Southern Highland Wine Region

This year's Australia day was on Tuesday, as it did not fall on a long weekend, we've decided to visit Bowral with another couple for a one-day trip.  Bowral is a nice historic town locates 1½h south of Sydney, where there are antique, art and craft shops, cafés and most importantly it is the center of the Southern Highland Wine Region.

The Southern Highland wine region is a small wine region in Southern New South Wales that specialises in cool climate wines.  The average temperature in winter is 9°C and it can get to as low as 1-2°C.  Since I was not familiar with the wines from this region, I looked up the James Halliday guide on the wineries.  I found a five-star winery, the Centennial Vineyards, they have a huge list of wines and many different varietals.  Their Savagnin on the list caught my eyes, the Australian Savagnin/Albarino muddle was a heat topic in 2008.  Just a little background; the Australian cuttings of Albarino, a varietal from Spain, was mixed up with Savagnin and was later discovered by the CSIRO.  This caused a huge threat to the wine producers since what they thought was the noble Spanish varietal Albarino, was actually Savagnin.  There was a big drama of what to name it, how to name it, whether to change all the wine labels... ... as they were not allowed to put Albarino on the labels anymore.  I guess at the end of the day, if it is a good wine, wine drinkers will still love them, but it might take some time to recover from the shock!

We arrived in Bowral, visited the local information center and a few local shops, had brunch in a little pastry café, and then we headed to the Centennial Vineyards.  It was a very beautiful vineyard, with a neatly maintained garden in front of an elegant sandstone building.  My original plan was to have high tea at the vineyard, but unfortunately their restaurant does not open on Tuesdays.  After taking a few photos, I was so eager to do some wine tastings.

We first tried the Bong Bong Classic White 2009, it was a blend of Sauvignon Blanc, Pinot Gris, Riesling and Chardonnay, a nice refreshing start of the day!  Then we tried their Sauvignon Blanc, first the Woodside and then the Reserve, both wines were nice and crisp, less grassy then the ones from our New Zealand neighbour.  We went on to try the Pinot Gris, a light body wine, not as creamy as the King Valley Pinot Grigio style.  Then followed by the Woodside and the Reserve Chardonnay, the first one was a lighter style and the Reserve has a nice creamy, vanilla mouthfeel, a fuller body wine.  Then, it was the Savagnin that I was waiting for.  I have tried some Savagnin at the Wine Focus Australia Savagnin/Albarino forum, they all have different characteristics, some were crisp and fragrant and some were rich and creamy.  In comparison, this one was a little bit ordinary, not a style that really stands out.  As the lady at the bar was looking a bit impatient while we went down the list, I skipped the Riesling and Verdelho, as I suspected that they will not be as good as the ones from the Canberra District and the Hunter, respectively.

Finishing the white wine list, I turned over the page to try the red wines.  We started with the Pinot Noirs, Woodside and Reserve, they were not as aromatic as I expected.  Then we tried the Sangiovese, it has a very nice aroma, a gentle medium body wine.  The Shiraz Viognier was next on the list, the lady pour some out and I can immediately smell vinegar, she opened a new bottle and it was quite nice.  The spiciness of the Shiraz was balanced out by the Viognier, full of berry flavours, a nice dinner wine.  Then we tried the Barbera, I had a sip and it was oxidized.  I really wanted to try the NSW Barbera and compare it to the King Valley Barbera so I told the lady that it was oxidized, but she disagreed and said the acidity was the characteristic of a Barbera and she didn't open a new bottle for us to taste.  Yes, Barbera has certain acidity and therefore goes well with many tomato-based Italian dishes, but when it is tart and damp, something is wrong!  Anyway, we quickly tried the Reserve Cabernet Sauvignon/Merlot, brought some wines and left.

After all the tastings, we brought the Woodside Sauvignon Blanc 2008, the Reserve Chardonnay single vineyard 2008, the Reserve Sangiovese single vineyard 2008 unfiltered, the Reserve Shiraz Viognier single vineyard 2006 and the Reserve Cabernet Sauvignon/Merlot 2004 and were given the Bong Bong classic red as a gift when purchased 6 bottles.  Interestingly, almost all of their wines were made from grapes from the Orange region, and other wine regions in NSW.  I guess you just don't get to taste the "Terroirs" in this region!  A little disappointment especially when you are visiting the wineries or regions for this purpose.

