THEY carry a forbidding name, but Brokenwood's flagship Graveyard vineyard shiraz reds have brought joy to wine drinkers over the past 40 years.
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The wines rank with Penfolds Grange and the Henschke Hill of Grace in the hierarchy of Australian reds and they have been elevated to the highest category - Exceptional - in the Langton's auction house's Classification of Australian Wine and the 2018 Graveyard was declared James Halliday's Wine Companion 2021 Australian Wine of the Year.
After being forced by bushfires and smoke taint to abandon a 2020 Graveyard, Brokenwood has just released the $350-a-bottle Graveyard Vineyard 2021 Shiraz.
Its creator, Brokenwood senior winemaker Stuart Hordern, said 170 millimetres of rain fell in December followed by 77 millimetres in January, leaving the 2021 vintage "close to the edge". It was saved when the rain stopped and the sun came out bringing good hot weather to dry out the vine canopy and keeping botrytis mould at bay.
Despite that good fortune, Stuart was only able to get one of the smallest ever output of Graveyard.
My tasting reveals a wine not equalling the excellence of the 2018 and 2019, but still worth a 5.5-star rating.
The story goes back 55 years when it was owned by Hungerford Hill company, which called it Graveyard block because it was dedicated, but never used, as a cemetery.
Hungerford Hill planted shiraz and cabernet sauvignon there in 1968 and one of the workers who established the vines was Keith Barry, who up to his sad death in 2016 was Brokenwood's 23-year veteran vineyard manager - a post now held by his daughter Katrina.
Brokenwood bought the vineyard in 1978 and produced shiraz reds in 1980 and 1981 but it was not until 1983, in the wake of Iain Riggs's 1982 arrival in the Hunter from Hazelmere winery at McLaren Vale, that the first wine labelled Graveyard appeared.
Since then, Brokenwood's Hunter portfolio has been enhanced with wines from McLaren Vale, Orange, Cowra, Canberra, NSW Central Ranges and Beechworth in north-east Victoria and, along with the 2021 Graveyard, its team of Stuart Hordern, winemaker Kate Sturgess and vineyard manager "Kat" Barry has recently released impressive batch of whites.
They are the $75 Brokenwood 2022 Indigo Vineyard Beechworth Chardonnay and the $28 Brokenwood 2023 Hunter Semillon, $66 2022 1899 Old Vines Vineyard Semillon and $66 2022 Oakey Creek Vineyard Chardonnay and at brokenwood.com.au and the McDonalds Road, Pokolbin, cellar door.
WINE REVIEWS
GRAVEYARD RED
PRICE: $350.
FOOD MATCH: beef burgundy.
AGEING: 12 years.
RATING: 5.5 stars
THIS beautiful, multi-faceted, medium-bodied, 13% alcohol, violet-scented, bright garnet-hued Brokenwood 2021 Graveyard Vineyard Shiraz brings vibrant blackcurrant flavour to the front palate. Plum, bramble jelly, spice, black pepper and savoury oak feature on middle palate and earthy tannins play at the finish. Great with barbecued duck and balsamic vinegar dressing and cellar for 15 years.
OLD VINE ELEGANCE
PRICE: $66
FOOD MATCH: seafood crepes
AGEING: seven years
RATING: 5 stars
THE pale straw, jasmine-scented Brokenwood 2022 1899 Old Vines Vineyard Semillon has fresh, elegant grapefruit front-palate flavour, middle-palate lemon curd, sherbet, gunmetal and nascent honey and a flinty acid finish. It's a Brokenwood inaugural release from an Oakey Creek Road, Pokolbin, vineyard bought by veteran vineyard manager Greg Drayton in the 2022 Drayton Family Wines partition.
INDIGO SHINES
PRICE: $75
FOOD MATCH: paella
AGEING: seven years
RATING: 5 stars
FROM the Beechworth vineyard once part of the Yarra Valley-based Seville Estate and now owned by a group including Iain Riggs and other Brokenwood stakeholders, this delightful Brokenwood 2022 Indigo Vineyard Beechworth Chardonnay is brassy gold, lychee-scented and with expressive peach front-palate flavour. The middle has kiwifruit, melon, mineral and cashew oak and the finish slatey acid.
