Current release. Open, vegy nose. Big and bold and an attempt at a Burgundy grand cru rather than even a premier cru wine! Very toothsome indeed. Well done! Long. Some honey …
The following article by Huon Hooke appeared in The Sydney Morning Herald, October 11th 2011
A super-wet season has prompted a perfectionist to sell off his pinot for a few dollars.
Brian Croser draws three samples of 2011 pinot noir …
Whopping price on this first-release merlot-cabernet franc blend from Tapanappa’s Whalebone Vineyard. But the wine quality is excellent.
Elegant, finely structured, ripe but not sweet. It walks the talk of modern Australian red wine. It tastes of pencil and fresh …
I was busy tasting some Pinot Noir the other night, and I have to admit, I quite enjoyed it. This sits under the other Pinot Noir from Tapanappa – Foggy Hill.
Mint, squishy red fruits, nice oak – contributes a …
BRIAN Croser believes he’s discovered Australia’s true home for growing cabernet franc.
Holding court at Sydney’s Quarter Twenty One, Croser proudly presented his latest super-premium Tapanappa red – 2007 Whalebone Vineyard Merlot Cabernet Franc ($85) – and he used the …
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What I needed for my £20 was a wine with lowish tannins, a nice bit of acidity and intriguing flavours that come and go in the glass.
…
And third, to the cool Fleurieu Peninsula in South Australia, where …
Sourced from one of the hottest vintages ever for the Tapanappa Wrattonbully vintage and it shows here – not even the high quality oak and astute winemaking can hide it.
Dusty, stewed blackberry, cedar and slightly caramelised red fruit nose. …
Brian Croser, one of Australia’s most respected winemakers, has been on a mission to find the perfect spot to grow pinot noir in Australia. He settled on the Fleurieu Peninsula on the tip of Sotuh Australia, and the result, while …
Sourced off younger, close spaced vines in the Tiers vineyard, this is effectively the second wine to the ‘Tiers’ Chardonnay and carries more than a little of that worthy DNA. Think hand picking, alcohol and malolactic ferment in barrel (50% …
John Gladstones has constructed his wonderful new book, Wine Terroir and Climate Change to examine the effect of each element of terroir (the environment) on the stages of growth and fruit ripening of the grape vine. He has proposed …
Brian Croser raised a few eyebrows with his inaugural 2007 Foggy Hill, sourced from a region barely associated with top shelf Australian wine, let alone pinot noir. Then, with his follow up from 2008, Croser showed the capabilities of his …
Good medium-depth colour; a very savoury briary style, with texture and structure its strengths; needs time to show whether there is enough pinosity (a Croser word) at its heart.
91 points / 4.5 glasses
Drink by 2015…
This wonderful book is a book in two parts. I deal here with the Wine and Terroir part of the book, which is contained in the first 11 chapters and then again in chapter 14, 21st century viticulture and its …
In the 42 years of my involvement in the Australian wine industry the bad wet vintages prior to 2011 have been, 1969, 1974, 1983 and 1989.
Including 2011 that’s one every 8 years or so.
It’s been 22 years since …
Not surprisingly, Kiwi’s aren’t the only ones producing silky smooth wines Down Under. For an absolute corker, try Tapanappa, Foggy Hill Pinot Noir 2009, Adelaide Hills [Ed: Fleurieu Peninsula], South Australia. The colour of morello cherries, it’s produced by one …
Fragrant red fruits, sage and cedary oak combine on the bouquet; the palate is medium-bodied, with ample polished and rounded tannins, providing texture to the gentle fruit and spice on offer.
91 points / 4½ goblets – Drink by: 2016…
Deep crimson; the bouquet offers black plum, licorice and cinnamon; the palate is compact and firm, slowly revealing the sweet dark fruits that lie therein; mineral driven and savoury to conclude; a marked difference in style from the Foggy Hill …
Bright mid-gold; a restrained and elegant bouquet of white peach, grapefruit, cashew and well handled toasty oak; the palate is fresh on entry and deeply textured with a generous core of sweet fruit; laser like acidity draws out the finish …
The most important reviews are those made over the table at home or out to dinner by the everyday drinker and wine lover. Having said that media reviews are certainly a nice pat on the back and do provide some …
The following article orinignal formed a response to the Winemakers’ Federations of Australia’s submission to the GWRDC 5 Year Planning process.
