Recognition

Characterful and energetic, this is probably the most distinctive pinot that Brian Croser has drawn from his Foggy Hill Vineyard yet. The best clones in the best part of the site unite in a savoury style, filled with beetroot, Moroccan souk and bay leaf. Juicy strawberries and red cherries of a warm season offer flesh and body,

 » Read more about: Definitus Foggy Hill Vineyard Pinot Noir 2019 – 94 points Silver  »

15% of the fruit was placed at the bottom of the fermenting tubs, progressively crushed. Each block was pressed separately, and clonally, then settled and matured on full lees in one-third new barriques for 10 months. A darker note of berry here – blueberry and black cherry. It’s fully fragrant, with the stems adding their woody spice and seasoning.

 » Read more about: Foggy Hill Vineyard Pinot Noir 2019 – 96 points Gold “Top Rated”  »

Pinot Noir doesn’t need to taste like Burgundy to be good. This Tapanappa Definitus Pinot Noir 2018 is the example of this.

It’s a Pinot of rippling power. Of tannins and conviction. A Bordeaux drinkers Pinot Noir, if you’re still looking for a French connection, that arguably trades less in seduction and more in structure.

 » Read more about: 2018 Tapanappa Foggy Hill Vineyard DEFINITUS Pinot Noir  »

It’s a firm, fragrant, spice-riddled pinot noir with blueberry and macerated cherry notes shot through with aromatic herb notes. In fact it’s quite earthen, almost beetroot-like, with a sweetness to the finish in the context of its dry/earthen style. This is a pretty impressive wine it has to be said. Different in its Australian context.

 » Read more about: “A pretty impressive wine” – 2019 Foggy Hill Vineyard Pinot Noir  »

There are four hectares of pinot noir growing on the Foggy Hill vineyard; this is from a one-hectare strip. It’s planted at a density of 4444 vines/hectare, using clones 115 and 777, all planted on rootstock.

Firm, ripe and convincing. Cedarwood oak shows keenly but fruit-derived flavours are yet myriad. Dry tobacco, garden herbs,

 » Read more about: 2018 Foggy Hill Vineyard “DEFINITUS” Pinot Noir  »

Sour cherry and dark fruit profile, touch more of the savoury – almost hedgerow, stem like – than I necessarily recall. For that depth of aromatics, it carries a lightness to itself; silken in its flow across the palate and not sacrificing length nor depth of flavour. 

Tannin is exemplary: both fine and minerally.

 » Read more about: “A quiet achiever, needs time or cellaring” – 2019 Foggy Hill Vineyard Pinot Noir  »

Brian Croser’s Fleurieu Peninsula Pinot has evolved quite a bit over its existence, the style reaching for more delicacy every vintage. It doesn’t always get there, but the trade-off is a wine with no shortage of power. It’s easy to overlook the subtlety with this 2019 vintage release too. The nose has a distinct Pinosity complete with a little leaf litter and loads of almost glace red fruit.

 » Read more about: “Classy Wine” – 2019 Foggy Hill Vineyard Pinot Noir  »

For Foggy Hill the 2018 Definitus is quite open for business at a young age, no doubt thanks to the warm and dry vintage. Bright mid cherry in colour, there is a powerful core of dark and red cherry fruits with distinctly spicy, herbal and slightly meaty complexity, plus French oak also playing its part.

 » Read more about: 2018 Tapanappa Foggy Hill Vineyard DEFINITUS Pinot Noir  »

Brian Croser’s Fleurieu Peninsula Pinot has evolved quite a bit over its existence, the style reaching for more delicacy every vintage. It doesn’t always get there, but the trade-off is a wine with no shortage of power. It’s easy to overlook the subtlety with this 2019 vintage release too. The nose has a distinct Pinosity complete with a little leaf litter and loads of almost glace red fruit.

 » Read more about: 2019 Tapanappa Foggy Hill Vineyard Pinot Noir  »

It’s a firm, fragrant, spice-riddled pinot noir with blueberry and macerated cherry notes shot through with aromatic herb notes. In fact it’s quite earthen, almost beetroot-like, with a sweetness to the finish in the context of its dry/earthen style. This is a pretty impressive wine it has to be said. Different in its Australian context.

 » Read more about: A pretty impressive Pinot Noir – 2019 Foggy Hill Vineyard Pinot Noir  »

2017 gave Foggy Hill the growing season and vintage it craved for. In terms of varietal character, texture, structure, balance and length, the wine can’t be faulted. It is by some distance the best Foggy Hill Pinot Noir made to date. What will the ensuing vintages provide?
97 points

 » Read more about: The best Foggy Hill Pinot Noir made to date – 2017 Foggy Hill Vineyard “Definitus” Pinot Noir  »

Foggy Hill is located on the Fleurieu Peninsula, and is one of the coldest places on the Australian mainland. It creates a very unique style of Australian Pinot – particularly savoury, spicy and even meaty wines. The wines are also structural and have a pretty edge.

