ripe wild strawberry and a whiff of roses, all cut by suave acidity and firm grape skin tannin. A touch of earthy mulch to season the cut of a mineral grip. Improving over two days, those cool soft tingles, perfect ripeness and that composed freshness which can clearly mark Burgundy are much in evidence. A delicious surprise, though a current RRP pushing $100 makes it perhaps not the best value Pinot Noir on the planet.

13.5% alcohol. Cork. Thanks D and finewineco.com for such a bargain.

93 very suave points.

2012 Murrindindi Vineyards Cabernet Sauvignon

From a vineyard on the backroad from the Yarra Valley to the Goulburn Valley. Such is flat old Australia that the Yarra flows south toward the sea whilst the Goulburn flows north and inland, wrong way, silly river. Both valleys do grow some good Cabernet and no surprise this one seems to sit well between the cool reserve of one and the generous ripeness of the other. Starts a bit tart and savoury with a bit of truffle. Airing brings a perfume of mulberry, black currant and a back end of sweet ripe cherry. The acidity’s perky and well bound to sweet currant and raisin tannin. The second day, gently oxidising and doing a Bordeaux impression of sorts in seaweed and iodine breezes over some good solid fruit. It’s been a long time since the still mourned Mark Shield reviewed a delicious 1990 Murrindindi Chardonnay. Wine memories linger long.

14% alcohol. Screw cap. Was about $25 maybe?

93 points.

2015 Descendientes de J. Palacios Petalos Bierzo

From a very good vintage in top left corner of Spain whether it be Galicia or just across the border in Leon following the river Sil upstream, this was worth a bid at auction. DJP as us Mencia fanciers know them seem to be the original revivalists of the variety in the almost just a memory vineyards of Bierzo. Smoky and floral in that unavoidable comparison with the north end of the Rhône valley. Grew in the glass to rich but never jammy soft berries, summer pudding style. An extra depth of fruit fills out the rear and just as powerful, there’s a roaring cut of perfectly ripe tannin and extraordinary stoney, mineral acidity. If this is the entry level, it does make you wonder how good the more expensive single vineyard bottles could be. Very tempted to spend the whole month’s wine budget on one or several months’ worth in the case of La Faraona.

14% alcohol. Cork. $47 at auction.

94 points.

2016 Domaine Chignard Fleurie Cuvée Les 10 Coupées

Trusted observers suggest there was a lot of crop loss to hail in Beaujolais in 2016, particularly in Fleurie. Some of what was left ended up in this delicious bottle of deep joy. Over two days, it started a bit wild yeasty with middle weight cherry, all bright and fresh. The countryside yeast swirls into sweet clod earth. Just picked fresh fruit acidity and pithy grape skin push the flavour along. Second day, things darken, kirsch, exotic spice and a floral perfume to still lighten. Succulent and concentrated, power and poise. Beneath the depths, a rigid backbone of sparkling granitic acid. Hearts and bones as Paul Simon sang.

13% alcohol. Cork. Thanks D for the careful choice.

94 points plus a bit in time?

2011 Wendouree Shiraz

There was much bemoaning the 2011 vintage in quite a bit of Victoria and SA. Well, it was very soggy and cool for days in summer. Nevertheless, comes the test and if the vineyard’s ancient, deep rooted and seen worse, then there’s reason to believe it won’t be a waste of money to support this oversubscribed treasure. Comparisons, here we go again, are maybe less than odious if they help with context. If the 2011 Malbec had Wendouree packing up its flavours and taking them on a trip to Barbaresco to find its structure, then this Shiraz seems to have swapped the usual iron and velvet for a finer acid based frame from somewhere like Saint Joseph. In fact this is delight for those sniffy North Rhône fanciers, dark brown spices, menthol, Oz bush and bracken lift and season just ripe cherries and very ripe raspberries, harmonious and sotto voce. Floating and crisp rather than that usual firm velvet fog. Makes a nonsense of trying to fetish the favoured vintages, Wendouree way the bottle always seems too small.

13.7% alcohol. Screw cap. Thanks for keeping the faith dear C.

93 points but more soul than some bigger scores.

