Domaine Direct attended the Australia Day Tasting at the Saatchi Gallery in London on 19th January, to show the entire range of wines from Leeuwin Estate.
Inevitably, for a frigid January day during intriguing economic climes, talk amongst many members of the wine trade at the tasting was often about cost. Australia, despite its historic association with good value wine, has not been immune to higher wine prices. Also inevitably, the prices of wines from Leeuwin Estate, as well as other estates that make up the top ‘Exceptional’ tier of Australia’s Langton’s Classification (the arguably more accurate Australian equivalent to Bordeaux’s 1855 classification), were apt to raise an eyebrow or two.
Exceptional quality Australian wine, if truth be told, is no longer ‘cheap’. The blame is most often put on the currently eye-watering strength of the Australian Dollar compared to the puny Pound. All too true – current exchange rates are affecting imports of wine into the UK like never before, due to Sterling’s loss of value. However, a more insidious factor that has certainly affected the upper echelons of Australian wine estates has been the cost of fuel, thus transport, and the equally strong value of the Euro.
Consider that most Bordeaux château spend roughly sixty percent of their yearly expenditure on oak barrels: the same is true for an equivalently ranked estate in Australia making similar wine styles. Yet for the estate in Australia, that same oak has to cross several oceans before being installed in an appropriately cool Australasian cellar. Steadily growing rises in the cost of fuel throughout the last year, therefore, have made a significant difference to small Australian estates in simply buying the raw materials they need to make exceptional wine. Moreover, not all oak barrels are ‘equal’: as in cooking ingredients, there is a gulf of difference between the ‘basic’ range of oak barrels and the hand-crafted variety, which all top wine makers seek out for their ability to merge their flavours seamlessly with maturing wine. The difference in cost between ‘good’ and ‘basic’ French oak barrels can be as much as €300. Consequently, the strength of the Euro has hurt the cost of one of the key winemaking components for all great estates in Australia. These costs, of course, are incurred before the wine has actually been made, or shipped back to thirsty customers around the globe.
One unusual consequence of the iniquities of exchange rates and apocalyptic economic outlook has been that finally, great Australian wine is now more equivalent to great Old World wine – both in price and in quality. The Leeuwin Estate range at the Australia Day Tasting demonstrated this change perfectly. Leeuwin have long been known for restrained wine styles and for a remarkable degree of age-worthiness, both attributes not always associated by wine lovers with Australian wine. Furthermore, both of these attributes are shared not only by the other great Australian estates listed in Langton’s ‘Exceptional’ tier, but are also seen as the defining hallmark of great European wines: “restrained fruit and ability to age”, the mantra of all Masters of Wine when blowing the dust off something old, rare and unpronounceable.
With prices, wine styles and cellar potential now sharing some similarity to European wines, the Leeuwin Estate wines opened at the Australia Day Tasting generated many comments. The 2008 Prelude Sauvignon Blanc/Semillon and 2009 Art Series Sauvignon Blanc were compared to Bordeaux Blanc by one classically trained European Sommelier, who equally felt that the 2009 Art Series Riesling shared many qualities with Alsace. Several trade customers were surprised at the balance and still youthfully vigorous 2004 Prelude Cabernet/Merlot, particularly the fine tannins that are going to ensure a healthy life for some years to come. Whilst the 2008 Art Series Shiraz is possibly the most open style of all Leeuwin Estate wines, many tasters commented on how restrained the wine style was in comparison to the burlesque of Barossa Shiraz.
The majority of opinion at a Leeuwin Estate tasting, however, concerns the qualities of Art Series Cabernet Sauvignon and Art Series Chardonnay, in particular. The just-released 2005 Art Series Cabernet Sauvignon was a triumph, displaying pure Cabernet fruit with no hint at all of herbaceous-ness, beautifully fine-grained tannins and seamlessly integrated oak. Like its younger brother, the 2004 Prelude Cabernet/Merlot, the 2005 Art Series Cabernet will make a splendid bottle in ten or fifteen years’ time, whilst also having the grace, balance and youthful intensity to drink now.
Two vintages of Art Series Chardonnay were on show – the 2007 and the not-yet-released 2008. Comments from tasters on these two wines were arguably the most fascinating, in retrospect. Tasters found that the 2007 was certainly showing brilliantly, but could equally manage many more years in the cellar. General opinion on the 2008 was that it was far from ready, with quite ‘angular’ acidity that would need time to merge and settle, with all tasters finding the complete absence of malolactic fermentation in the Leeuwin Estate Chardonnays a welcome shock. Overall opinion was that the wines were showing brilliantly, albeit youthful, and atypical for many ‘classic’ Australian Chardonnays in their complete absence of overt butterscotch, raw oak, excess vanilla and suspect residual sugar. These are certainly not descriptions found in tasting any of the Leeuwin Estate Chardonnays!
As Burgundy specialists at Domaine Direct, where have we heard similar comments about young Chardonnays before? ‘Angular, youthful acidity’ – 2008 white Côte d’Or, perhaps? This was the abiding memory of a highly successful tasting at Australia Day: the frequency of how often Art Series Chardonnay was compared to Puligny-Montrachet, not only on the insidious issue of price, but also on the equally apparent quality which all tasters found. As the top tiers and regions of European wines are frequently compared and contrasted with one another, those same comparisons and contrasts should now really include the best of Australian wines to reach any accurate conclusion. Moreover, it is now quite clearly pointless to compare the wine styles of small estate, hand-crafted Australia wines with the majority of mass produced Australian wines, good value and good wines though those are.
Whilst fascinating to see a real demonstration of how Australian wine has developed and the ensuing quality now being produced, it is unlikely that these comparisons could have been drawn if not for the remarkable region where Leeuwin Estate are based: Western Australia’s Margaret River. The other equally apparent outcome of Domaine Direct’s stand at the Australia Day Tasting was how markedly different Margaret River is to all other Australian wine regions, seemingly being the wine region that consistently shows the most restrained Australian wine styles, yet with no loss of quality or complexity but a gain in both. Whatever comparisons are made, Leeuwin Estate and their fascinating range of wines are not European, but proudly Western Australian. The Australia Day Tasting revealed quite demonstrably that the best wines of Margaret River – which we sincerely believe include Leeuwin Estate – are fine equals to classic wines from around the world.