Even if the WFA’s new research model is adopted by the GWRDC and is supported by the Australian wine …
In the latest issue of Australian House and Garden Toni Paterson suggest a great pairing for our 2010 Fleurieu Peninsula Pinot Noir – Grandvewe Fleur – a Manchego-style sheeps’ cheese lightly coated with Tasmanian lavender.
We’d love to hear any …
Once again we see Brian Croser’s belief in the site paying off as these relatively young vines are really starting to pay dividends.
A lovely nose of plum and cherry some charry oak and eucalypt but fundamentally it’s earthy and …
Tapanappa Pinot Noir 2010
This comes from the cool Fleurieu Peninsula in South Australia and yet this was one of the warmest years. The result is a wine with deliciously appealing flesh and, at the same time, a firm tight …
Here’s the new range from Brian Croser’s ‘Wines of Terroir’ series, showing how Cabernet and Shiraz from Wrattonbully are a force to be reckoned with. This is a sibling to the Whalebone, from the Joanna vineyard where grapes grow on …
This post was originally in response to a question raised by a magazine editor on what is natural wine, and does this description have any real meaning.
This is a subject on which everyone is correct.
It is only relevant …
Tapanappa is pleased to announce the appointment of Terroir Selections as its Australian distributor commencing July 1st, 2011.
A jointly issued media release announcing this new partnership can be found in our Resources via the menu above or via this …
The Australian wine community is allowing itself to be tarred by the brush of climate politics.
Sometimes called the “canaries of climate”, wine regions have emerged and disappeared with the swings of climate over the more than 10 centuries of …
The following post was originally in correspondance with a UK wine writer.
I am convinced cork has a future as long as its considerable past as a wine closure. That’s not from a “green” perspective but as a closure which …
Brian Croser led Australia’s chardonnay romance by planting the Tiers vineyard at Piccadilly in 1978, though his significant reassessment on how to best treat this grape variety is indicative of Australia’s renewed success with chardonnay. For his family’s Tapanappa label, …
Tapanappa 2010 Piccadilly Valley Chardonnay
Lovely signature of peaches and cream like a subtle Peach Melba desert, a touch of vanilla and caramel. Gorgeous oak accent and some citrus and nectarine all vieing for attention. The palate shows, citrus, burnt …
After Lion-Nathan’s acquisition of Brian Croser’s much-loved Petaluma Wine, Croser established Tapanappa with Jean-Michel Cazes of Chateau Lynch-Bages, Bordeaux, and Societe Jacques Bollinger, the parent company of Champagne Bollinger. In 2003 Tapanappa acquired Koppamurra Vineyard (established in 1974 by John …
This will be a long and technical Blog. Even if no-one else reads it, the very writing of it will ease my mind.
The story begins with the rebirth of the ANU University House wine Symposia. The 7th was held …
This new wine is a little brother to Tapanappa’s Tiers Chardonnay. It has a rich, full-blown stonefruit and nutty bouquet showing lees and barrel-ageing characters. High acidity …
The following profile is taken from The Age Epicure lift out, May 17th.
Xavier BizotFrom: Champagne
Arrived: 2005
Role: General Manager
Where: Tapanappa, Adelaide Hills
Signature wine: Coonawarra cabernet sauvignon (Ed: Wrattonbully)
Although Xavier was born into wine (his …
2007 Wrattonbully Cabernet Shiraz
Here’s a red with pedigree; a nephew of one of Australia’s all-time great reds, the famous 79 Petaluma Coonawarra. This one from nearby Wrattonbully is not a blockbuster but a wine of complete but not excessive …
BRIAN Croser has a history of surrounding himself with some of the most distinguished and influential names in the wine world.
When the Petaluma founder secured a partner for his Croser sparkling wine project in the mid 1980s, it was …
The smoke or should I say the cloud of fungal spores is dissipating after the 2011 harvest and we now have a clearer view of quality and quantity.
This is a really difficult situation to manage.
