Louisa Rose, viagra dosage the chief winemaker at Yalumba has invited me for a Viognier Breakfast today, or better said, she has arrived here at Percy’s with a chef and several appetizing looking bottles in tow.
Louisa, or “Lou” as she is affectionately called by her friends and colleagues, has been a winemaker since graduating at the top of her class from Roseworthy in 1992. Since 2006 she is the chief winemaker here at Yalumba. I’ve been able to observe Lou at work this week. She’s a no-nonsense woman that shoots straight from the hip. She’s honest to the point of being blunt, but the reason she can pull this off with such admirable grace is that not only does she have an impeccable palate and is extraordinarily good at what she does, she is also a very fair, honest and warm-hearted boss and colleague.
One of Lou’s great achievements at Yalumba has been her work with the Viognier grape variety and the creation of one of Australia’s great icon wines – “The Virgilius” Viognier. Indeed, the amazing popularity and success of Viognier in Australia is largely due to the efforts at Yalumba.
It is worth recalling that back in 1968 there were only 14 hectares of Viognier growing in the northern Rhône in the tiny appellations of Condrieu and Côte Rotie. Not much of it was growing anywhere else in the world. Due to the variety’s demand on climate and difficulty in the vineyard, it had become nearly extinct, having been replaced by easier and more predictable varieties.
I heard that the Hill-Smith family family fell with the variety on a trip to the Northern Rhône. I wasn’t able to confirm that, but I do know that they planted 1.2 hectare of Viognier on their Vaughan property in Eden Valley in 1980. They experimented with it quietly for about 10 years before subsequently extending their Viognier vineyards not only in the Eden Valley, but in the Riverland and Limestone Coast regions of South Australia. Much of Australia’s Viognier vine material actually originates from the Yalumba estate nursery.
The clone used for nearly all of the early plantings was the Montpellier 1968. In the late 1990’s Yalumba initiated discussions with other great Viognier makers around the world and placed cuttings from their best vines into a clonal development program at the Yalumba Vine Nursery. This work continues today where Yalumba, after years of observation, have selected 11 of the most successful clones for its youngest Viognier plantings in the Virgilius Vineyard on Flaxmann Valley Road in Eden Valley.
The original vines in Eden Valley were planted on their own roots, but these new vines have been grafted just as Yalumba’s other subsequent Viognier plantings have been grafted. Although there has not yet been phylloxera in South Australia, that pest is not the only reason to graft vines. In a replanting environment in the Riverland, Ramsey rootstock is used to help combat nematodes, salinity and drought. In the Limestone Coast Teleki 5C and Paulsen 1103 are used as they have good lime tolerance and reasonable, but not excessive vigour to cope with the shallow limestone soils.
Louisa Rose says, “Getting the cropping levels right early in the season is the biggest challenge. If the vine is left with too much fruit it will struggle to develop sufficient canopy to set the berries and ripen the crop. If the vine is struggling then leaf health is severely affected. If over cropping occurs on young vines it can take a number of years for the vine to recover due to poor cane development and the vine ends up with stunted growth and poor spur or cane positioning.”
The Virgilius
The flagship Viognier was conceived as the white partner to the flagship Barossa Shiraz called Octavius. The name “Virgilius” stems from the Roman poet Virgil who was also friend and mentor of the first Emperor of Rome, Octavius (Augustus). After nearly twenty years of experimentation, the Virgilius made its debut in 1998.
Virgilius is sourced from the best Viognier vines from the Eden Valley. Viognier can be notoriously high in alcohol and flabby due to it inherently low acid. This is because it needs to be really ripe before it develops all those lovely peach and floral aromas. And when Viognier finally does ripen, it ripens very fast. Louisa monitors the ripening progress diligently and gets her team out there to pick quickly in the cool early morning hours to preserve that precious acid.
To minimize the high phenolic content, she practices whole bunch pressing. Structure, balance and longevity are her goals with this big-bodied wine so it is fermented slowly with indigenous yeast in used French oak barrels. The wine remains on its lees for 9-10 months. Only the best barrels are chosen for the final blend.
The Breakfast
Lou presents the entire line-up of Yalumba Viognier with our breakfast. We have two variations of eggs Benedict: one with spinach and Barossa ham and the other with smoked Pacific salmon. All three of the dry white Viognier wines pair superbly with the eggs. We began with the 2008 Yalumba Y Series which exhibits excellent varietal character with jasmine and white peach flavours. The 2008 Yalumba Barossa Eden Valley is a bit more rich and intense with apricot and peach laced with a little citrus and orange blossom – I really enjoyed this with the Florentine version of the eggs. The Virgilius is a really sexy wine and I really have to hold myself back. (It would be easy to sit for a few hours enjoying this, but do still have a day of work ahead of me.) The 2008 Virgilius has intense aromas of peach apricot and ginger spice. It is wonderfully textured and displays well-balanced structure with vibrant acid and integrated alcohol. The finish is very long and mineral and while this wine is generous, it is by no means blowsy. I adore it with the salmon and the Hollandaise sauce. In the tradition of the northern Rhône, Yalumba also produces three dry red wines that are Shiraz blended with a small amount of Viognier. This adds a discreet floral components and bright yellow stone fruit to dark briary Shiraz. The 2008 Y Series Shiraz Viognier is reminiscent of crushed raspberries and rhubarb with a bit of cinnamon and jasmine. This is a jazzy medium bodied wine with soft juicy tannins and actually goes pretty well with the salmon. The 2006 Yalumba Barossa Eden Shiraz Viognier is a deeper darker wine with plum and black raspberry fruit and a cedary juniper berry component. The 2007 Yalumba Handpicked Shiraz Viognier is a complex wine with blackberry, honeysuckle, wild heather, dried apricot and a hint of roasted coffee. The tannins are abundant and very fine-grained and the finish lingers long with an array of spices and fruit. Yalumba also produces a sweet botrytized version of Viognier in adequate vintages. The 2008 Wrattonbully Hand Picked Botrytis Viognier is absolutely delicious with the fresh fruit. The superb ending to our meal is the Yalumba V de Vie, which is the pure, clear distilled Viognier.