2017 Spinifex Late Release Riesling

Pete Shell is the gift that keeps on giving. This is the first vintage of Spinifex’s flagship Rostein Riesling, released six years after the vintage. Spinifex’s two-acre Rostein vineyard is home to two parcels of seriously old Riesling, one planted in 1945 and the other in 1957. These parcels produce minuscule yields for Riesling—a paltry 0.8 tonnes per acre is the norm—resulting in wines of atypical concentration and power. The fruit comes predominantly from the oldest vines (1945, indeed some of Australia’s oldest Riesling vines!), facing east and sitting at almost 500 metres elevation. The dry-grown vines sit on sandy loam over quartz and gravel soils. The fruit was hand-picked in three passes over a week. The wine was then fermented naturally and aged on lees for 11 months in 1,000-litre neutral oak and was even allowed to go through partial malo. It was then bottled unfiltered after 14 months. In other words: this is anything but your garden variety SA Riesling. 2017 was a cool, lean and citrus-forward year for Riesling in the Eden Valley, so Pete decided to hold the wine back for a few years in bottle, allowing the acidities to mellow and integrate and the fruit to flesh and round out. Et voila. This is a unique, wonderfully textured, layered bottle-aged Rizza of delicious, mouthwatering intensity, texture, and length. There are some lovely developing characters, adding layers of complexity to more classic refreshing notes of citrus, florals, lime, cream and honey. Then there’s a smoky wisp and a saline tang on the long, slightly grippy close. Fans of aged Riesling will not be disappointed. Or rather, fans of great Australian Riesling full stop will not be disappointed.