The quantity of quality …
The rain is predicted to arrive tomorrow so the last sparkling autumn day is with us after nearly two weeks of glorious weather. If only this weather had prevailed in the last weeks of March and the first weeks of …
What a tempting wine this is. OK, it’s very youthful – and comes from young vines, too – planted by veteran winemaker Brian Croser at Parawa; a cool, foggy site on the Fleurieu Peninsula, in 2006. The proof is in …
Almost the latest Easter possible and in only a handful of vintages over the past 33 at Piccadilly would we still have fruit to harvest and fermentations in exponential phase on April the 23rd. Despite the very late harvest, Easter …
Cool climate sceptics take note.
There are those in higher latitude viticultural climes who claim ownership of “real cool climate”.
I think this is mostly meant to imply the Australian main land and California at least are incapable of producing …
This is a year to have small low close spaced Cabernet Sauvignon vines. We left at 5am on Monday still mildly affected by receding wedding hangover and arrived at a drizzly Whalebone Vineyard at 8.30 after the obligatory “steak, onion …
Well it happened. The pickers chose. The most diverse group of new Australian arrivals including some very tall people from the north of Africa arrived to harvest our diminutive vines. Foggy Hill was harvested on Tuesday and Wednesday in the …
April 5th and we have harvested the older block of 114, 115 and 777 Pinot Noir clones from Foggy Hill at 5 tonnes/hectare as expected but exactly one month later than last year. Foggy Hill has had more than 200mm’s …
As I have pointed out before, at the end of February, counter-intuitively, all of Tapanappa’s terroirs had accumulated marginally more heat than average for the October to February growing season so far. Days have been cooler than average but nights …
I am sitting in Auckland, waiting to go through to Adelaide at 3am Adelaide time, having started from Chile 18hours ago after a twelve hour-day in the vineyards of Alto Jahuel and Leyda. It will be raining on my Pinot …
All stable in Chile at least. The Chileans understand the risks of living in a shaky land and empathise with the New Zealanders and especially with the Japanese and the shattering dimension of their land’s torsion and the consequences.
It …
Young vine Pinot rarely flatters, but these six-year-old vines are finding their place. The cooler 2009 season provided tart acidity which underlines lifted rose petal perfume and precise red cherry palate.
It’s honed, fresh and expressive.
93 Points…
Off to Chile at 6am tomorrow morning. Every thing in the Tapanappa vineyards is now about watching the “pot boil” and trying not to take too much notice of the weather predictions. Nothing can be done now but wait for …
Walked Tiers and Foggy Hill after the drizzle cleared this afternoon and the sun shuttered through north-bound clouds. No fruit split and the ground has soaked up the moisture and drained it away. Thank goodness for our slopes and friable …
The dilemma that has kept me awake overnight is to not put nets on Tiers and whether to take the nets off Foggy Hill.
Without nets we can spray with sulphur dioxide to control the inevitable Botrytis following berry split …
We are sampling today in all sites. The rain comes this evening and for the next 2 to 3 days so we need to know where we are with sample composition before the expected 30 to 60 mm’s of rain.…
The Piccadilly Valley weather station in the Tiers Vineyard is broken. We are flying weather blind although using the data from Mount Lofty (700metres ASL) the temperature summation from October to the end of February is 804.1°C days versus the …
I have a small number of Tapanappa wines in my cellar, but never tasted the full range until last night. I cannot think of another small Australian winery which produces four different wines at such an outstanding level. I much …
It’s a very busy time of year. The usual “clear the cellar” panic to make way for the new vintage is less frenetic in 2011 as ripening processes in the vineyards are on more normal time-lines and proceeding …
2008 Tapanappa Tiers Chardonnay
Brian Croser lives alongside the superb Tiers vineyard in the Adelaide Hills and coaxes one of the country’s finest chardonnays from its 30-year-old vines. This has restraint and fruit purity, wonderful texture and bright, refreshing acidity.…
Tapanappa is very proud to announce the appointment of its new Digital Presence Manager – Sam Barlow.
Sam is well known to the team at Tapanappa, being the man behind the recent and very successful redevelopment of our website. …
Most drinkers regard merlot as a simple, light quafer with hints of plum and raspberry but the best merlots offer intensity, depth of flavour, firm tannin structure and serious length. Merlot works best blended with cabernet and other Bordeaux varieties, …
From Huon Hooke’s article on the recent Mornington Peninsula Pinot Noir Celebration.
