White wines.....

2006 Swinging Bridge Chardonnay
CODE: SBECRD06

• Top 40 Wines of the Year 2007 NSW Wine Awards
• Best Wine of Show Trophy & Gold Medal 2007 Cowra Regional Wine Show
• Bronze Medal 2007 Melbourne Wine Show
• Bronze Medal 2007 Wine Wise Awards
• Bronze Medal 2007 Cowra National Wine Show

The grapes were harvested on the 21st February 2006. The fruit looked in magnificent condition and the canopy had held up extremely well throughout the year. The intensity of fruit was showing from the start and it was a vintage that we were keenly waiting to see how it would come up in the bottle. It was worth the wait and a wine that we are extremely proud of.

Colour: light yellow with a slight olive green tinge.

Nose: Developing well with some apricot and honeydew characters as well as some slight toasty oak.

Palate: Nice initial acid with good primary fruit weight. Slightly riper fruit characters on the palate with some peach as well as apricot coming through. Acid and oak carry as a nice backbone through the wine and blends in well in the back palate. This wine is drinking extremely well now which is shown through the awards that it has received but it should also develop nicely through the years. Enjoy.

2005 Swinging Bridge Chardonnay
CODE: SBECRD05

• Silver Medal 2007 Cowra Regional Wine Show
• Bronze Medal 2006 Cowra National Wine Show

After last years extremely hot picking day in the sun we realised that we could probably pick the fruit in better conditions. This saw the first year that we decided to machine harvest the fruit. We went through and thinned out any bunches that we thought were undesirable before picking.

We then started harvesting at 4.00am on 21st February 2005 and the grapes were in the wine press at 7.00am. As the temperatures are so much cooler in the night it allows the grapes to be sitting somewhere between the 10 – 20 C for harvest. This is positive from a winemaking perspective and creates a better wine. Also the quicker that the fruit is able to get to the winery then it enables it to chilled immediately which prevents wild yeasts and oxidation. It also helps prevent many phenolics (can cause a drying the mouth and affects the mouthfeel of the wine) from being extracted in to the resulting juice.

Colour: Light - medium Yellow

Nose: Lychee, apricot and melon as well as some nice vanillan oak and a touch buttery character from the malolatic fermentation.

Palate: Nice sweet fruit on the front palate showing some honeydew melon and apricot characters. On the back palate it is developing nicely with some creaminess coming through on a long back palate. It is best consumed now and will also develop over the coming years.

2004 Swinging Bridge Chardonnay

• Tony Gray Award for the Best Local Wine 2005 Cowra National Wine Show

• Gold Medal 2005 Cowra National Wine Show

18th February 2004. What a hot day to pick grapes! The baume of  the grapes was 13.9 Be. As the grapes were to be handpicked this had to be done starting as early as possible. Unfortunately we were let down in pickers, which ended up in a long day for everyone and a later finish (and we had to harvest that night as well).

The grapes were chilled overnight to 2 – 3C in the coolroom and then pressed the next day. It is important to cool the wine down as quick as possible as fermentation is much better to occur at lower temperatures. Generally we like the ferments to start around 16C and to not get too much above that for white wines.

The wine picked up a gold medal at the Cowra National Wine Show. There was only 2 gold medals awarded in the class with over 200 entries. It also won the Tony Gray Award for the best local wine at the show.

Colour: Medium Yellow

Nose: Intense primary fruit of apricot and honey dew melon. It shows some nice vanillan/spicy oak characters

Palate: It has a beautiful palate weight and it is extremely luscious and creamy on the front palate. The wine shows beautiful stonefruit characters and integrated oak characters. It has extremely long length on the back palate and is a pleasure to drink (for those lucky enough to still have some of it left in the cellar)

2003 Swinging Bridge Chardonnay

• Best White Wine 2004 Cowra Regional Wine Show

• Gold Medal 2004 Cowra Regional Wine Show

Vintage had started earlier than normal which was extremely disappointing. Not from the wine perspective but Will (Mark And Anne's middle child) and Kim were getting married in the vineyard and we had promised them that vintage would not get in the way. We assured them that vintage had always been at least a couple of weeks after the wedding. As the grapes ripened and we could see in the vineyard that things were getting close we started to worry. However all was right and the grapes slowed down and we did not need to pick them till after the wedding.

This was the first year that we had started with Chris Derrez and we were impressed immediately by his eye to detail and his uncompromising ways. For Chris wine was the first and only priority (although that did change with the birth of his daughter Lila but with no detrimental effect to the wine!)

This also saw a change in the flavours we were starting to look for in the grapes and we started to pick at a riper baume. This year the grapes at the winery ended up being 14.1 Be. The fruit had some intense apricot and melon primary fruit characters.

Colour: Medium yellow to straw

Nose: Showing some honey, apricot and nuttiness. It is also carrying its oak well with some toasty development

Palate: It has some nice primary fruit weight on the front palate with some melon and peach as well as a developed honey characteristic. There is an extremely nice creaminess coming through on the back palate as well as some alcohol heat. It is a wine that is best consumed now and for another couple of years.

2001 Swinging Bridge Chardonnay

• Tony Gray Award for the Best Local Wine 2001 Cowra National Wine Show

• Gold Medal 2001 Cowra National Wine Show

Our first Gold Medal and the realization that our wines were something special. The grapes for this wine were taken from Block 1 which has been the traditional backbone of our chardonnay.

Harvested by hand the baume (sugar ripeness) of the wine was 12.6 Be. The vintage had started out wet but then we got a warm and clear ripening period leading up to harvest (which was a considerable change from 2000 vintage where we saw 17 out 30 days with rain).

The wine has continued well and at our last tasting we were starting to see some bottle age (we only have a few cases left as most of them were consumed at the three Ward weddings that were held in 2003).

Colour: Medium yellow

Nose: The wine is starting to show some honey and cashew characters while still exhibiting some primary fruit.

Palate: It has a nice luscious and velvety texture as well as some toastiness with the acid still holding the wine together.