Under DIAM5. I found this in the cellar, but I had not added it to my inventory. I guess that is a bonus of sorts? I was out of town and my wife picked this up somewhere (Costco?) and apparently put it in the cellar without noting it anywhere. Yeah, that tracks. Pale straw in the glass with lemon curd and vanilla. Yum. The palate is similar, with plenty of fruit and that vanilla aspect, but there is also a boatload of acidity, which serves to hold it all together. Yes, Copain is now part of a corporate conglomerate, but the wines continue to perform at a very high level. Very nice.

12.1% alcohol. Own rooted vineyard planted in 1982 at 1000 ft. Lemony and bright with a touch of marmalade and some nice stony characters. There’s a tapering lemony finish with nice weight and a lovely fruity character. Some lime oil hints too. It has some fruit sweetness, but it’s dry.

Very stylish with a hint of mint as well as beautifully balanced blackcurrant and cherry fruit. Lovely fruit character with brightness and balance. Has a supple character: lovely freshness. Tastes a little Australian, in a good way.

Lovely, ripe, sweet blackcurrant and cherry fruit with some spicy oak in the mix. Nice balance here between the sweet fruit and the tannins, with the oak blending in well. Ripe but balanced, finishing slightly sweet. A real crowd-pleaser: very stylish.

A beautiful, harmonious nose, with notes of violets and lavender honey. It’s highly fragrant, full on the palate but also weightless, clearly very light extraction. Despite this, there’s great presence and depth, it’s still young and is mostly about the texture for now. A stylish, special Grenache, that’s stylistically quite peerless, with a real tuning fork resonance on the finish. Taken from the highest section of their 1946 Grenache, planted on deep sandy soils. 50% whole berries were destemmed and placed in open fermenters, with a long, gentle maceration. Wild yeast fermented. Free run juice only, matured on lees in older, large French oak barrels and ceramic eggs for 11 months.

Established in 1971 by Alan Hickinbotham on the hill above Clarendon, this vineyard developed into a legend under the halo of the family name (Hickinbotham’s father had established the oenology course at Roseworthy; his brother Ian was the first winemaker at Wynn’s Coonawarra). The Jackson family, already invested in Yangarra Estate, purchased the property in 2012 and put the Yangarra team in charge—Peter Fraser and Chris Carpenter, working with Michael Lane on viticulture. Shiraz accounts for 80 acres of the site, providing this “pure and concentrated, perfumed syrah,” as panelist David Hawkins described it. There’s freshness to the fruit, along with a savory undertone of fruity mushrooms. The brisk tannins are elegant and delicate in the context of McLaren Vale. Oak aging adds to the wine’s espresso roast depth, its firm, gentle touch like a finger on the pulse of the fruit.

A fairly pale but luminous purple-red in the glass. It’s full-bodied and mouthfilling with lots of puppy fat, vibrant raspberry and strawberry fruit and garrigue herbs. The keen, deep-set acidity feels natural, it’s low but balanced. This has layers and movement. Really quite fluid, with no heaviness. A sandy, mineral touch on the finish. This has complexity and depth, and will improve with age. From unirrigated bush vines planted in 1962 at 225m altitude. Fermented and matured in egg-shaped amphora.

From a 4.5-acre parcel of ironstone gravels, the vines planted in 1999 and certified organic since 2012, this wine’s beautiful mineral structure builds complexity into fresh fruit. It’s brisk and floral, with sweetness in all the right places. Sour cherry fills the earthy mineral savor with fragrance. Magical wine.

All about tar, this grenache opens to the lanolin and green, woody-herb scents of rosemary-laced lamb. Voluptuous in its oaken depths, inviting in its fragrance of strawberry leaf, the wine offers persistent and fresh flavors while the tannins seem to stick against the walls of the mouth, then slowly fade away. From bush vines planted in deep sands in 1946, this grows at the highest block at Yangarra, up to 680 feet above the Gulf St. Vincent. Peter Fraser allows the grapes to ferment spontaneously, half of them as whole berries, then matures the free-run juice on its lees in used French oak and ceramic eggs.

There’s a lemony high note to this wine’s acidity, lifting the floral scents over flavors of green apple. White flowers and a hint of oak frame the fruit for a balanced, elegant white.

This fabled vineyard from the Chalone appellation gave a wine with a lovely scent of sun-warmed berries, strawberries and juice. There’s a back note of black tea and chaparral herbs carried on a mulled-wine texture. A mid-weight red for ribs

There’s a sweet molasses note up front, then the fruit settles into its acid structure, integrated with the tannins. Skycrest Vineyard tops out at 2,000 feet above sea level, a steep hillside providing the fruit for this pinot.

Forward and spicy, this has a horehound scent and shy red berry flavors. It’s mouth filling, with a dark weight and a firm finish. For a smoked pork chop.

Tasted off the Earl's wine list in early March. Winemaker Peter Fraser is behind this single vineyard McLaren Vale shiraz grown biodynamically at 180m on the estimated 54 million-year-old North Maslin Sands, a mix of sand and ironstone that covers a dozen unique blocks. It has an unusual aromatic dark fruit aroma with bright spice that lifts the wine out of the glass with style. The tannins are supple and speak to an impeccably balanced wine. The long and entertaining finish pitches more blueberry, blackberry, and black licorice. The texture, as always, is amazing. Technically, 10% of the fruit remained as whole bunches, with the remaining fruit destemmed and mechanically sorted. 50% remained as whole berries, while the other 50% was lightly broken. It was native fermented in open fermenters, and finally kept for 12 months in 25 percent new French oak.

