Dark spice, cassis and some floral notes on the nose. Moving through the palate, there's great depth of dark fruit flavour sitting alongside aromas of oak, clove and forest floor. Savoury, earthy flavours give way to fine tannins with well balanced acidity. Seamless on the finish, this is great now but has potential to improve over the next 5-6 years.
Awards and Accolades
94 Points - Campbell Mattinson, The Wine Front "Smoky, minerally, reductive style. More than a little attitude to it; almost seems cocky. Wood smoke runs through cherries. Smattering of spice. Twiggy notes. Top notch."
93 Points - Rob Geddes MW, Australian Wine Vintages "This steps up intensity and complexity with a whole bunch spice and strawberry fruit concentration. The palate has fabulous fruit, ripe strawberry fruits, even long and fleshy generosity with very fine-grained tannins on the long finish."
93 Points - Ned Goodwin, Australian Wine Companion "An open, nicely svelte pinot of blood plum, pomelo, raspberry, huckleberry and red cherry sass. Some rhubarb, briar, beef bouillon and root spice confer a savoury tone, mingling with gauzy almost dusty tannins, bright acidity and a dollop of oak, for good measure and focus. A fine estate expression, tempting one into pinot's nether-nether of campfire and autumnal mulch."
2014 Vintage: 95 Points - Campbell Mattinson, Australian Wine Companion "Wild with aroma and flavour. Spice, stalk, garden herbs and then dark, juicy plum and black cherry. Call me anything but don't call me simple. Smoky oak slips suggestively under the covers of the fruit. Tremendous drinking from a range of angles."
From the Winery
The Kooyong vineyard is located on the Mornington Peninsula at Tuerong, on Miocene sedimentary soils. Our wines are made from domain grown, handpicked grapes and aim to manifest terroir: the integration of our geology and soils with the macroclimate of our region, the mesoclimates of the various sites within our vineyard and the weather of the annual grape growing season. Our cultural operations in the vineyard and practices in the winery endeavour to articulate these unique characteristics diligently, respectfully and without artifice.
Kooyong Estate Pinot Noir comprises fruit from a combination of blocks within our Meres, Haven and Ferrous vineyards. It offers a broader taste of the Kooyong vineyard, with parcels from various soils and mesoclimates blended together to create the Estate label. Year after year the same blocks are consistently chosen, giving this wine an underlying similarity across vintages. The fruit was fermented in a combination of large-format oak foudre, large-format concrete tanks and stainless steel tanks, without yeast inoculation, for 18 to 21 days, with a small proportion of whole bunches included. The malolactic conversion also, is indigenous. The maturation period is 9 months in French oak barriques, 20% new, followed by a further 10 months in large format French oak foudres. It was then bottled without fining or filtration.
The 2013-2014 growing season started with a warm winter followed by strong early season growth and an early spring with above average temperatures. An extended cold and wet period in October and November lead to a prolonged flowering period with reduced fruit set, resulting in below average yields.
This cold period continued throughout December, finally broken by a warm summer with several heat waves during the month of January. A warm February and the lower yields brought an earlier than usual start to harvest.
Mild March weather and the lower yields made for a short and steady harvest for both our viticultural and winery teams.
While yields were low, the quality of the fruit was very high producing wines that impress with depth, length and linear direction.
