Tasting Notes
Tasting Notes |
Passionfruit and lychees and the hint of cumquat.
Background: The Verdelho vine came to Western Australia with the early colonists. They obtained it, and the variety we know as Brown Muscat, in South Africa. It is planted in other states but is proportionally much more important here than elsewhere. In the Douro valley in Portugal it is known as Gouevio where it is used for White Port. In Madeira it is one of the four varieties used for the wine of that name, so renowned in the days of sailing ships when, the benign warmth of equatorial waters and continual movement and sloshing about in the bilge facilitated its speedy maturation. Madeira was very much appreciated in the Americas. It was an age where only the very sweet wines like Madeira, Hungarian Tokay or South African Constantia would keep for any length of time. Verdelho has produced some wonderful sweet styles on the Swan, in the hands of practitioners like Jack Mann but the art has declined with the fall in popularity of fortifieds. Such wines thrive on heat and oxidation. Their high sugar levels and impressive alcohols protect them against bacterial spoilage.
Happs produce a sweet style, very modern style, requiring refrigeration and filtration to stop a ferment and tame yeast activity at the chosen moment and from the 2001 vintage a dry style as well.
In our Dunsborough
vineyard Verdelho is planted on a dry,
gravely ridge where it ripens early. The
small berries produced carry intense
flavour, high sugar levels and ample
acidity.
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We think the natural expression of this fruit is as a sweet wine. The Karridale fruit is on the top of a hill in granitic soils, never irrigated, strong vigorous, late ripening, wonderfully flavoursome, quite acidic, almost a different beast. It has led us to revise our opinions of what we can do with this variety.
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Photo time for the pickers.
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Current Vintage:
DRY VERDELHO 2004
LATE PICKED VERDELHO 2006
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