Here we have the pinnacle Chardonnay release from the first vineyard planted in the Piccadilly Valley since the 19th century. Restrained power is the term that comes to mind here. It’s tight and focussed, yielding enough aromatic presence to get …
Here we have the pinnacle Chardonnay release from the first vineyard planted in the Piccadilly Valley since the 19th century. Restrained power is the term that comes to mind here. It’s tight and focussed, yielding enough aromatic presence to get …
Named on account of the 1.5 metre spacing between vine rows. Fresh, tightly wound and elegant aromas of white peach and cedar kick things off, followed by green apple, Meyer lemon, peach blossom, nectarine pulp and cinnamon. There’s a taut …
High quality cedar oak sits confidently here, melding with fresh cut nectarine, quince, peach skin, kumquat and red apple with some savoury cashew cream beneath. There’s a lot of impact aromatically thanks to good concentration and balance. The palate is …
The original Tiers Vineyard Chardonnay planted in 1979 in the Piccadilly Valley was the first Adelaide Hills vineyard to unknown clones. 2024, though slightly warmer, was yet another cooler vintage in the run since 2020. Modest cropping of 4 tonnes …
2024, though slightly warmer continued a run of cool vintages. French oak barriques (1/3 new) for fermentation (2 months through Autumn). Barrel aged on full lees until October 2024, before racking off and then a November bottling.
Pale lemon colour …
The Piccadilly Valley is ‘entry’ level for this exquisite range of Chardonnay. 2024 another cool vintage like the 4 before it, but marginally warmer with a modest crop of 4 tonnes per hectare on the 30 year old vines.
Medium-light …
There are few more committed or driven people in the Australian wine industry than Brian Croser.
From the time he released the beautiful pristine rieslings under his Petaluma label back in the late seventies to his more recent focus on …
Quite a bold and brassy chardonnay defined with spicy, cedary oak over peach and nectarine, red apple, grapefruit and banana notes, with touches of toffee apple in there, too. The richness feels apt and balanced, though one could suggest that …
Fruit is picked from a close-planted block that was planted in ’03. This is wonderful chardonnay – all finesse, tension, filigreed minerality, light, savoury undertones and pristine, bright green pear, nectarine and pink grapefruit freshness. Touches of nougat, sea spray …
From the first Croser vineyard, planted ’79. A potent and rich chardonnay of distinguished power and presence. It’s set at a riper pace but feels supremely balanced and delivers emphatic notions of quality. Rich pear notes, dried and fresh, honeyed …
Pretty aromas of just-ripe white stone fruit, white flowers, grilled nuts, nougat, sweet spice, honey and green melon. The palate has lovely weight and texture, creamy, nutty and mouth-filling, with a core of nectarine, grapefruit and pithy, mineral acidty. Long, …
Bright and vibrant in the glass. The aromas are lifted and layered, cashew nut, white stone fruit, nougat, melon skin and white flowers. Powerful and mouth-filling in flavour, but with fabulous balance and purity. There’s a seamlessness to the palate, …
Complex and layered aromas of cashew nut, just-ripe white stone fruit, wheat puff, white flowers and grapefruit pith. Fine, focused and layered in flavour. There’s a drive of stone fruit, melon and a nutty creaminess. Pithy, crunchy acidity then kicks …
