Adored the 2012 Bay of Fires Riesling, like this follow-up but not quite as much. Warmer and drier year.
A small amount of residual sugar (4.2g/l) tempers the driving acidity and perhaps plays a role in breadth of flavour. Lime zest and apples mostly. It still feels pretty much dry. Has a fascinating suggestion of woody, slightly bitter rosemary and some crimping phenolics. Wet slate through the finish, good salty carry. It has a sort of drink-now appeal but I wouldn’t be surprised if it looked better again in a year. 92
Region: Tasmania
Alcohol: 12.5%
Closure: Screwcap
Price: $35
Tasted: January 2014
I wonder why they feel that it can command that rrp. Seems high in the context of Australian riesling.
Luca – I think the 2012 was good enough to command that sort of RRP, especially given you’re bound to find discounts if you look. I haven’t been into a retail store to see what the Bay of Fires range is going for but the prices provided to us can be misleading. It’s a difficult situation for wine reviewers. That’s just one of the reasons I score regardless of price and try to hold back from making statements about value. This does offer something quite different to your typical Clare or Eden Valley stylings so comparisons on those fronts can also be misleading to a degree. Having said that, it wouldn’t surprise me if quite a number of people baulked at the dollars asked – and they have every right to.
Luca,
I think its really difficult to celebrate the class of the best 20-30 Rieslings produced in Australia if, for example, we make them jump through a thousand hoops before we collectively sign off on any full retail price beyond the low to mid $20s. There are hundreds of Australian examples at around that price. Having a handful of exceptional ones for $10-15 more is not really greatly out of context at all. And Bay of Fires has fairly established itself for some years as among the flagships.
As Jeremy has indicated, it can be found for a little less. I just walked past some at $29.99 a single bottle, $28.49 in a mixed six.
By all means, shrug shoulders and walk past Riesling for more than $25 if the wine itself doesn’t have the capacity to move you emotionally. I personally on a number of sites are a vocal critic of high pricing which is often defended by industry insiders who have no intention of paying that amount themselves. But really good Riesling for $30-40 is not beyond the pale, and the number of industry types who put their money where their mouth is and spend that much confirms this.