After wine tasting we went to Berrima for the Australia Day celebration and had lunch in a little tea house.  There were many European style boutique shops in this beautiful town, just like a fairyland in cartoons.  The shops were all linked together and they were like little cottages with many rooms displaying the special art and crafts, toys and clothes.

With the disappointment from the first winery, I remembered another outstanding winery from the James Halliday guide, the Cuttaway Hill Estate.  We couldn't find the winery on our map but saw a sign to Cuttaway Creek, we drove along the creek but still couldn't find the winery but we found Tertini Wines, and we later found out that Cuttaway Hill Estate does not have a cellar door!  We stopped at Tertini Wines and were greeted by their German shepherd Bella and Tertini's sales manager Robert Kay.  He was so passionate about the Tertini wines and was telling us all the trophies each wine has got, wine medals from Hong Kong, etc etc... ... 

I have mixed feelings on wine trophies, since almost every bottle you find in a bottle shop will have at least one trophy, some have as many as ten or more, and what does it all mean?  Some of my childhood memories came back when I put some thought into this question.  When I was younger I was a dancer, I started dancing when I entered high school, which was quite late compared to other dancers who started at the age of five.  At the beginning, I never had great confidence in dancing but somehow getting awards from dance competitions made me think that I have gain recognitions in the field, and I started to like dancing more and more.  So I guess wine trophies do mean something about the wine, and when you flip over pages in magazines, you will appreciate this a little more when they tell you the categories such as "Best wine under $20", "Best cool climate Shiraz", etc... ... and you just can't compare across the categories thinking that a trophy means it is a good wine.  Anyway, back to Robert's story on his Hong Kong trip, wine competition and wine dinner.  I was delighted to hear about the battle between the 2 Michelin stars Alvin Leung vs. our famous Sydney Chef Sean Connolly.  At the Hong Kong International Wine and Spirit Fair, tourism NSW and Hong Kong tourism have organised an event to showcase NSW food and wine.  Alvin and Sean need to create a nine courses degustation menu with 18 matching wines using local ingredients from NSW.  He told us that Alvin used vegemite in one of his dish, a very brave attempt but it turned out very well.  I was salivating listening to his story!  Let's do some wine tasting! 

We started with the Rieslings, the Tertini Riesling 2005 and the Eighteen55 Riesling 2006, and I like both of them.  They have a beautiful Riesling kerosene aroma with floral fragrance, you can immediately identify it as a Riesling.  They both have young fruity characters and balanced acidity, very nice.  I saw Arneis on the list, but they were all sold out and the new vintage was not for tasting.  Having engaged in a lovely conversation on the Hong Kong wine fair, food and wine matching, and most importantly knowing that I have the WSET cert, Robert has decided to bring out the 2009 Reserve Arneis for us to try.  I was very happy since I like this varietal as soon as I tried it the first time at King Valley.  It was a very special wine but I can understand the purpose of the winemaker not to release it so soon.  It was quite young and high in acidity, but I was interested to see it mature so I brought one home to cellar!  We finished the whites and tried the Tertini Rosé, it was made from Merlot and Cabernet Sauvignon, a dry version of Rosé, to enjoy it with a cheese platter would be nice!

Then we tried the reds, we started with the Pinot Noir, the 2006 Tertini Pinot Noir from the Southern Highlands then the 2005 Eighteen55 Pinot Noir from Berrima Valley.  They were both very aromatic, beautiful floral, berries, perfume aromas, my friend sat there with the wine and said she can smell this all day!  They were both beautiful, medium body, cool climate Pinots, definitely worth adding them to my cellar.  After the Pinots, we tried the Cabernet Sauvignon/Merlot and the straight Cab Sauv.  The 2005 Eighteen55 Cabernet Sauvignon was the only wine from Tertini that uses 80% Barossa grapes and all the others were grown locally.  Last but not least, we tried their 2008 Reserve Noble Riesling, which was made from natural Botrytis.  It was a lovely wine to finish off, a beautiful Botrytis wine! 

We couldn't leave without buying some beautiful wines, we brought the 2005 Riesling, the 2006 Eighteen55 hand picked Riesling, the 2006 Pinot Noir, 2005 Eighteen55 hand picked Pinot Noirs, 2009 Reserve Arneis Barrel fermented and of cause the 2008 Reserve Noble Riesling.  I was impressed with the small but focus and full of regional characteristic wine list.  Although they are still a very young winery, their first plantings in 2000 and first vintage in 2005, but you can already see the potentials.  I guess after all, being proud of the wine trophies is not a bad thing.  What a surprising discovery from our little detour!