2022 Tapanappa B&V Syrah has a medium density, very vibrant purple-crimson colour, the colour of a fresh young wine.
The aroma is very intense with ripe mulberry, blackberry and cassis and the slightly tarry, anise of Syrah grown in a …
The 2024 Chardonnay leads with pineapple husk and green bananas, nectarine, crushed cashews and a puff of custard powder. In the mouth, the wine is creamy and fruit sweet, with taut acidity that vibrates throughout. I think this wine will …
The 2024 Chardonnay Tiers Vineyard 1.5m is floral and fine, creamy and detailed. The wine shows pressed white flowers, jasmine tea, something creamy like crushed hazelnuts and white chocolate, Golden Delicious apples and saffron. The Bernard clones 76 and 95 …
The 2024 Tiers Vineyard Chardonnay always ratchets up the fruit power and intensity from all other Chardonnays, both at Tapanappa and in the Adelaide Hills region at large. This usually gives us a thundering display of concentration and phenolic drive, …
2018 was the second warmest vintage on record after 2016. Despite being warm at 1799C days versus the average of 1464C days there were no heat waves and fewer than normal days above 35C. The rainfall post veraison …
2018 was the second warmest vintage on record after 2016. Despite being warm at 1799C days versus the average of 1464C days there were no heat waves and fewer than normal days above 35C. The rainfall post veraison …
The Tiers Vineyard was planted in 1979, the first vineyard in the Piccadilly Valley since the 19th century. The vineyard is close spaced and vertical canopy, the first of this quality focussed design in Australia. The clone …
In 2003 the Croser family removed 1.3 hectares of the original Tiers Vineyard Chardonnay, that was planted in 1979 in the Piccadilly Valley as the first Adelaide Hills vineyard. The area was replanted with the French Bernard clones …
The 2023 vintage in the Piccadilly Valley was very cool and very late. The growing season only accumulated 1093oC-days versus the average of 1135oC days. 2023 was the coolest of the four successive cooler …
Another superb Tiers Chardonnay highlighting the beauty achieved with the grape in the Adelaide Hills. Adjectives get a real work out with this wine. Ripe fruit is noted and while the alcohol suggests it might be bigger – 14.1% abv …
The use of 1.5m informs the drinker that a part of the vineyard has been close-planted – a 1.5 metre spacing between rows of vines – a fact that can excite some because of the suggestion of higher quality, amongst …
A refined, concentrated Chardonnay from another cool year in the Adelaide Hills, one of five consecutive cool vintages in a row. A cool site in a cool year brings its own form of elegance, one that is both harmonious and …
Concentrated aromatic with white florals and citrus blossom, mangosteen, splice, fresh fig, pear, yellow and white peaches, sugar melon, banana ester, sweet pickled ginger, almonds, cashews, creme brûlée. Generous and open!
In the mouth it’s immediately delicious, generous and welcoming …
Tapanappa = great wine and from the fifth successive cool vintage, this Piccadilly Valley Chardonnay doesn’t disappoint.Fermented in French oak (33% new) and on full lees prior to bottling, the interest factor is plentiful.
It opens with custard powder, …
Wow! This is something. I know many prefer the Tiers Chardonnay, but for the last two years I have leaned towards this 1.5m and I don’t apologise for it. Elegance and purity seep through this wine’s veins and I …
Concentrated and focused, let this Tapanappa Tiers Chardonnay breathe for now or give it some bottle age and it will pay you back in spades. A few days of tasting proved that. An excellent wine as ever, but it’s tightly …
Brian Croser of Tapanappa in the Piccadilly Hills reports on an extraordinarily early – yet promising – harvest. Above, bins of plump, just-picked Pinot Noir.
The word exceptionalism was invented to describe the USA as an economic entity, or at least to …
Focused, powerful and lifted aromas of citrus blossoms, jasmine tea, pome fruits, lime, grapefruit, nectarine, cashew, hazelnut, toasted oats, nougat, white pepper, ginger, sweet dusty spices and a touch of brine.
In the mouth it’s powerful, intense and has an …
A pretty, perfumed and finely detailed nose of sweet citrus and apple blossoms, apple gums, donut peach, honeydew, honeyed cashew, white pepper, dried galangal and gently woven spice.
In the mouth it’s tightly coiled, tense and shaped like a Barracuda; …
From a close planted block established in 2003. Bernard clones 76 and 95. It’s distinctly different to the Tiers old vine Chardonnay as a result, and I tend to think it’s the clonal selection that’s the biggest point of difference. …
The vines used for Tiers were planted in 1981, which is pioneering territory for Adelaide Hills. The clone is unknown, though they think it’s related to the cuttings brought in by James Busby in 1832.
There’s a bit of ooomph …
This has to rank up there with the best of the Tiers Vineyard chardies yet released. It was an ever so slightly warmer vintage than the previous and this is reflected in the depth and fruit concentration expressed with relative …
The close spaces planting of this part of the Tiers vineyard imparts a slightly different flavour and textural feel to the chardonnays from the old Tiers plantings. Intense aromas of tropical fruits, brioche and spices. The palate is ripe and …
…From a cool vintage, although not as cool as the ’23. This is a delightful chardonnay from the Piccadilly Valley with a vibrant freshness and energy which is complemented by the subtle stone fruit characters. Fine savoury notes with lemony
A lovely cool year with destemmed berries. Matured in one third new barriques for eight months. Satsuma plum, wild raspberries and Alpine strawberries. A cherry blossom prettiness and pulled paperbark earthiness. Dry powdery tannins surge forward providing a veil across …
The second release of the Definitus, sourced from a specific block within the Foggy Hill Northwestern slope. Here in the warmer vintage we see the aging potential of this unique bottling. Boysenberries, ironstone, cured meats and five spice. A potent …
The march towards ever more delicate versions of the Tapanappa Foggy Hill Pinot Noir continues. Each vintage, this Fleurieu Peninsula wine gets a little more contained, with a bit more Pinosity. That’s not saying the previous vintages of Brian Croser’s …
The full ripening of a small crop in perfect cool, dry and sunny conditions, has again defined a very special Chardonnay, predominately from Pat and Ted’s Vineyard on Mount Bonython and two other vineyards in the distinguished Piccadilly Valley terroir. …
2024 Tiers 1.5M Vineyard Chardonnay stands alongside its older sibling, the 2023 Tiers Old Block, as an equal but with the subtle differences induced by its close-spaced, French clone, earlier ripening habit. Both wines are truly outstanding vintage examples of …
Of the past five wonderful vintages in Tiers Vineyard, 2024 was not the coolest but fulfilled that old aphorism, “In a cool vineyard site, the best wines are produced in slightly warmer vintages.”
