Iain Riggs has been winemaker at the premium Hunter Valley winery of Brokenwood since 1982 and its managing director since 1985. Under his guidance Brokenwood has followed the traditions of Hardys, Mildara and Mount Pleasant, which in the 1940s and ’50s would selectively blend parcels of Hunter shiraz with other varieties from different regions. Brokenwood has also focused on the Hunter’s specialities of shiraz and semillon and has developed its flagship Graveyard Vineyard shiraz to its present status as one of Australia’s more sought-after prestige labels. Riggs has also seen Brokenwood source fruit from McLaren Vale and take on board the highly regarded Yarra Valley winery of Seville Estate. He is an experienced and respected show judge and a guy who tends to call an issue exactly as he finds it. What grapes do best in the Lower Hunter? Only semillon, shiraz and chardonnay, in that order. Everywhere chardonnay has such a stranglehold on acreages, but we have 160 years of history in which semillon and shiraz have dominated. I’m optimistic over the future for semillon – it’s not a big seller everywhere, but it thankfully is in Sydney, where people recognise it for the local product it is, a little like riesling in South Australia. I’ve no idea why it’s so hard to crack in Melbourne; our sales there are minuscule. Recent releases of Graveyard seem more weighty. Is a deliberate move on your part? I don’t know that I’d agree that it’s getting bigger. The wines of 1994, 1991, 1987 and 1986 are certainly bigger in structure, but they’re still generally around 12.8-13.2% by alcohol. If you compare them to the shirazes of McLaren Vale and the Barossa they appear more mid-weight and still seem light-bodied compared to the modern big alcoholic numbers. I figure that style-wise we have hit on a standard, which is Hunter in weight and character, with earthy, briarwood and savoury flavours and tannins that aren’t too big. Some look like powerful Hunter wines when they age, like the 1991 vintage. It looked very good when Langtons did their Shiraz auction and we’ve had very favourable reports from events in London and when Grant Burge did his Meshach comparisons between it and the 1991 Hill of Grace and Grange, when it was considered to be very distinctive. They’re good food wines, without the high alcohols you can’t jump over. Compare making the Graveyard shiraz with your Yarra Valley speciality, Seville Estate’s shiraz. There are actually more similarities than differences. Seville Estate’s shiraz is also a lower alcohol wine with a lighter structure than other premium shirazes. In terms of flavours and structure the Hunter and Yarra are pretty similar, given the white pepper characters and savoury pizza biscuit flavours of Yarra shiraz. The biggest contrast I have is with the Rainer Vineyard Shiraz we make from McLaren Vale fruit. It’s a huge wine with around 14.5% alcohol, a typical plumcake and chocolate number. That’s what McLaren Vale does best. Being from a hotter year, the 1997 Seville Estate wine shows more black pepper and spice and is around 14% alcohol. What do you enjoy most about Seville Estate? Playing with pinot noir and chardonnay, since the shiraz tends to make itself. Peter (McMahon) always had great success with shiraz and he also made some great chardonnays, especially those of 1991 and 1993. We’re having a lot of fun honing the style. By comparison the pinot has been a weak link and as yet we haven’t got it anywhere near right. If you’re comparing the making of Yarra chardonnay to Hunter chardonnay, you’re generally about making a finer wine with Yarra fruit. You’ll whole bunch press most of it, crush it, only use free run juice and barrel ferment the lot. You just get a different product. Hunter chardonnays are always that much broader, more nutty and more tropical, whereas in Yarra you’re focusing more in the melon and fig end of the flavour spectrum, with more complexity. Our Hunters tend to peak in 2-4 years, whereas Seville chardonnay needs between 5-7 years. The Yarra has a broader spread of climatic regions than the Hunter. From St Andrews and Dixons Creek all the way to Hoddles Creek you could be 100 miles apart in climate. Seville is in the eastern end where pinot and chardonnay are better suited, along with some shiraz. Up the other end you can just about grown anything, but pinot and chardonnay still dominate. I still feel that too many Yarra cabernets show too much green character. Last year you judged the Air New Zealand Wine Awards. What’s your impression of Kiwi wine? The world market is obviously most enamoured with their chardonnay, cabernet and merlot, but they should stick with what they do best – pinot noir and sauvignon blanc. I bought two cases of some of the award-winning reds and chardonnays back with me to see if they looked good back here in the cold hard light of day. Some looked pretty ordinary and weren’t that consumer-friendly. As you’d expect, the pinots were fantastic, but the main players weren’t in this show. Palliser’s was good and the Walnut Ridge (the trophy winner) pretty smart. I visited Larry McKenna at Martinborough and some of his wines in barrel from 1998 looked unbelievable. Riesling is where they could do well. The 1996 Stoneleigh Riesling is simply an outstanding wine and so are the 1998 rieslings from Framingham and Grove Mill. The best reds I saw there from Bordeaux grapes were from Trinity Hill and Unison, but most still have that green thread running through them even if they’re 13.5 % alcohol. I wasn’t that impressed with their merlots. Their main problem in New Zealand appeared to me that they’re not protecting their industry. There’s no integrity programme and too much pressure on people to supply wine, which could possibly lead some to do questionable things.
