It’s happened again. I’ve just tasted another bottle of the new Jasper Hill Georgia’s Paddock 2001, and it’s worlds apart from the bottle of the same wine I tasted two weeks ago. I don’t feel the need to justify this comment, but some might be interested to know that on this occasion I tasted both wines with winemaking consultant and the guy who set up TarraWarra, David Wollan, who happens to possess one of the most acute technical palates I know. He concurs entirely with my assessment. The first bottle of the wine was thick, soupy and cooked, even slightly medicinal and clunky. The second is long, fine-grained, and rich, but was obviously made from grapes of genuine physiological ripeness. The first rated 16.3 and was clearly fast-maturing. I rated the second 18.5, and I’d expect it to become a typically long-term expression of Georgia’s Paddock. Recent subscribers to Level 4 might be interested to learn that I’ve had identical experiences with Giaconda’s 2001 Chardonnay and the 1998 Penfolds Grange in the past week or so. Naturally I am very, very concerned. Some people have made the suggestion that I actually taste two bottles of every wine I review, but I simply don’t have the time. Eight to ten thousand Australian wine bottles a year is plenty, thank you, without doubling the number. My confidence in the ability of any given bottle of wine to fairly represent its batch is taking a right old shellacking. Of equal concern was another wine I have just tasted, and a wine I have seen three times in the past two weeks: Mitchell’s Watervale Riesling 2002 vintage. Sealed by a Stelvin screwtop, the two preceding bottles were perfectly presented. The third, however, was not. It was exceptionally reductive, to the point that it would have been absolutely no pleasure at all to drink that bottle of the wine. Some in the wine trade have spoken about the potential for bottles of screw capped bottles to exhibit profound reductive qualities, but this was the first time I have witnessed it to anything like this extent. Oh my. On a positive note, I have also just tasted an exceptional Victorian chardonnay you might like to remember. The Arthur’s Creek 2002 vintage is generous, ripe and minerally, with wonderful depth and richness of melon and stonefruit flavour, delivered with a palate of length, tightness and refreshing austerity. It’s powerful, yet stylish, and makes a wonderful reminder that when carefully chosen, good chardonnay is indeed difficult to match.
