Greywacke Pinot Gris 2021

Popping a bottle is like walking past a cake shop - whiffs raspberry lamingtons, strawberry compote and vanilla cream.

Greywacke Pinot Gris is a B-E-A-U-TIFUL elegant white. Scents of juicy nectarines, plump sun-dried apricots and lemony citrusy with musky oriental spices. The palate is silky and sumptuous with an off-dry and textural wine. It has an intense richness, laced with citrusy, sherbet-like zest. We paired it with a Foie Gras dish with compote from Tropical fruits - it was a dream.

Viticulture Much of the fruit for this wine is from the Selection Ovaille and Mission clones grown at Wrekin Terrace Vineyard in the Brancott Valley, a valley floor site on gravelly clay-loam soils typical of the Southern Valleys. A smaller parcel of the Entav 52 clone (known for its small bunch and berry size) was grown at Riverbrook Vineyard in Rapaura, in young alluvial soils containing high proportions of greywacke river stones. The vineyards are trained on a two-cane VSP (vertical shoot positioning) trellis and crop thinning are carried out to target a modest yield of 7.5 T/Ha.

Winemaking The three clones were hand-picked separately at high ripeness levels and whole-bunch pressed using very low maceration press cycles. The resulting juice was cold settled, then racked to fermentation vessels. Most of the juice went through a natural indigenous yeast fermentation in old French oak barriques and the balance was fermented in stainless steel tanks using cultured yeast. Towards the end of fermentation, all the wine was transferred to stainless steel tanks, where the fermentations were stopped, retaining 11 g/l residual sugar. The blended wine was then filled into old barrels, remaining on yeast lees for a further five months, prior to bottling in November 2018 with alcohol 14.4%, pH 3.50 and acidity of 5.5 g/l.