Friday, August 18th- Barossa & Eden Valley

We started the morning with a winery tour at Rusden Wines and Troll Creek. Christian Canute makes the wine for his own label, Rusden, and for his cousin’s label Troll Creek. We then drove up into the Barossa Ranges to the Canute’s farm house. We were treated to a breakfast of egg-in-the-hole, Christian’s homemade bacon, baked beans, bloody marys and wine, of course. We tasted through the new releases of the Rusden and Troll Creek wines, including…
2005 Rusden Christian Chenin Blanc
2004 Rusden Driftsand GSM
2004 Rusden Ripper Creek Cabernet/Shiraz
2004 Rusden Chookshed Zinfndel
2004 Rusden Boundaries Cabernet
2004 Rusden Black Guts Shiraz
2004 Rusden Christine’s Vineyard Grenache

2004 Toll Creek Shiraz
2004 Troll Creek Cabernet


We continue over the Barossa Ranges into Eden Valley to visit Domenic Torzi and his multiple projects, including Torzi-Matthews, Old Plains, Longhop and Veronique. Dominic is an Australian of Italian decent that is very passionate about food and wine. He bakes some of the best olive oil in the country (Una) and bakes equally superb bread.
Tasted were…

2004 Torzi-Matthews Frost Dodger Shiraz (Eden Vlley)
2004 Old Plains Power of One Shiraz (Adelaide Plains)
2004 Longhop Old Vine Reserve Shiraz (Adelaide Plains)
2004 Longhop Old Vine Grenache (Adelaide Plains)
2004 Longhop Boomerang Shiraz (Adelaide Plains)
2004 Veronique Shiraz Barossa


Down the road to Hutton Vale we go for lunch. Hutton Vale is owned by the Angas family who are direct decendents of George Fife Angas who used to own the South Australia Company. Once one of the wealthiest families in the world in the 1800’s, their property holdings totaled 14,000,000 acres in what is now the state of South Australia. Hutton Vale is also a commercial sheep farm and we were lucky enough to be able to watch sheep sheering. We ate lunch at their 1840’s farm house, a highlight of the trip.
Tasted were…

2005 Hutton Vale Riesling
2002 Hutton Vale Grenache Mataro
2001 Hutton Vale Shiraz

On to The Willows Vineyard for a tasting with Peter Scholz. 100% estate grown wines from the 100 acre vineyard in Light Pass.

Riesling, Semillon, Cabernet, Shiraz, G7 Grenache, Bonesetter Shiraz and The Doctor Sparkling Shiraz.

We then drive down the street to meet Rob Gibson at Gibson Wines/BarossaVale. Rob had a full spread of wines to show us, including blending components from barrel. These were some of my favorite wines of the trip.
Tasted were…

2004 Gibson Reserve Merlot
2004 Gibson BarossaVale Wilfreda Blend
2004 Gibson BarossaVale Shiraz
2004 Australian Old Vine Collection Mclaren Vale Grenache
2004 Australian Old Vine Collection Barossa Shiraz
Barrel Samples…
2005 Grenache Blender for Gibson BarossaVale Wilfreda Blend
2005 Mourvedre Blender for Gibson BarossaVale Wilfreda Blend
2005 Shiraz Blender for Gibson BarossaVale Wilfreda Blend
2005 Shiraz Blender for Gibson BarossaVale Shiraz
2005 Shiraz Blender for Australian Old Vine Collection Shiraz
2005 Grenache Blender for Australian Old Vine Collection Grenache
2005 Shiraz Blender for Eden Valley Old Vines
2005 Bordeaux Blend

Into the belly of the beast we go for dinner with Greenock Creek Vineyard & Cellars at the home of Michael and Anabelle Waugh. We tasted through all of the new releases and several older wines. Excellent heavy hors devours were pass all night long while we tried to finish all of the wines that the Waugh’s had opened for us (three bottles of each wine listed below)- we were unsuccessful.
Drank were…

2005 Greenock Greek Cornerstone Grenache
2004 Greenock Creek Cabernet
2004 Greenock Greek Alice’s Shiraz
2004 Greenock Greek Apricot Block Shiraz
2004 Greenock Greek Seven Acres Shiraz
2004 Greenock Greek Creek Block Shiraz
2001 Greenock Greek Roenfeldt Road Shiraz
2001 Greenock Greek Roenfeldt Road Cabernet

1996 Greenock Creek Seven Acres Shiraz
1997 Greenock Creek Creek Block Shiraz
2000 Greenock Creek Alice’s Shiraz (inaugural year)