THE semillon sauvignon blanc (SSB) or the sauvignon blanc dominant of these blends’ (SBS), share of the Australian white wine market continues its unrelenting surge.
WA’s dominance on the national show circuit with these blends – 28 of the 37 silver and all 11 of the gold medals has been discussed before.
The SSB and SBS blends are split into three categories.
There is the original slightly sweet, fresh and fruity entry level Margaret River classic style; the ubiquitous fresh, vibrant, tangy and exciting unwooded SBS style that is creating the market surge and now the more complex wooded or Graves style that is becoming more prominent in the market place.
Graves is a commune in Bordeaux that is famous for lean, dry, classy and long-living reds that can be truly great and it also produces Bordeaux’s finest white wines, a high-quality wooded semillon sauvignon blanc blend that in recent years has been transposed into Australia.
Given the results of a recent tasting of both Graves’ and Australia’s best of this style, it would appear that Victoria’s Yarra Valley and WAs Margaret River are producing this country’s leading examples.
Until recently, despite there having been some marvellous Aussie examples over the years, these reasonably heavily oaked styles have not been mainstream market players.
In the past four or five years, the quality of the fruit and winemaking craftsmanship are evolving to where in the Australian version the oak is less dominant than previously and the fruit is allowed to take centre stage.
With this increasing appeal has come a series of high-quality, serious and delicious highly drinkable mainstream partially-oaked wooded blends of this style.
WA has spawned a culture of extravaganza varietal tastings of the type founded by the Cape Mentelle cabernet tasting, Cullen chardonnay tasting, Howard Park riesling tasting, Millbrook viognier tasting, Peel Estate shiraz tasting and now Nigel Gallop and Clive Otto’s Fraser Gallop Winery Graves style SBS tasting displaying Australia’s and Graves’ finest.
Among the very interesting results, three very expensive 2005 French whites (Laville Haut-Brion, Smith Haut Lafitte and Domaine de Chevalier) dominated the proceedings and from there, there were differing views.
The Australian show judges selected Gary Gosatti’s Arlewood and the Yarra Valley’s Mount Mary next.
The wine industry attendees’ top Australian whites were the McDonald-Pym Suckfizzle release and the Yarra Yarra while the consumers’ top Aussie whites were the Yarra Yarra and the Arlewood.
On my card, the highest pointed Australians were the quite distinctive and viscous Yarra Yarra 2005 ($40, 18.7pts), incredibly long, minerally Voyager Tom Price 2005 ($55 at cellar door only, 18.5pts), Suckfizzle 2005 ($46.50, 18.3pts), Yarra Valley’s Mount Mary Triolet 2006 ($70, 18.3pts), the wonderful Cape Mentelle Wallcliffe ($41) and Cullen ($34.80) 2006 releases.
Yep, it’s official. This is now a mainstream Australian style and well worth the extra dollars that you’re paying for the added expenses and craftsmanship in their production.