Just when you think you’re beginning to get a handle on this pinot noir thing, up comes a wine that doesn’t entirely make sense. Freycinet’s Pinot Noir begins its life as a supple, relatively uncomplicated, fragrant and flavoursome young pinot noir. As it ages it acquires depth, richness and complexity, its better vintages typically peaking between a very respectable eight and twelve years of age. Like most of the better Australian pinot noirs, Freycinet’s comes from a relatively warm site, but makes its best wine in warmer years like 1994, 1998 and 2000. So far, so good. It’s also very much a vineyard-driven wine, based around a single hectare of vines planted in 1980 to which another 0.35 ha of recently top-grafted pinot noir selected from the new Dijon clones have been added. Still with you. What happens next is where Freycinet would appear to succeed in the face of conventional wisdom. Most premium makers of pinot noir, be they Australians, New Zealanders, Californians or even French, subscribe to the view that it’s best fermented in small and relatively shallow open containers that enable direct hands-on (or feet-in) manipulation of the skins and must. This would typically follow a short period of pre-fermentation maceration. At Freycinet, however, skins and must, with about 8% in whole bunches, are virtually all transferred into a rotary fermenter, where they remain until dryness, when the entire lot is pressed without any extended maceration. Winemaker Claudio Radenti does his best to use the rotary fermenter to duplicate the process of plunging the ferment in open vats, peaking the temperature at rather a warm 32-33 degrees Celsius and giving the machine an intensive workout to extract maximum colour, flavour and tannin. ‘The wine is all about really good fruit’, he says, ‘so we keep the technique fairly simple. We’re not trying to introduce feral characters, and we’d prefer to let bottle age develop the wine’s perfume and gamey influences.’ There’s no cold soak before fermentation, although it does take a couple of days to slip into gear, and Radenti says he’s found that extended maceration compromises fruit freshness. After a settling, the new pinot is racked into barrels where it undergoes a long, slow malolactic fermentation. The wine spends a total of around ten months in small oak, again with the emphasis on fruit preservation, of which between 25-30% is new. The paradox with Freycinet’s pinot is that although it is made with relatively uncomplicated techniques into a distinctly fruit-driven style, it is a wine that appreciates substantially with age. It should be mandatory tasting for the multitude of New World pinot makers so effused with the concept of creating complexity that their wines are unnaturally over-worked while young and unable to last even the shortest of distances. Freycinet is a well-sited vineyard near Bichenot about half-way up the Tasmania’s east coast. Like a Greek theatre, its vineyards form a basin-like valley, focusing its vines towards the north and east where they perfectly capture early morning sunlight and warmth. It’s a site straight from the viticultural textbook and gives its fruit every chance of making the most of every season. Furthermore, the vineyard’s terroir is moderated by its proximity to Great Oyster Bay and its cover of shale-like stones that retain heat into the night. None too fertile, its soils are old podsols and decaying granite over a friable clay base. Since the 1994 vintage, Freycinet’s Pinot Noir has been amongst Tasmania’s most consistent performers. It has only missed out in the cool, wet 1996 season, producing a greenish, botrytised pinot (16.0, drink 1997-1998) lacking in longevity and concentration. Highlights before this time include the fragrant and briary 1991 vintage (17.0, drink 1999-2003), a firm, fleshy and savoury wine with musky forest floor complexity attached to a fine, tight backbone. Showing its age, the 1988 wine (16.8, drink 1993-1996+) is a riper reflection of a drought year. Now moving towards a lanolin/wet wool character, it retains some intense red cherry and plum fruit and firm tannin. A greenish and spicy accent to its slightly hollow palate stamps the 1992 vintage (16.3, drink 1997-2000) as a cooler year wine, while an early autumn prevented the 1993 vintage (16.0, drink 1998-2001) from ripening beyond its vegetal, musky and clearly botrytised fruit expression. While it lacks real concentration and is faintly greenish, the 1990 release (16.6, drink 1995-1998) reveals some attractive briary and marzipan fruit and leathery development. The turning point for Freycinet’s Pinot Noir came in 1994, when despite twelve inches of rain falling in December, the season followed textbook guidelines, finishing warm to hot with fully-ripened pinot fruit. It’s astonishing to see how complex this wine (18.7, drink 2002-2006) has become, with the sort of ‘dirty’, earthy and cheesy aromas of spicy, musky sweet berries and cherries you’d expect in a wine given a load more latitude in its making. Bursting with bright dark raspberry/cherry fruit, it has a juicy fleshiness that lightens the palate, culminating in lively fresh acids and fine, firm tannins. There was less sunshine in 1995, but it was still comparatively warm to hot until the later ripening season which finished under cool, humid conditions. Genuinely ripe and accentuated by cassis/cherry/plum fruit, it’s smooth, fleshy and distinctively minty, culminating in a long and luxuriantly rich palate enhanced by creamy oak (18.0, drink 2000-2003+). After a short, sunny and hot summer the 1997 wine (18.1, drink 2005-2009) is more floral and fragrant, with rose garden aromas and a succulent but tight palate built around sweet red and black cherries with lightly smoky chocolate and cedary oak. There’s little doubt that Freycinet’s benchmark pinot is its 1998 wine (18.8, drink 2006-2010), the result of a perfectly dry, hot and sunny season. On one hand it’s smooth, supple and fleshy; on the other it’s a classic illustration of the restrained power seen in so many great pinots. Unusually earthy and briary for a Freycinet pinot, its pungent aromas are floral and spicy; its palate steeped in small berry fruit neatly interwoven around fine-grained tannins. Classy stuff. Of similar calibre to the 1997 vintage, the 1999 Pinot Noir (18.2, drink 2004-2007+) comes from a damper and less sunny season than 1998. It’s slightly sappy, with a minty, spicy note to its pure black and red fruit. Well-handled oak enhances its creaminess and elegance. There’s no doubt that the recent string of warmer vintages in southern Australia has helped Freycinet’s pinot noir become such an outstanding modern wine. Allied to a mature vineyard, an experienced and focused approach to its winemaking, and Freycinet would appear to have crossed the threshold into the top echelon of Australian pinot. If it retains its focus, there’s no reason why it shouldn’t stay there.