The 2018 shows its typical youthful flourish – floral,

 » Read more about: A complex and delicious Pinot Noir – 2018 Foggy Hill Vineyard Pinot Noir  »

The 2018 Foggy Hill Vineyard “Definitus” Pinot Noir is a blend of Clones 115 and 777 from a strip of vines over the site’s shallowest soils. Winemaking is similar to the rest of the vineyard’s production, and maturation takes place in 30% new French oak, with the balance of the wood being one and two years old.

 » Read more about: A more generous and complex Pinot Noir – 2018 Foggy Hill Vineyard “Definitus” Pinot Noir  »

More floral and ethereal in character than the sturdier 2018, the 2019 Pinot Noir Foggy Hill Vineyard delivers notes of fresh herbs, black tea, roses, cherries and cranberries. Medium-bodied and silky in texture, it also weighs in with 0.8% alcohol less than the previous vintage. While it’s less expansive and rich, it floats easier on the palate,

 » Read more about: An ethereal Pinot Noir with accents of floral and fresh spice – 2019 Foggy Hill Vineyard Pinot Noir  »

Medium to deep ruby colour with purple tints and a complex bouquet of smoky, vegetal, possibly whole-bunch fermented characters, some notes of char-grilled vegetables, all melded with raspberry-like fruit aromas. Hints of humus and Campari. The wine is intense and medium to full-bodied, well-structured and firm but not overly tannic for its fruit-weight. Succulent sweet-fruit centre.

 » Read more about: A delicious glass of Pinot – 2018 Foggy Hill Vineyard “Definitus” Pinot Noir  »

Bright and vibrant ruby colour from core to rim. Black cherry, iodine, smoke and vegetable broth aromatics. Intense from the palate entry, dark cherry fruit shows early then morphs into multiple savoury layers of smoke, meat and undergrowth. Quite mouth-filling, Acids and tannins show a guiding hand yet stay supple and in the background. Very long and has many years ahead of it
94 points

 » Read more about: Has many years ahead of it – 2019 Foggy Hill Vineyard Pinot Noir  »

It’s a firm, fragrant, spice-riddled pinot noir with blueberry and macerated cherry notes shot through with aromatic herb notes. In fact it’s quite earthen, almost beetroot-like, with a sweetness to the finish in the context of its dry/earthen style. This is a pretty impressive wine it has to be said. Different in its Australian context.

 » Read more about: A pretty impressive wine – 2019 Foggy Hill Vineyard Pinot Noir  »

I can’t help but think that warmer years are helping Foggy Hill. Not that the wines from cooler years are not delicious, but they are generally quite savoury and need some time to put flesh on their bones. But no such problem with this vintage, which is one of the best.

Bright mid cherry in colour,

 » Read more about: 2019 Tapanappa Foggy Hill Vineyard Pinot Noir  »

Cool site, warm year, as Brian Croser pitches it in the accompanying letter – detailed, and insightful as ever – with the sample.
An expressly aromatic take on Pinot Noir: Chinese five spice, sandalwood, something Plum like, a touch of Goji Berry even. Exquisite, haunting, certainly captivating. Supple, lithe – certainly initially so on entry –

 » Read more about: Exquisite, haunting, certainly captivating – 2018 Foggy Hill Vineyard Pinot Noir  »

An elite microcosm of the Foggy Hill site. The best strip, so to speak. I prefer this to the ’17. More integrated, compact, layered and detailed. The tension, curtailing the ripe and inherently sweet fruit. The oak, tannic extract and judicious whole bunch amalgamating as a finely tuned structural skein, corralling the billowing sweet berry fruit,

 » Read more about: 2018 Definitus Pinot Noir – 96 points, Gold  »

A broad patina of sous-bois, pickled cherry and fecund strawberry, aged judiciously in French oak (30%). Silky, with a gentle rasp of herb-inflected tannins and saline maritime acidity.

 » Read more about: 2017 Foggy Hill Vineyard Pinot Noir – 94 points, Silver  »

There are four hectares of pinot noir growing on the Foggy Hill vineyard; this is from a one-hectare strip. It’s planted at a density of 4444 vines/hectare, using clones 115 and 777, all planted on rootstock. It’s light, firm and immensely spicy. Roots, leaves, earth and wood combine with strawberry, red cherry, beet and violets.

 » Read more about: Impressive wine, inherently complex – 2017 Foggy Hill Vineyard “Definitus” Pinot Noir  »

Something akin to a block level wine off the Fleurieu’s Foggy Hill Vineyard. The Definitus strip being a sub-Ridge formed where ferruginuous sandstone comes close to the surface. The strip also marks a delineation between two rows of two Bernard Clones (115 and 117, planted in 2003).

Highly perfumed, violets, sour cherry, slight spirited/lifted note.

 » Read more about: Latterly it asserts itself, dark and pronounced – 2017 Foggy Hill Vineyard “Definitus” Pinot Noir  »

This is smoky and savoury, scented with dried herb and dried flowers like the regular Foggy Hill, but with a little more density, flesh and concentration. Very savoury and quite delicious, the finish long and harmonious.
94 points

 » Read more about: Very savoury and quite delicious – 2017 Foggy Hill Vineyard “Definitus” Pinot Noir  »