The ADELAIDE Review April 2013 43
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Grenache gears up to go it alone
to be used as a base variety for port; its existence as a table wine was intermittent at best.
by Charles Gent
As the demand for table wine accelerated in the 1960s and 70s, the more vaunted charms of Shiraz and Cabernet-Sauvignon and the boom of white wine saw many Grenache vines uprooted to make way, although the grape was still regularly called off the bench for blending, usually in a junior role to Shiraz.
t might be premature to say that the Barossa Valley is entering a Post-Parker Period, but the increasing prevalence of wines that are characterised by elegance and structure – such as Damien Tscharke’s 2011 Gnadenfrei Marananga Grenache – suggests that the dictates of fashion are indeed moving on.
Straight Grenache, often made from remnant bush vines, began a revival in the 1990s, thanks in part to the nostalgic tendencies of Barossa vignerons such as Charlie Melton. A more serious regard for the variety has grown steadily since. In McLaren Vale in 2004, a coterie of winemakers formed an official fan club, with each putting out pure or Grenache-dominant wines under the Cadenzia banner.
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Damien Tscharke was never interested in making his red wines in the steroidal style engendered by US wine writer Robert Parker’s penchant for bruising levels of fruit, oak and alcohol, and he now believes that with the recent cooling of American enthusiasm for Australian wine, the Parkerised product will find itself increasingly irrelevant.
The Tscharke Grenache, fourth place-getter in The Adelaide Review’s Hot 100 South Australian Wines, points not only to a leavening of the bootsand-all winemaking philosophy in the Barossa, but also to the emergence of Grenache as a high quality table wine – all on its own. As a variety, Grenache has Mediterranean origins, and in recognition of its hardiness and vigour in warm dry climes, it was planted early and often in South Australia. For the next century, though, most local Grenache was fated
In 2011, mind you, it would have been hard to make a jammy monster even if you’d wanted to. The vintage was preceded by the coldest, greyest and dampest growing season in living memory;
much of the fruit struggled to ripen and the vines were dogged by disease from beginning to end. Thanks to the naturally earlier ripening on the western slope of the Valley, the Tscharke Grenache was ready for picking a couple of weeks before most other Barossa reds, sparing the Marananga vines the final rains that elsewhere brought terminal visitations of mildew and mould.
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His terroir helps too. Two of his three vineyards are located in the Barossa’s Marananga subappellation, where his terraced Grenache vineyard bears the region’s original German name, Gnadenfrei. In addition to boasting the Barossa’s geologically oldest soil, the locale’s elevation and easterly-facing aspect confer subtle differences from conditions on the Valley floor.
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“When Grenache can be done well it can be an amazing drink, and there needs to be more benchmark straight Grenache wines out there to build the credibility that this varietal really deserves,” Tscharke says.
“Our vineyards tend to produce wines with lovely balance – we get good ripeness and flavour development, but also still a lovely retention of natural acidity,” Tscharke said. “It makes for a great single varietal wine.”
As yet no club has been formed, but Tscharke says many Barossa growers and winemakers are thinking along the same lines as their McLaren Vale counterparts.
And while bearing no malice towards the ubiquitous three-way Rhone blend, he sees no benefit for his own grapes.
“We’re seeing a lot more parcels of Grenache finally getting to the bottle without being bastardised or blended with something else.”
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In years like 2012, with its overabundance of sunshine, it’s easy for Grenache to over-ripen and tend towards a formless fruitiness, but Tscharke is an advocate of prompt picking to keep any boisterousness at bay.
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