Cabernet Sauvignon Riserva Magnum

2022

2022 PRIMA ALBA

Sauvignon Blanc (100%)

Prima Alba, meaning ‘First Sunrise’ in Italian. This wine marks a new beginning for Mr Barval. A re-imagining of a Margaret River white varietal classic of Sauvignon Blanc, but not as you would know it. Hand harvested fruit, gentle whole bunch pressing, wild fermented in old French oak barriques with 5 months on light yeast lees.

A bone dry, medium/light weight wine displaying crisp lime acidity, abundant tropical fruit notes, with mouth coating texture. This new wine for us treads an intriguing line between light delicacy and profound complexity. This wine is bottled unfined and unfiltered and a harmless sediment may remain.

2022

73% Viognier 27% Marsanne

13.4% Alc.

Production: 2991 bottles (screw cap)

This wine is inspired by the white wine blends of the Northern Rhone Valley in France. Originating in Switzerland, the Rhone river flows west towards Lyon before turning south down the Rhone Valley to the Mediterranean coast. The strong, cool wind known as the 'Mistral' blows down the Rhone Valley from the Alps and has a profound impact upon all of the agriculture in the valley, viticulture being no exception. This is the inspiration behind the name of the wine.

Perhaps the most famous of the Rhone white varieties is Viognier (pron. Vio-n-yay). The bronze tinted, thick skinned, hardy white grapes typically produce a medium weight, dry wine with characteristic bright floral and apricot notes. This is often blended with either or both of Marsanne and Roussane, to produce a vibrant, complex, floral wine, capable of being enjoyed in its youth as well as to be cellared and enjoyed with several years of bottle evolution.

The Vineyards:

The Viognier for the 2021 Mistral was sourced from two separate vineyards. The first is located in the Walcliffe sub-region of Margaret River, with a northerly exposure and around 4km from the Indian Ocean on the banks of the Margaret River itself. Sitting high on this hillside, the vines grow in gravelly, well drained soil and experience fantastic exposure to the warm summer sunshine and regular, cooling sea breezes.

The other portion of Viognier comes from the north of the Margaret River region, on the border between the Yallingup and Willyabrup sub-regions. This site is very exposed to both our regular winds and full summer sunshine, and the Viognier thrives in this site.

The Marsanne portion of the blend is grown at one of the most southerly vineyards in the Margaret River region located in the Karridale sub-region, some 4.5km West of the Indian Ocean and 6km North of the Southern Ocean.

Winemaking:

All of the grapes for this wine were handpicked into small 8kg crates and immediately transported back to the winery where the whole bunches of grapes were placed gently into an old-school basket press to extract the juice. Whole-bunch basket pressing is the most gentle way to extract the juice from the fruit and is a process common to the world’s highest quality white wines. No additions, subtractions, fining or filtration of any sort was conducted on the juice.

From the press the juice was run directly into 3 and 4 year old French oak barriques for fermentation. The wine was fermented utilising the indigenous yeast which came in on the grape bunches from the vineyard. The wine fermented to absolute dryness and was left in contact with its fine lees for 4 months.

The 2022 Mistral spent 9 months in barrel before being racked via gravity to tank pre-bottling. This wine was bottled unfined and unfiltered and displays the possibility of producing elegant, pure, bright and clear wines, in this very natural way.

The Wine:

As always with these blends it is the nose that strikes you first. Bursting forth with lifted aromas of white flowers, apricot, and an array of sweet spices and perfume. Whilst this beguiling mix of flavours carries through to the palate and is held in frame by a wonderful line of fresh natural acidity, I really feel it is the incredible mouthfeel which this blend achieves that is the star. Somehow this wine achieves a feeling of softness and textural amazingness whilst still being light a fresh! Enjoy it in its first 2-3 years to make the most of this veritable bazaar of exotic flavours and aromas or cellar for 5-10 years to witness the evolution to a more savoury and subdued delight.

Salutè

Robert Gherardi

2022

100% Chardonnay

13.1% Alc.

