Wednesday, 24 March 2010
2009 Sandpiper Eden Valley Riesling
2005 Morello Nebbiolo
It took a while to get there.
And, in another sense, it didn’t.
Given the number of wineries we visited on the South Australian sojourn in early November 2008 it was going to be hard to get around to ordering a dozen or two from all of them without the wine rack space factor rearing its ugly head. It’s not as if this is the only area that I buy wine from, and there were a lot of very impressive wineries.
Of course, that’s why we put our names on mailing lists.
Doesn’t mean that calls to mailing list customers are going to come at the best time,which is what happened when the initial call this time around turned up on the mobile.
We were heading out for supplies to sustain us over the forthcoming Allman Brothers Moogis stream, had been delayed by an unexpected visitor and had about half an hour to do what needed to be done.
A call back the following morning came at a better time, and resulted in an order for a dozen Sandpiper 2009 Eden Valley Riesling and six of the 2005 Morello Nebbiolo.
Initially, it was going to just be the Riesling, but a chance remark reminded me that I’d bought a bottle of the Nebbiolo in Southport and had found it rather tasty, so the extra half dozen was definitely indicated.
The gotta try this again factor meant tthe Nebbiolo had barely had a chance to get over the transport trauma before I was cracking a bottle to go with a batch of my favourite sugo alla bolognese.
That mightn’t be the best match (my research indicates that you might be looking towards mushroom dishes, grilled steak, strongly-flavoured slow cooked casseroles and game, or aged cheeses) but impatience does that to you.
From the first glass it was obvious that half a dozen aren’t going to last all that long, unless Hughesy manages to find levels of restraint that haven’t been in evidence to date.
The wine’s an attractive crimson cherry red in the glass, with plenty happening on the perfumed nose. Taking a whiff it’s very much a case of what aroma is that, a game I’m disinclined to get too deeply into, but you could probably spend a good ten minutes debating the identity of some of the characters in evidence there.
The key point is, however, that it smells good with plenty happening on the nose, and those aromas carry through onto the palate, where the savoury elements I’ve come to expect in Italian red varietals are present in spades.
Medium bodied, it’s a good food wine with balanced acidity, a rounded mouthfeel, and a lingering finish. Given the pernickety nature of the grape itself, this is an unexpectedly good wine, particularly at the price point (I ended up paying $15, though RRP is, according to the web site $20).
I think I’ll be back for more.
As far as the Riesling goes, there’s also every possibility that I’ll be lining up for more as well.
The Sandpiper Range is Thorne-Clark’s entry level offering, and at $15 RRP, the 2009 Sandpiper Riesling is as good a wine as you’re likely to find at that price point, underlining yet again the extreme value for money that you’re getting when it comes to Australian varietal Riesling.
Lovely pale yellow, with the expected lime citrus notes on the nose, good depth of flavour balancing the acidity with a crisp finish this is a outstanding wine with an extremely reasonable price tag attached.
Halliday describes it as totally delicious and rated it a 94. It would be churlish to quibble....