2014 Stoney Rise Pinot Noir

Producing good Pinot Noir seems to need the close attention only a dedicated, hands on producer can provide. In this case, naked bodies immersed as well according to reports. Still a good bright red colour for an Aussie Pinot, fragrant with tart berries, rose oil, wild strawberry and that sort of incense like mystery that does nothing to stop the obvious comparison to things from the Côte d’Or. There really is a flavour ripeness you don’t often see in Australian Pinot, energy, focus and poised between the herby and the brown sugar sweet. Mouthwatering acidity and a lick of iron filing tannin. Spotlessly clean too, as you’d hope the pigeage was too! Must be a good place to grow Pinot.

13% alcohol. Screw cap. $30.

94 points.

2017 Hervé Souhaut Syrah

Time seems to pass so quickly, the first vintage of this quintessential natural wine that won my heart was 1999. A discovery at that Paris haven of real wine, Caves Augé. Some years later and it seems as if the wine making just gets better and the results appear finer, more perfumed and poised. There’s that floral, smoky raspberry thing typical of the Northern Rhône and perhaps also characteristic of whole grape Syrah ferments? Amazingly perfumed, that typicity plus brown baking spices, a riot of autumn berries and rocks. Rich fruit floats on supremely ripe but crisp acidity. Tannin to support, gently. The essence of flavour ripe Syrah on featherweight frame. Just so clean and focused, brilliant craft. Low alcohol too, liver approved.

12.5% alcohol. Nomacorc Green Select. $40 at auction which was good as the RRP is rising most unfairly.

94 points.

A 2019 was just as good. The note above serves well. Saves repeating myself. Beautiful natural wine in the true sense.

2015 Wynns Coonawarra Estate V and A Lane Shiraz

Well, the WordPress platform can be odd. I tried using an ampersand between V and A as it appears on the label and when it saves it turns into & …..bizarre. So, “and” it is. Conjunctions aside, this is an elegant, for want of a better word, fresh and sort of subtle Shiraz, an antidote to the high alcohols of the late nineties and early two thousands. I can clearly remember a 1980 Leconfield Cabernet drunk in the nineties that was the essence of sweetly perfumed pillow softness and somehow this echoes the memory. Starts with noticeable oak, albeit not too raucously so, then in sweeps pepper, spice and just ripe red fruits that last and perfume the mouth. Soft but positive tannin and acidity match the composed flow of flavour. Even after a couple of days oxygen, it stayed tightly bound, suggesting a future of slow resolution in the best tradition of great claret wherever it’s made…..and no buts about it.

13.1% alcohol, AND better for it. Screw cap. $35 Dan Murphy clearance, thank you very much.

93+ points.

2009 Stefano Lubiana Grande Vintage

After months of sensible pandemic restrictions, the joy of being allowed to cook dinner for a dear neighbour was doubled when they turned up on the doorstep with such luxurious bubbles. Something like 70% Chardonnay, the rest Pinot Noir left on lees for nine years before disgorging and goodness, some impact and power. Starts a bit reductive and green but with the dense bubbles tickling the nose, there’s a richness of spice, caramel, butter pastry, crystalline citrus, barley sugar and aniseed. Lingers with a deep flavour of ripe Chardonnay and still fresh chalky acidity. Not exactly subtle but a powerfully balanced mouthful. Splendid Australian sparkling wine of its own merit. What a great way to celebrate our lockdown patience and true neighbourliness.

12.5% alcohol. Diam. Thanks.

94 points.

2005 Domaine de l’Oratoire de Saint Martin Cairanne Haut Coustias

The domaine’s top of the range label, still at retail for less than most CNdPs, is normally a blend of 60% old vine Mourvèdre with equal parts Grenache and Syrah making up the rest. It’s always with some trepidation that I risk a bid at auction for something well past its tenth birthday but here’s a well cared for bottle. No ullage, good cork of some length, always a relative term, no leakage and no taint, phew. Starts off with those dusty old bottle of wine smells, no surprise, swirl and air, then gloriously clean plumes of old leather couches, sweet kirsch cherries, blackberries, garrigue and spice, all deep, warming and rich. The fruit power and sweetness backed by an umami glycerol blanket of game meat pan juices, all those caramelised delicious bits. An earthy bass line of clay soil broken up with chalky stones, really. Remarkably all that richness is cooled by perfect fine pixel acidity and the ripest sweet tannins. The label may not be cutting edge fashion but this is great natural wine, biodynamic, no additions apart from some sulphur, I think and so clean and pure. A smile on the face of old Bacchus and me too.

14.5% alcohol. Cork. $33.80 bid.

95 points.