Production: 2247 bottles 

The Vineyards:

Three diverse and  select parcels of Gin Gin clone Chardonnay combined to produce this wine. Gin Gin clone vines were used exclusively as I believe that this clone more so than any other expresses the exceptional and unique Margaret River and sub-regional terroir.

The first 2 plots of vines lie in the famed Wilyabrup sub-region. More examples of Margaret River’s most famous Chardonnays and Cabernets originate from fruit in this subregion than anywhere else in the district. Whilst only being around 150m apart, the two blocks behave drastically different and produce very different qualities in their fruit. 

The second plot of vines is in the far south sub-region of Karridale - the most southerly of Margaret River’s subregions. The vineyard is in close proximity to both the Indian and Southern Oceans leading to typically far lower growing season temperatures.

The 2020/21 Season:

Spring got off to a good start after a typically wet, cold winter, and things were looking good. Margaret River experienced one of its wettest Novembers on record which, looking back, was the beginning of the late season issues for many vignerons. We had a very dry (pretty much 0mm of rain) for December and January, but then came a couple of very wet days at the beginning of February where 60-100mm of rain fell across the district.

This big rain event caused some severe and widespread disease outbreaks in many vineyards in Margaret River. Thankfully, working with great sites which have been well managed for many years, these more challenging conditions did not spell disaster for our grapes, unlike many down here. We literally saw less than 10 diseased bunches in our 3 chardonnay picks!

Overall I would count this vintage as a stressful one and one that threw up many more things to consider when making our harvest decisions. The early signs are that the Chardonnay is looking like the star of vintage so far. 

Winemaking:

All of the grapes for this wine were handpicked into small 8kg crates and immediately transported back to the winery where the whole bunches of grapes were placed gently into a traditional basket pressed to extract the juice. Whole-bunch basket pressing yields around 20+% less juice than a conventional airbag press, but the juice quality is second to none.

The juice was run into a mix of brand new and seasoned oak. 1 brand new French oak barrel was used, giving the wine a new oak percentage of 13%. The remainder of the barrels were a mix of 2 and 3 year old oak. The wine was fermented dry utilising the indigenous yeast which came in on the grape bunches from the vineyard.

Following alcoholic fermentation the wine was encouraged to undergo malolactic fermentation, a process whereby the malic acid naturally present in the grapes is converted into  the softer and more textural lactic acid. As with the alcoholic fermentation, this occurred through bacteria which were naturally present in the juice and winery environment. Following 100% completion of Malo the wine was sulphured and the wine racked off its heavy yeast lees. The wine has rested and developed in oak for 9 months during which time it underwent the process of bâtonnage (stirring of the yeast lees in the bottom of the barrel) for 4 months to encourage development of more complex, savoury aromas and flavours.

This wine was bottled unfined and unfiltered, with our aim being to showcase the amazing fruit which went into making it in the purest way possible.

The Wine:

From what was really quite a 'disjointed' growing season, our 2021 Chardonnay really highlights how well suited Margaret River is to growing great Chardonnay fruit. As always in our wines we try to get a defined acid focus to the wines but balance this with texture. Medium weight, hints of beautiful french oak lie nicely behind the primary flavours of apple, pear and white stone fruit. For such a young wine, the balance right across the palate and the length of the palate are impressive. This wine is drinking well upon release but will really hit it straps in another year or two in bottle and will reward extended cellaring of 10-15+ years.

Salutè

Robert Gherardi

13.9% Alc.
Production: 2293 bottles

This wine is inspired by the early release Langhe Nebbiolo and Nebbiolo d’Alba styles of wine produced in the Barolo and Barbaresco zone of Italy. I have been living and working between Margaret River and this most famous of Italian fine wine regions since 2009. For this wine I wanted to make a great introduction to this grape variety which is totally foreign to most Australian consumers. As with all of my wines I sought to promote a purity of varietal expression and not take any aspect of the wine ‘too far’

A flawless pale garnet in colour, this wine displays all of the typical colour notes of the Italian Nebbiolo grape. Hints of just ripe red cherry, violet perfume and red/purple rose combine with a savoury ‘meatiness’ to give a light yet complex nose. The wine is medium weight at best, with high acidity and a high level of tannin so reminiscent of the Nebbiolo variety. Importantly, the tannins are not bitter but display a nutty dryness which works well to balance the cherry fruit and floral spice core of the palate. This wine was conceptualised as an early drinking style and will perhaps be at its best in the first 5 years of its life, but careful cellaring will see it mature and develop for well beyond that short timeframe.

