Are Wynns out to change the popular conception of the Coonawarra red? Or rather, is Penfolds/Southcorp? Plenty of this magazine’s readers will remember the old Wynns Coonawarra black label cabernets of the ‘seventies or will have them in their cellars. I grew up with the sweeter, so-called ‘elegant’ styles of the early and mid 1980s and from time to time get to taste the black label cabernets of the ‘seventies and earlier. What to they have in common with the modern Wynns wines? Not much. Like most wine enthusiasts of the day, I vividly remember the public debut of the 1982 Wynns John Riddoch cabernet sauvignon; the first of its line and a statuesque, superbly balanced red fashioned by a master winemaker in John Wade. Wade has previously played a secondary role assisting Ken Ward to make the Jimmy Watson-winning 1976 black label cabernet sauvignon, a lovely supple red that unlike many Watson winners was able to justify its publicity. Ward was the man behind the brilliant run of black labels culminating with this wine, faring poorly only in 1971 and 1974, which included the Bristol double-gold winning 1972 black label. What stood the 1982 John Riddoch apart from every other red wine made in Coonawarra until that time was its unprecedented power, richness and concentration. Elsewhere throughout the region techniques such as mechanical pruning and cooler fermentations were spawning tank after tank of leafy sweet blackcurrant and mulberry juice dressed up as Coonawarra cabernet sauvignon as exemplified by the wines of Lindemans, Katnook Estate, Mildara and the early Petaluma Coonawarra cabernet blends. Fashion changes quickly and it has certainly overtaken the wines of the early ’80s. If the Katnook 1980 Cabernet Sauvignon, a multi-award winner, had been any more sweet and intensely blackcurrant it could have been sold as a Vitamin C supplement. The early Petaluma Coonawarras (cabernet blends) were thin and fast-maturing. The Mildara white label cabernet collected awards by the bucketful, but I’m not so worried that my cellar doesn’t have any left. The Wynns black labels were themselves tighter, leafier, more supple and restrained. Such, then, was the impact of the John Riddoch on the perception of Coonawarra. It changed everyone’s ideas of what Coonawarra could do. A perfectionist, Wade followed his 1982 success with another fine John Riddoch in 1984 (1983 was a soaking wet vintage that followed a drought) and admits, after he had departed for new horizons in Mount Barker, Western Australia, to disappointment that Wynns (by then owned by Penfolds) chose to release the leaner 1985 vintage. Wade’s replacement at Wynns was Peter Douglas, still its present incumbent. Douglas’ debut John Riddoch was the brilliant 1986 wine, which will live forever. Apart from 1989, another cooler season which did not give the John Riddoch style much of a chance, he has ably carried the flag for this classic wine up to and including its latest release, the 1991. But not only has Douglas so ably stepped into the John Riddoch’s slippers, but he has overseen a considerable beefing up of the black label Cabernet Sauvignon itself. ‘It had to be done’, he says. ‘Marketers were running the show from the late ‘seventies to the early ’80s. You had to make wine people could drink just hours later. Today winemakers can create wines that capture every sceric of flavour and if they happen to have more structure, so be it. People like the richness of the new wines, and they will certainly cellar a bit.’ Because Penfolds/Southcorp has title to just over half of the 2400 ha (approx.) under vines in Coonawarra under the brands of Lindemans, Rouge Homme, Penfolds, Hungerford Hill and Wynns, its unprecedented ability to put the Coonawarra name before wine drinkers in Australia and elsewhere by and large enables it to dictate the identity and style of the entire Coonawarra region. For various reasons, many have followed. New Coonawarra winemakers such as Ralph Fowler and Kym Tolley are also leaning more towards the richer breed of Coonawarra red, as have Phillip Shaw (Rosemount), Doug Bowen (Bowen Estate), Robin Day (Orlando), Matt and Nick Zema (Zema Estate). Fowler is responsible for the wines of Leconfield, Parker Terra Rossa Estate and Balnaves, neither of which challenge the John Riddoch for structure, but do begin to approach its quality. The direction taken by Kym Tolley (himself a former Penfolds winemaker) with his Penley Estate reds parallels Peter Douglas’ faith in the fuller expression of Coonawarra. Since McWilliams bought into Brands Laira, its wines have also put on additional flesh and weight. The few labels which persevere with lighter to medium-bodied red styles include Rouge Homme and Lindemans, both of which, ironically, are part of the Penfolds/Southcorp group, plus Mildara and Redman. The trend certainly begs the cynical question as to whether the modern Wynns wines are actually becoming more like those of their part-parent, Penfolds – a suggestion Douglas is quick to deny. ‘We use different oaks, for different lengths of time, crush differently and ferment differently’, says Douglas. Penfolds ferment with header-boards to keep the cap of skins from rising; Wynns tend to put everything through rotary fermenters. In fact the Wynns component of the Penfolds classic labels of Bin 707 and Bin 389 has increased markedly in recent years, so draw your own conclusions. Peter Douglas is adamant that Wynns are making today what the region does best – and what other areas will not be able to duplicate. ‘Our modern wines are more like the Coonawarras from the ’50s and ’60s’, he says. ‘Anyone anywhere can make what we used to make in the ’70s and early ’80s, but not the sort of stuff we are making now. People are happy to pay for flavour and structure, and we deliver.’
