Wine & Spirits - February 2018 - 27

sourced from his McLaren Vale vineyards. As we sit
in a hard-hat zone of the soon-to-open d'Arenberg
Cube, a five-story glass structure that will house
art installations, a restaurant, bars and a tasting
room overlooking the vineyards, he says there are
still many varieties he'd like to test out. "If climate
change continues, these warmer varieties from southern Italy and parts of Spain are going to be suited to
[our] environment," he says, "So let's start playing
with them now." He already does so with wines such
as Anthropocene Epoch Mencia and Conscious Biosphere Petit Sirah Aglianico. Other bottlings include
sagrantino, which, he says, "works in pretty much
every environment that you put it in," and cinsault,
another variety he's decided to try out.
Peter Fraser, who produces grenache from Yangarra's
biodynamic vineyards at the region's northeastern
edge, near the Adelaide Hills, also notes an increasing
demand for new flavors from his customers. "The consumer is moving away from 'big is better,'" says Fraser. "[There's a] huge thirst for eclectic wine."
Fraser has been looking mostly to the southern
Rhône for inspiration, planting small plots of carignan, cinsault, vaccarese and picpoul, to name just a
few, as well as roussanne, which has become the basis
for one of the winery's most popular white wines,
a rich and textured cuvée fermented spontaneously
in concrete eggs. He's planted a minute amount of
graciano as well.
In Fraser's view, Yangarra's vineyards represent a
microcosm of McLaren Vale: "a hodgepodge of Mediterranean grapes." He hopes the alternative varieties

will create a safety net for local growers, a sentiment
shared by others in McLaren Vale.
For Gill Gordon-Smith, these alternative varieties are
more than a safety net: The former Qantas flight attendant has built a second career working with heattolerant Italian varieties at Fall From Grace. On a
winter afternoon in her garage-turned-winery, Gordon-Smith siphons some montepulciano from a barrel labeled "Montey;" it's a light, fresh red. Her 2017
nero is equally low in alcohol, coming in around 12.5
percent abv. Other barrels are filled with carignan
and arneis, wines she makes for everyday drinking.
"I like 'village' wine," she says. "Wines that you
don't need an occasion for. It's dinner-let's smash a
bottle of this. I like really drinkable, smashable wines
with texture."
For now, her easiest sell might be nero d'Avola.
"Nero has allowed 'savory and textural' to be added
to the conversation; it's not just 'ripe fruit flavors,"'
Gordon-Smith says. "The consumers are loving this
variety as it has similarities to the shiraz they are used
to, but it can be made in a variety of styles and ripeness levels-everything from rosé to 14.5 percent
ripe-and-fruit-forward styles. For me, it gives me the
choice to pick early and make more elegant wines."
Familiarity, climate and creative risks all bode
well for the success of these relative newcomers to
McLaren Vale-especially nero, Gordon-Smith finds.
"People like what they can pronounce," she says,
but she also finds that wine buyers are willing to try
something new. "When people get used to things,"
she says, "it's like the new black." n

"Choosing varieties
is like betting on
horses: You can take
an educated guess
looking at track
records. If we keep
finding varieties that
work here-to put
in with shiraz and
grenache as a bit of
an arsenal-it will be
good for us."
-Gill GordonSmith, Fall From
Grace

Joch Bosworth, Battle of
Bosworth (left); Yangarra's
biodynamic vineyards

WINE & SPIRITS

FEBRUARY 2018

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