The colour of 2024 Tiers is pale …
A warm and dry vintage for the region in 2019, which helped ensure that the Whalebone Vineyard, planted 45 years ago, had a very small yield. The wine is a blend of 85% Cabernet and 15% Shiraz. The Shiraz comes …
Confusingly, this new, limited-edition model from the Croser stable is from Mount Barker SA, not the more common Mt Barker WA. Regardless it’s amazingly fragrant and exceptionally easy to drink despite its nearly 15 per cent. 9.5/10.…
This is about as fashionable as merlot gets, however, just because you have money, doesn’t mean you have taste, in which case buy this to cover it up. Scrumptious red wine for the rich and fashionable. 9.5/10.…
There are very few Australian Pinot releases where you crack a bottle open and think, ‘This needs six years’. It just doesn’t happen. Bindi, maybe, some of the structured Yarra Pinot releases (Mount Mary sometimes), Bannockburn, By Farr, Domaine A. …
The red berry scent is complemented by hints of star anise, mint and high quality oak. Lingering varietal flavour carries the tannin firmness well. Needs 3-5 years.
…
Grapes rotting on vines; billions of bottles’ worth of wine sitting in tank farms, wanted by no one. Australia’s inland bulk wine producers are in crisis, causing an image problem for the wider industry.
BRIAN CROSER claps a heavy hand …
Tapanappa Piccadilly Valley Tiers Vineyard (Alt. 450m) Chardonnay 2023, $110. About as much going on as a chardonnay can provide and all of it good. Somewhat lighter than exxy chardonnays are renowned, and better for it. Alas, few will discover …
The 2022 Chardonnay is all class. It unleashes a mouthwatering torrent of stone fruit flavor on the palate, filling it with a rising tide of chalky phenolics, piercing fruit flavor, intense acidity, crushed nuts and brine. Awesome. At under $50 …
The 2022 Chardonnay Tiers Vineyard 1.5m is exactly what I expected it to be: excellent. A piercing intensity of flavor is matched by the piercing (and juicy) acidity. It fills the mouth side to side with sapid, staining fruit and …
The Tapanappa 2022 Chardonnay Tiers Vineyard is one of Australia’s great Chardonnays, and that has never been more apparent than in this 2022 vintage. A superstar wine of grand proportions, the fruit has startling intensity in the mouth. The juicy …
What a super wine this is. As we all know, good Chardonnay often comes at a price, given the necessary inputs required to come together. From quality oak, lower-yielding vines and often time spent maturing prior to release, it’s easy …
The 2023 Tiers Vineyard Chardonnay has elderflower and white peach, pressed flowers and kiwi fruit, custard apples and scraped vanilla pod. The wine is delicate but also powerful and finishes in a spooling flourish of flavor and salty acidity. A …
The 2021 B & V Syrah leads with fenugreek and arnica, cassis, blackcurrant and raspberry seed. Once the wine is moving in the glass, it really opens up beautifully. On the palate, the wine is succulent and polished, with plenty …
The 2018 Definitus Pinot Noir Foggy Hill is darker in the glass than the Foggy Hill Pinot tasted beside it, and this wine enters with a rich cascade of cherry and woodsy spice, forest underbrush/sous bois, aged leather and old …
Hay colour. Light ginger biscuit feels amid crunchy early season white nectarine, spilling into a fresh palate, lime-like citrus juices, with a tangy edge to season the ripe fruit flavours and delicate savoury finishing notes. Neatly crafted styling.
12.5% alc …
From the Hills pioneer Chardonnay vineyard in the Piccadilly Valley, immediately a class above, lovely ripe white stone fruit aromas, subtle creaminess and flaked white nuts, everything deliciously balanced and edged with underlying citrussy acidity, chardonnay fruit magic vital to …
The colour of the 2024 Tapanappa Eden Valley Riesling is very pale green-yellow.