In the glass La Muse is ruby-garnet colored with a purple rim. It is composed of 90 percent Merlot and the balance Cabernet Franc and Malbec. It has heady aromas of black raspberry jam, red plum and saddle leather. There’s a seamless transition to the palate with ripe fruit flavors and touches of flint, mocha and tobacco leaf. The tannins are pleasantly grippy with balanced acidity. Drink now or over the next 20 years.

You may not know it, but La Crema has been producing wine for over 40 years. This 2022 Sauvignon Blanc is part of that proud heritage. This offers light lemon-lime, quince, honeysuckle, resin, apricot and guava notes. It’s a lighter style wine that makes it inherently better with a diversity of food. The acidity is in check due mainly to the use, predominately, of stainless steel, and just 27% went into neutral oak allowing for a flinty, tactile expression.

Hints of almonds and savory herbs in the aroma accompany Bosc pears and vanilla on the palate as this handsome, toasty wine balances fruitiness and an oak-aged spiciness for a complex and complete expression. Best through 2028. Editors’ Choice.

Many years ago, I walked the early Vérité vineyard blocks with winegrower Pierre Seillan, whose take on complexity was simple, “Every hillside, every elevation and every aspect offers us a different micro-cru. From the beginning, the pure expression of these unique sites has defined our winemaking philosophy.” It makes it easy to understand the birth of the Vérité trilogy: La Joie, La Muse, and La Desire, each exploring a different grape while reflecting its Sonoma origins. In 2019 the vintage began with a healthy water supply in the soil from a warm winter of storms. Budbreak was early in what would be a warm year, complete with some heat spikes. Merlot is at the heart of la Muse, and it comes with a series of complex flavour layers. Inspired by the Pomerol style, the first release was 21 years ago. Seillan works with fifty micro-crus in Eastern Sonoma when he blends this wine. The fruit is California opulent, but Seillan plays that off against dried herbs, woodland spices, and French oak ageing to achieve a level of harmony seldom seen in California. 2019 is aged 16 months in 95 percent new French oak, and the blend is 90/5/5/ merlot, cabernet franc, and malbec from Alexander Valley, Bennett Valley, Chalk Hill, and Knights Valley.

The 2019 Pinot Noir La Crête is a powerful, expressive wine. Very spicy to begin, the nose explodes with cola, tea leaves, charcuterie,pipe tobacco and dark spices over a deep core of raspberry jam.The medium-bodied palate is powerful yet elegantly structured with a frame of powdery tannins, bright bursts of mouth watering acidity and continually unwinding, spicy accents on the extended finish. There's a sense of latency to this wine that suggests graceful evolution in bottle over the next 10-15 years. This will be releasedin April of 2023.

Pale ruby-purple, the 2018 Pinot Noir Slope takes some time in the glass to reveal scents of cranberry sauce, orange peel, charcuterie and flinty streaks that make the generosity on the palate all the more surprising. Medium-bodied, it's bursting with layer after layer of concentrated, savory fruit and is loaded with floral perfume.Grainy and fresh, it offers a harmonious structural balance and glides effortlessly into an incredibly long, detailed finish. Wow!

Pale ruby-purple, the 2018 Pinot Noir The Sum has alluring scents of cranberry sauce, tea leaves, gravel dust and iron with meaty undertones and wafts of iodine. The medium-bodied palate is grainy and refreshing with concentrated, savory fruit and a flourish of spicy accents across the long, detailed finish. With its structural harmony and detailed intensity, it's a great candidate for the cellar.

The 2007 Cabernet Sauvignon Reserve Speciale was aged for 24 months in French and American oak barrels and comes from several vineyards, including Lasseter, Monte Rosso, Murray Ranchand Smothers-Remick Ridge. It is incredibly expressive, at its peak between supple fruit and savory maturity. Deep ruby, the nose is surprisingly detailed, holding on to a core of black currant andcherry fruit. It offers up continually shifting nuances of dried lavender and rosemary, soy sauce, aged leather, cured beef and the iron-like mineral tones characteristic of many of the ArrowoodCabernets. Powerful but weightless, the full-bodied palate isintense and pure, with layered perfume, powdery tannins,seamless freshness and a very long finish. It will continue to hold inthe cellar for another decade. 490 cases were made.

Pale ruby-purple, the 2018 Pinot Noir Estate Cuvée has a pure,detailed perfume of lilac, blueberries, aniseed, tea leaves and woodsmoke. The medium-bodied palate has a powerful frame of grainy tannins and mouthwatering acidity that elevates its nuanced, floral flavors, and it finishes very long and layered.

Pale ruby-purple, the 2018 Pinot Noir Triple Black Slopes is powerful and perfumed! It explodes from the glass with a sultry perfume of lilac, blood orange, tea leaves and conifer with anintense core of red cherry and blueberry. The medium-bodied palate offers firm, ripe tannins and seamless acidity to support its concentrated fruit, and its long, spicy finish hints at more to come.It's a great candidate for cellaring.

The 2019 Pinot Noir Clairière comes from vines top-grafted to the 667 clone in 2018. It has deep, broody aromas of blackberry and boysenberry preserves, brewed tea, bergamot, aniseed and cola,with singular herbal and floral tones that set it apart in this lineup.The medium-bodied palate is surprisingly powerful, offering abundant, finely chalky tannins, energetic acidity, loads of complex,detailed flavors and a very long, nuanced finish.