A Beautiful Bouquet – Or Just a Good Nose?

The bouquet of a wine is considerably more complex (to humans at least) than the flavour because our taste buds are limited to the basic flavours being sourness, bitterness, saltiness, sweetness and savouriness. Hence the aroma of wines sniffed before tasting will enhance the flavour and the enjoyment of the wine.

Tyrrell’s Wines have been getting things very right for five generations now and have recently been recognised with a swag of awards over the last six months.

In August 2018 Tyrrell’s Wines were awarded their 6th Wine of Provenance Trophy at the Hunter Valley Wine Show for their 2004, 2011 and 2018 Single Vineyard Stevens Semillon. This most important trophy celebrates the greatest wines of the Hunter and their ability to age, improve over time and show a sense of place. Tyrrell’s also won the prestigious Silver Bullet Trophy, awarded by International Judge Corinne Mui, for the 2007, 2014 and 2017 Single Vineyard Stevens Shiraz.

The Tyrrell and Stevens families have worked together since the 1993 vintage to produce Semillon and Shiraz that are individually distinctive to this vineyard and these trophies recognise that the Hunter Valley produces some of the best wines in the world that stand the test of time.

Along with trophies for Best Current Semillon, Best Mature Semillon, Best Semillon, Best White Wine of the Show and Best Museum Red Wine, Tyrrell’s was awarded a total of 10 gold, 10 silver and 14 bronze medals at the 2018 Hunter Wine Show.

In November 2018 at the National Wine Show held in Canberra, Tyrrell’s Wines won the ATOS Semillon Trophy with their 2013 Belford Semillon.

2019 continued to tell a good story for Tyrrell’s Wines when Huon Hooke (wine writer, judge and critic) included a number of Tyrrell’s wines in his Top 100 wines of 2018 on his website.  The wines are:

• Semillons – Tyrrell’s 2005 Vat 1 Semillon and Tyrrell’s 2013Single Vineyard Belford Semillon (these were the only semillons to make the list), and
• Shiraz – Tyrrell’s 2017 Sacred Sites OId Patch Shiraz (Old Patch was on the list alongside other Aussie icons Henschke Hill of Grace 2013, Penfold’s RWT 2016 and Penfolds Grange 2014).

To top things off, three Tyrrell’s wines have been included in the 2019 February/March issue of Gourmet Traveller Wine’s Top 100 New Release Wines:

• 2013 Belford Single Vineyard Semillon (97 points)
• 2013 Stevens Single Vineyard Semillon (96 points)
• 2013 HVD Single Vineyard Semillon (95 points).

No doubt a memorable list of achievements in deed!

To see Tyrrell’s featured in the James Halliday Cellar Door Series – click