Cabernet Sauvignon Cabernet Sauvignon is arguably the world’s premium red wine grape. It is a truly global variety, for it is grown in what must be every wine-growing country this side of the Iron Curtain, and has the somewhat unusual, and uncanny ability to taste very similar in all growing conditions, which as the cultivators of Pinot Noir will bemoan, is an unfortunately rare phenomenon. Cabernet ( let’s be colloquial, if you will permit ) is the backbone of the most famous red wines of the world, the clarets of the Medoc region in Bordeaux. Indeed it is found in some proportion in all but a small percentage of all Bordeaux red wines, often blended with its close relative, Cabernet Franc, and its distant relatives, Merlot and Malbec. Young Cabernet is typically blackcurrant-like ( those from Tasmania being somewhat akin to fortified Ribena and very nice thank you ) and capsicum or green-pepper-like. Few of them carry both flavours, most young cabernets tend to be dominated by one or the other. The fruit character is found at the front of the mouth. The berry itself is very small, large-stoned and thick-skinned, which means that Cabernet often makes quite a tannic young drop ( for tannin is extracted from the skins and seeds of grapes ). If the winemaker makes an acidic young wine, there will then tend to be a concentration of flavour at the front of the mouth and the characters of acid and tannin at the finish. Thanks to the possible hole in the middle, Cabernet can make what is referred to in the traps as a `doughnut wine’. One adds the Merlot and the Malbec to fill out the middle palate, lending weight and body. As Cabernet ages flavours of violets, cedar ( un-wooded ones can taste woody ) cigar boxes and mint can develop, making a wonderfully complex wine. As I have suggested, Tasmanian Cabernets have a remarkably intense fruit flavour, which when coupled with a very strong regional leafiness, makes them extremely attractive prospects while young. I have only tried one with any real bottle-age of ten years or more, and it still seemed to have the same sort of character of the young Tassie Cabernets. It will be interesting to see if they do develop in a more conventional fashion, and I guess that only time will tell. Victorian Cabernets (and I am lumping together some pretty diverse areas ) have elegance and depth of flavour, and should achieve good varietal character. Coonawarra Cabenets are typically ripe and fruity, with the herbaceous leafiness found in cooler climates. They are light to medium-bodied and show elegance and early-drinking ability. Those fom the Margaret River region south of Perth are more robust, with enormous depth, richness and style – the best being quie extraordinary. The further you move north, the less intense and pronounced the varietal character, especially in bottle-aged wine. Hunter Cabernet tastes varietal while young, but as with other red varieties there, after a few years it tends to taste of `Hunter Red’. As ever, there are exceptions – Lakes Folly being the obvious one. Cabernet Franc There has been quite a rush on plantings of Cabernet Franc over the past five years, but what on earth is it? Cabernet Franc is a relative of Cabernet Sauvignon, and shares some of its properties, although it is less distinctive. The wine has less colour, complexity, body and tannin, but is softer, more subtle and aromatic. It is ideally suited to blending back to Cabernet Sauvignon, which is just what the Bordelaise get up to to further enrich the complexity and character of their wines. Straight varietal reds are a rarity in Bordeaux, the home of the Cabernet grape varieties, largely restricted to a few first growths and eccentrics. It is fact that much of Australia’s early plantings of Cabernet Franc were quite unintentional, for the vignerons frequently mistook it for Cabernet Sauvignon – not all that had to do. It still occupies a significant proportion of some vine rows. Most of the recent plantings have been in the cooler southern areas of the continent, with the intention to blend it to make the highest-quality-possible claret-like blends. The results have been excellent to date, and these `Bordeaux blends’ have been accepted by the market here and are now sought after. I have yet to try a really impressive vareital Australian Cabernet Franc, but that too will come in time. Grenache Anonymous, ignored, forgotten, but consumed in frighteningly large quantities, Grenache is very much the Claytons red grape – it’s what you drink when you can’t be prepared to buy a fine wine. You don’t see it advertised heavily at all, and it rarely appears in lights on the cardboard covers of the casks it lines, but it’s there all right. Grenache makes light red wines without much depth, character or quality. Next to a premium variety it tastes positively insipid. What it is suited to is the production of fresh, grapey rose styles, which it does quite commonly in France and all too rarely in Australia. In a country with all our sunshine, summer food and outdoor eating, one would expect roses to be our most commonly-drunk daily beverage. But the style seems to suffer from the same lack of recognition as Grenache, but that’s life. Grenache is still the most heavily-cropped variety for red wine production in Australia. Malbec Malbec is another of the Bordeaux red varieties designed to fit snugly into the pattern of the Bordeaux blend wines. The reason why there are not many straight varietal Malbecs lies in its somehwat harsh, aggressive flavour which can be remarkably reminiscent of cabbages. Malbec makes very tannic wine, has a rich middle palate and real character. You don’t need much of it to dramatically alter your blend, and if it previously lacked in middle palate, acid, tannic extract and flavour, the addition of a little Malbec will certainly have changed all that. Like Merlot, it fills out the flavour of red wines. Planted in small patches, generally in premium wine areas, it has quite regularly been confused with an Italian variety by the name of Dolcetto, whose small plantings in Victoria were largely intended to be Malbec. Merlot With every merlot vine we plant in Australia the industry matures a little. Merlot is the second major `claret’ variety, and originates from Bordeaux. An earlier-ripening grape than Cabernet Sauvignon, Merlot is planted to fill out claret styles, and is occasionally seen to make a straight varietal wine. As I have discussed, some straight cabernets may lack body and depth in the middle of the mouth or palate, and need another variety to add structure. In Australia we have traditionally used Shiraz for this purpose, but there is an influential school of thought that claims that although these two varieties are suited to blending, they should not be blended to each other. Merlot is the major component of the solution, which may also involve Cabernet Franc and Malbec. Many Australian wine companies have planted these other `cabernet’ grapes to improve the quality of their `claret’ styles, which has also added to the variety on the marketplace. Merlot wines are typically soft and fleshy, frequently early-maturing. Their great attribute is their richness around the middle palate which complements the qualities of cabernet so well. Their flavour is often fruitcake-like – rich, complex and spicy. Varietal Merlot wines are becoming more common, and their success looks assured if their quality seen to date can be maintained. Pinot Noir The impossible dream for Australian winemakers? I hope the hell not. Recent results are on my side. It appears that we are well on the way to drinking reasonable quantities of our own Pinot Noir. It’s a variety that excites the emotions more than any other in Australia, and the reasons are obvious. Good Pinot Noir is about as good to drink as `great’ anything else. The illustrious and inconsistent red variety of Burgundy, Pinot Noir has been the red grape to plant in Australia for the last decade. It makes a lighter-bodied red wine that the traditional Australian wine drinker is used to, some of which are in reality only marginally out of the `rose’ category. Pinot Noir is also a major, and possibly the most important Champagne variety, where it lends depth and power to the fruit character of that region’s famous sparkling wine. Pinot’s classic varietal flavours are strawberries, cherries and plums. We are yet to see a large number of Australian Pinot Noirs with the complexity to display all three characters, but strawberries and cherries can be frequently detected in our wines. Viticulturally difficult to manage and handle, and even more problematical in the winery, Pinot Noir has given as many headcahes to grape growers and winemakers as it doubtless has to its consumers. Wine companies face the awful dilemma that although Pinot Noir best produces its classic flavour in cool climates, ofted it has enormous trouble ripening in cooler regions, which leads to all sorts of colour problems on the side. It is particularly pH-unstable, meaning that it is difficult for the winemaker to guage when to add acid in the winery and how much to add. With its low buffering-abililty, a Pinot Noir can jump in pH from 3.5 to 4.0 after a malolactic fermentation in no time, with the inevitable risky consequences to wine quality. It is incredibly difficult to get good varietal flavour, and to find the corect winemaking techinique. In our current Pinot-making infancy there are literally dozens of plausible technical options for the winemaker to follow – but which one should he take? We must continue to be patient for our Impossible Dream – and like Don Quixote be prepared for the odd nightmare along the way. Shiraz If you consider that Shiraz makes some of the rich, old classics from the Hunter Valley, some of the great reds of Coonawarra, central Victoria and Western Australia and many of the best light `Beaujolais-like’ styles in Australia then you must agree that not only is it exceptionally versatile, but it is of the highest quality. In spite of this Shiraz is frequently spoken of in less than glowing terms thanks to the trendiness of other red varieties such as Pinot Noir and the `cabernet’ grapes. The situation is clear however – if there were as many good wines made in Australia every year from Pinot Noir as there are from Shiraz, then Burgundy’s future would be in severe doubt. Shiraz is still the most widely-planted quality wine grape in Australia and it is found in every wine region here to some extent or other. There is continuing doubt as to its precise geographic origins – some believing it came from Persia, others from France. What’s more important is that Shiraz is a comparatively early-ripening variety, with medium-sized berries and comparatively thin skins. Its classic varietal flavours are of pepper and spice, although they may show a delightful fruitiness of fresh raspberries. Australian wine labels appear to offer the consumer two choices – Shiraz or Hermitage, when in actual fact they’re one and the same grape. Hermitage is the name of the wine region on the slopes above the small town of Tain, in the northern end of the Rhone Valley in France. The major red variety there is believed to be the same as the Shiraz found in Australia, and consequently some of the more marketing-conscious wine producers of yesteryear began to call their wine`Hermitage’ as an alternative. The practice has continued – undoubtedly the name is far more distinguished-sounding – although the majority of people call the variety by the more correct of the two names, Shiraz. Winemakers have found that by and large, Shiraz wines are generally fuller in the middle palate, where they have more `weight’ and flavour. Not surprisingly this has led to the making of softer, smoother styles of wine. When one also remembers that the grape itself is comparatively large and thin-skinned next to cabernet sauvignon, this too has contributed to softer Shiraz wines. In earlier days, many of these would have been called `Burgundy’, another wine name that is hopefully destined for summary extinction in Australia. With recent advances in winemaking knowledge and technology it is clear that the grape itself can make a far more versatile range of wines, and indeed many are almost `claret-like’. I hope that Shiraz gets more recognition and returns again to the shaky centre-stage of wine fashion. It will probably be only a matter of time, and hopefully not before too many more Shiraz vineyards are ripped out.
