2008 Sorrenberg Chardonnay

Beechworth 13.8% Cork $50.40 Source: Retail

The vineyard at Sorrenberg is only 2.5 hectares, so it doesn’t produce a lot of wine. But judging from this, my first experience with Sorrenberg, what Barry and Jan Morey do make is really worth checking out. The fruit for the Chardonnay undergoes full malo-lactic fermentation and is 100% barrel fermented, 25% in new French barriques. It’s wild yeast fermented and sees weekly lees stirring for ten months. So I guess you can safely call it a worked style.

It’s soft, rounded, textured and powerful but it has the minerally acidity to pull it off. Spicy, nutty, savoury, layered and finally, bitter in the most enjoyable of ways, leaving something like the taste of an exotic gin & tonic in the mouth after an extremely long finish. There’s white peach and ginger but it’s more a cohesive set of flavours that come together to form one special taste that really can’t be defined.

I get the feeling that it’s a style that could go horribly wrong if not executed to perfection. Fortunately it has been. Full of character and quite simply a fantastic wine.

Winery Website- http://www.sorrenberg.com/