The aroma is delicate but intense with the kiwi fruit and lime of a cool vintage Riesling and Eden Valley Riesling characters of floral aromas include tea …
A flashy and deeply brooding chardonnay with aromas of nectarines, peaches, Meyer lemons and gun smoke. The palate is medium-bodied with vivid acidity and a generous mouthfeel, giving notes of grapefruit pith, orange blossoms and chalk. Very complex with underlying …
Fresh aromas of minerals, lemon peel, gun smoke and grapefruit. The palate is medium-bodied with focused acidity and a textural mouthfeel, giving notes of lime curd, orange blossoms, shortbread, flint and baking spices. Wonderfully balanced, with both power and vivid …
Same winemaking as the Merlot blend, but this wine soaks up the oak perfectly. It’s dark and oak framed, but the core of dark berry minty impact is bold enough to take out. It’s brooding, chocolatey, tannic, and somehow more …
A blend of 55% Merlot and 45% Cabernet Franc, which is standard fare for Bordeaux but an outlier blend in South Australia. 470 dozen produced. Spends 18 months in 50% new and 50% single-use oak, which has a lot of …
Tapanappa 2012 Cabernet Shiraz is a big ripe wine reflecting the small crop, warm and early 2012 vintage.
The colour is deep and purple edged, the aroma is an amalgam of black currant Cabernet, spicy anise Shiraz and the earthy, …
Appealing and complex nose of lemon, honey, melon and a touch of spiced peach with some hints of gunflint and oak spice. On the palate it has a lovely balance of freshness and focused fruit, with a refined and quite …
Hailing from Adelaide Hills’ oldest block of Chardonnay – which was planted in 1979 – is this outstanding white from the brilliant winemaker that is Brian Croser. Although rich in flavours, it’s light in texture, with a clean, citrusy sensation, …
‘A lot of pain’: The hangover looming from Australia’s budget-wine boom
Grapes rotting on vines; billions of bottles’ worth of wine sitting in tank farms:
many inland wine producers are facing an unpalatable truth.
By Luke Slattery • November 09, …
Medium-full red/brick-red colour; the bouquet is mellow, complex and loaded with charred roast-meat, dried mushroom and sousbois characters, earthy/dried-herb and leather nuances, traces of tobacco as well. The structure is firm and the tannins provide backbone and extend the length …
This is a site not owned by Tapanappa but kindred to the motif of high quality vineyards within Tapanappa’s stable. This is beautiful and distinctly ‘syrah’ in its medium weight, silky tannins, huge perfume and gentle, savoury elements. It smells …
Tapanappa Foggy Hill Vineyard Fleurieu Peninsula Pinot Noir 2023 scores 95 points from Mike Bennie. “A fine-boned, texturally-structured and firm Pinot
Noir of dark cherry, raspberry and earthy undertones dashed with saltbush and spice. The grippy, minerally texture and fine …
Brian Croser: Australia went through a huge expansion through the 1990s to 2005. A lot of that expansion occurred in the inland, highly irrigated areas, with fruit that was destined for the grocery
stores as branded commodity wine—your Jacob’s Creek …
It feels Grinchish, but I’d rather drink the 1.5m Chardonnay now. That’s because, as this vertical showed, Tiers needs a good five years to show its best, not one. Especially from a vintage that was cool (1093C vs the …
The close-planted 1.5m block on the Tiers vineyard is now twenty years old and is clearly hitting its straps. In the early days, an element was missing in the spotty-labelled 1.5m Chardonnay wines that reminds us what vine age does …
There is a big jump in RRP for this entree to the Tapanappa Chardonnay range, but when crops are low and demand is high, it makes a lot of sense. This Piccadilly Chardonnay comes from ‘Pat and Ted’s Vineyard on …
Pale crimson in the glass, the swill itself deft, dignified. This poise, together with tight bright fruit, leads the trajectory for this remarkable wine from the cool and late ripening ’23 vintage. The wine is well-lit and the bouquet carries …
At the highest point of the Fleurieu Peninsula, half-way between Victor Harbour and Cape Jervis, lies the Foggy Hill Vineyard. Its Pinot Noir is quite exceptional from year to year. Even in very cool years like 2023, the vineyard produces …
2023 was a cooler vintage than some on the Fleurieu Peninsula, indeed the coolest of four such years for the Foggy Hill vineyard. The cooler year led the team to forego any whole bunches in the ferment. The wine spent …
This was an exceptionally cool vintage. Despite that, the colour is light but with a glowing intensity and vibrancy. The nose reveals that distinctive spicy character with savoury and slightly limestone-like characters. The palate is still tightly coiled with fine …
Sometimes, the early sell out of a wine is actually good news for drinkers. Take the Definitis ’21 Pinot Noir which quickly sold out leaving the door open for Tapanappa owner/ winemaker, Brian Croser, to dig deep into the cellar …