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Winter News 2006:
Life here continues to be busy with the tasks involved with grape growing, wine making, marketing, selling and looking after visitors at our cellar door. Personally, we are busy too, with 2 more grandchildren born so far this year and another in August, to make a total of 7 in 5 years!
Grape growing at Sulky continues to be a great challenge due to low rainfall for the 9th consecutive year. When we constructed our dam 21 years ago we never dreamed that it wouldn’t fill! Our governments must address the global warming issue seriously if the planet is to continue as we know it.
Thankfully, some grapes are still bearing and Rod continues to make wine for small growers in the area, so we do have fruit from the region to work with.
The Sauvignon Blanc, Chardonnay and Pinot Noir production here at Sulky is sufficient and the red varietals of good quality are sourced from Western Victoria.
The resulting wines are unique to our boutique nature and they are proving popular with our wholesale, retail and cellar door customers.
A little info about each variety:- The 2005Chardonnay is fruity, melon flavoured and lightly oaked.
The 2006 Chardonnay has a strong melon bouquet and is made of Ballarat fruit exclusively. It is an elegant wine and has a pleasant, sweet finish with no oak influence.
The 2006 Sauvignon Blanc was fermented in stainless steel and bottled within 2 months of finishing ferment to retain it’s natural freshness and herbaceous flavour.
The 2002 Pinot Noir was matured in French oak or 1 year and the result, is a full-bodied wine with cherry wood flavours.
The 2003 Cabernet Sauvignon has a pleasant long palate with a subtle touch of black current flavour and a hint of French oak at the end. It is much sought after.
The 2003 Shiraz grapes from Murtoa and Edenhope were aged in American oak for 15 months and the wine has an earthy aroma and spicy licorice flavours.
The 2003 Merlot is a full-bodied sleeping giant. It smells of violets and has a full fruity taste and we decided to bottle it as a stand alone varietal because it will cellar for 5-7 years.
We also have a non-vintage Sparkling Chardonnay and 2001 Sparkling Shiraz, both are delightful wines exhibiting typical varietal influences of and melon flavour and spiciness respectively.
Our Sweet Wines consist of non- vintage pink Chardonnay ‘Seduction’ the temptress! Try it chilled and savour a wine of adventure with nibbles. The 2004 Frontignan which has a delightful fruit salad aroma and similar palate. A pleasant drink with nibbles or serve with an apple tart and cream for something different!
The non-vintage Tawny Port grapes are sourced from North Eastern Victoria, are this fortified is as good as ever, smooth on the palate and nutty at the end. If you wish to order, download the order form and fax, email or snailmail it to us.
We have just finished our major bottling for the year and all the wines are resting until release later in the year.
At the moment we are preparing some shiraz for our spakling red in a few years time. More on that later......
For more information on the wines and purchase prices go to 'Our Wines' section on this site.
Hoping to hear from you or see you soon when you drop in to the cellar door again and savour our wines as well as the spectacular winter views here at Sulky. In the meantime, keep safe and positive!
Vineyard: Here winter calls us to the
vineyard to prune in readiness for the next growing season. It.s a cold,
monotonuous task, however it is not a thankless
task because from this work comes the fruit for next Autumn. We
have assistance with our pruning and this year, because Veronica has
resigned from teaching, she hopes to learn the art of pruning.
The
next job in the vineyard is to get the weeds under control so Rid will
need to be on the tractor spraying the offending plants.
Bottling day is always interesting.
We use the services of a bottling company which has a portable bottling unit which is wholly contained in a large caravan. It’s a most interesting and impressively efficient operation which has enabled us to bottle up to 10,000 bottles in a day.
Marketing:
Dulcinea Winery continues to sell it’s product locally, nationally and internationally. The Japanese market continues to grow and Rod has just returned from visiting our clients there. He also participated in a major exhibition in Hong Kong and made some good potential contacts.
Warmest Regards!..Rod and Veronica Stott
To read summer news 2002 click here
To read winter news 2002click here
To read spring 2001 news, click here
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