Eden Valley 11.5% Screwcap $18 Source: Sample
And now, the current release. It seems to be a little lighter and more restrained than the 2006 (as much as one can tell given their different ages). One thing it shares with that vintage though, is minerality. What is minerality? How does it differ from acidity? Does minerality structure a wine or is that the role of acidity? Are you a “superior” taster if you can tell the two apart? Questions for another time.
What interests me more is the inherent value given to the term. Minerality has currency in wine. Many claim to have captured it, some claim to have some sort of monopoly on it. It’s ill-defined, but by god it’s “good”. And its capital stems largely from a common conception that its presence is somehow related to the ability of the soil to travel up through the roots and the vines and right in to the fruit. I’m sceptical…
Having said that, I still think the descriptor is useful, ie it does tell us something about a wine even if we can’t put our finger on it. I know Philip White wants to eradicate the term in favour of which specific mineral is present. I find that odd, as Mr White generally has a good grasp on the poetics of wine writing but I guess we all have our blind spots.
Oh, apart from minerality, the wine kind of goes like this; Lemons, limes and zest, slate, thyme and the finest of bath salts. Focused and driven with good length, integrated enough for enjoying now but should have a bright future. Minerally finish with a touch of sea spray. I think I like the sea spray on the finish as much as the minerals. Mind you, salt is a mineral…
Another excellent Riesling from a great vintage, but like most others good ones, it’s still distinctive in its own way.
Winery Website- https://www.smallfrywines.com.au/
I'm very frustrated by those wines which have a little something in them that reminds you of something you'd love to put your finger on but can't. Most of them are pinots, and it's not so much that you can't remember the name of the little thing, but that you're not permitted to put your finger on it. As for poetry in wine, the tragedy is there's just not enough poetic wine made in this country. As for the flavours of geology, of course there's room for poetry there, too. But when you study geology, you are trained to taste rocks to help identify them. Salt does taste quite a lot different to mercury, chalk and peat. Grapes are bags of water that has been sucked up through vine roots. Water dissolves minerals.
Sounds like another quality Eden Valley Riesling . . . can't get enough of the stuff personally
Philip- thank you for contributing your remarks, I appreciate it.
It is indeed frustrating when you aren't permitted to put your finger where you know you'd like to, but I guess even civil liberties have their limit.
All jokes aside though, I think the explanation of your ideas on minerals and wine via your background in geology is very compelling and persuasive. I'm still a bit sceptical that the "precise flavours" in the soil arrive in the grapes without a fair bit of mutation. Sceptical, but still open to the idea.
I am intrinsically against the notion that Australia does not make enough poetic wine because
a) It seems to imply a covert "as opposed to..".
b) Amongst a lot of dross I keep discovering new Oz wines that make me desire a poetic response, often in such places as your blog.
c) I don't think we have enough wine writers exploring wines in that aesthetic paradigm to cover the wines that deserve it as it is.
d) To quote Ani DiFranco's "Good, Bad, Ugly"-
Sometimes you can hear the wind blow in a handshake
Sometimes there's poetry written right
On the bathroom wall
Red- I think I have consumed more Eden Valley Riesling this year than ever before, and its been a good year to. I cut my teeth on Clare and still love it, but Eden is now my personal favourite. The 09 vintage there will be very well represented in my cellar.
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Now, what did Monty Python say about Spam? That's right, they professed to like it. I don't.