Enjoy with salami and prosciutto, a rare grilled steak, or anything with some fats in it to give the tannins something to react with besides your gums and teeth and to transform the drinking experience.

Once again the Vino Rosso arrives to continue the humble story of this wine which is really to provide a bit of a guilty pleasure for you. Wonderful mixes of florals, fruit and spice but with a generous, soft structure and low tannins, this wine was made for enjoyment.

The Vineyards:

The Merlot portion of the blend is from a very special vineyard. One of the oldest and most historic in the entire Margaret River district, this Wilyabrup site displays all of the most sought after vineyard characteristics. Of particular note is that the vines are old – around 46 years old and un-irrigated, which leads to production of a Merlot wine with amazing depth and complexity. 

The Petit Verdot and Malbec portions for the blend come from 26 year old vines growing on a gentle north sloping vineyard also  in the Wilyabrup subregion of Margaret River. The soil is very gravelly and the vines work hard, focusing their energies on ripening healthy, vibrant fruit, not excesses of vegetative growth or high quantities.

The 2019/20 Season:

The 2019/20 growing season was characterised as being quite a warm one in respect to our typical mild Mediterranean seasons. Spring brought with it the typical mix of stunning days interspersed by a couple of significant storm events which lead reduced fertilisation of the many varieties across the district and consequent reduction in yields. 

Following on from a marginally warmer than usual spring, Summer arrived rapidly and we had several runs of significantly warmer than average temperatures which lead to an overall seasonal pattern of higher than average day time and night time temperatures – December in particular averaged 3 degrees warmer than average for day time maximum temperatures!

 Another key factor in our growing season weather was very low to no rainfall throughout the summer.

What does all this mean for the grapes? The warmer temperatures resulted in the most of our red fruit ripening around 2 weeks earlier than average. The warmer than average days and lack of rainfall had the beneficial result of an extremely low disease pressure throughout the growing season meaning that the health of the grapes upon harvest one some of the best I have ever witnessed. The make up of this blend, our careful winemaking and attention to detail in the cellar, and the time we allow for the wine to develop in cask before bottling all lead to another great instalment of one of our most popular wines.

Winemaking:

All of the grapes for this wine were handpicked into small 8kg crates and immediately transported back to the winery where they were gently de-stemmed and not crushed, directly into their small fermentation vessels, a procedure which allowed the ferment to start with what were almost totally unburst, undamaged individual berries. The wines were fermented on skins utilising the indigenous yeasts, which arrived on the grape skins when the fruit arrived at the winery.

The must underwent a slow, steady ferment with hand plunging twice each day. After around 14 – 20 days (batch dependant) the fruit was basket pressed into 3 year old French oak barriques and was left to complete malolactic fermentation in barrel utilising the activity of indigenous bacteria. The wine was left to mature for 21 months in barrel during which time it was racked via gravity one time and topped regularly.

1 day before bottling the wine was racked out of barrel to tank using gravity (no pumps at all) and was then bottled unfined and unfiltered.

The Wine:

As soon as the lifted purple floral perfume notes from the Petit Verdot and dense, ripe red and dark berry notes from the Merlto and Malbec hit your nose, you know that you are in for a treat. On the palate the wine is incredibly soft, with great richness and complexity, but the nice acidity from the Petit Verdot grapes stops the wine becoming too heavy and dense. For such a rich and complex wine, the finish is clean and elegant, again due to the fantastic acid line. No tannins and unashamedly upfront fruit make this the true definition of a vinous guilty pleasure. This wine drinks incredibly easily, with no rough edges, but it will develop and reward cellaring for the medium term (5-10 yrs easily)

Salutè

Robert Gherardi