…Some of my personal favourites at the pinot celebration: Tapanappa Foggy hill 2008; Dexter 2008; Paringa Estate Single Vineyard 2008; Moorooduce Estate The Moorooduc 2009 and 2008; Ten
Australia is apprehensively waking up to the news from north Queensland where Yasi has stalked onto the tropical land.
Here in the Piccadilly Valley we feel a world away from the violence and destruction but as Australians empathise strongly with …
Those not affected can only ever partially comprehend the misery inflicted by flooding. We observe the loss of irreplaceable personal effects, house, livelihood, the devastation of crops and productive land and we try to comprehend the mental and physical effort …
2009 is young for a flash pinot but what’s a man to do? We’re not camels. Young but you can see the makings … if only we had another bottle. 8.9/10…
Made by the Australian-French Tapanappa partnership, this wine from South Australia’s Fleurieu Peninsula sums up pinot noir’s sappy mystery well. Aromas of flowers, dark-cherry jam, forest earth and seamlessly integrated spicy oak lead through a satiny, medium-bodied mouthful with a …
Weather and climate are separate if related concepts that are innocently confused by our own memories of recent weather events and deliberately confused by many involved in the politicised arguments about climate change. Weather describes the atmospheric conditions today and …
A massive step up from the debut 2007 Foggy, so much so that it looks rather good value considering what you get in Burgundy (pinot’s home) for £20. To lay your hands on any of the other superb Tapanappa wines, …
I’ve had this open for a day and a half now and only now is it looking at it’s best. In fact, yesterday afternoon when I first opened the bottle I was left thinking ‘what did I see in this …
The establishment of Tapanappa could be the most exciting thing to ever happen to South Australian pinot noir. After following up his first vintage (2007) with a much improved wine from 2008 (94pts), Brian Croser has set the bar even …
2009 Tapanappa Foggy Hill Vineyard Pinot Noir
Serious and sensual with the poise of a cool maritime climate where the fog rolls in off the Great Southern Ocean.
Aromatics of fresh …
Work of art from Brian Croser, the Australian wine master. But still young, so pour into a jug for an hour to develop its flavours – stone, nuts, citrus honey – and don’t serve it too cold. About 12C ought …
It takes just over 24 hours to return from the Eola Hills in Oregon to the Piccadilly Valley in the Adelaide Hills. That’s if you don’t count the day lost as you pass over that invisible line in the Pacific …
A small section of the Petaluma’s Piccadilly Valley vineyard goes to Brian Croser’s own gem, here with excitingly bright fruit, ginger and pineapple skin zing, citrussy acidity and five-star character.
97 points.…
As polished and swish as you’d expect from the experienced Croser-Cazes team leading this project. Plenty of toasty oak, and deeply ripe, juicy plum/berry fruit presence – a convincing wine. The palate is swathed in supple, even tannin and finishes …
Good Wine Guide 2011 Merlot of the Year
Another merlot that speaks first of its oak – quite cedary and gently smoky – then mulberry, dried plums and spice. The palate’s laid out on sweetly ripe tannins, delivering plum flavour …
A step up on the 2008 edition, this has a veneer of creamy, spicy oak sitting across nicely ripened dark-cherry fruits and meaty complexity. The palate’s open and supple, with easily legible tannin detail: dark-cherry and blueberry flavours, bright acid …
All the reviews from the just released Age / Sydney Morning Herald Good Wine Guide 2011, authored by Nick Stock, have now been added to the reviews section.
Tapanappa performed very well receiving 94 points and two glasses for both …
At its official launch last night at the National Wine Centre in Adelaide, Tapanappa was presented with the award for best merlot in Australia for our 2006 Whalebone Vineyard Merlot, in the Nick Stock’s 2011 Good Wine Guide.
A great …
Great Neighbours.
Neighbours come with mixed reviews. We have always been very lucky, in the few instances in our lives where we have had to live cheek by jowl in university accommodation or suburban streets our neighbours have become life …
In its 7th edition, the respected UK publication Wine Behind the Label moved to an online format. The latest release also named Tapanappa winemaker Brian Croser as star winemaker for the southern hemisphere.
The results were:
It’s in the tank!
We picked Tunkalilla Vineyard Riesling on Saturday morning with the wind rising and the gloom enclosing from the Pacific Ocean over the hill.
5 tonnes of tart and floral Riesling grapes were under cover in our …
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PICCADILLY SA 5151
PHONE (08)7324 5301
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