Following Matt’s feature last month on the ground-breaking Cascabel winery in Australia’s McLaren Vale, we thought there’d be no better place to start our Featured Winery series of specials.

As with many obscure varietals or emerging wineries, it’s often only the most brave or adventurous of wine-drinkers that get to discover the hidden gems of the wine world. We think we’ve a few from Cascabel and we’ve knocked 15% off each of them to tempt some leaps of faith.

2008 McLaren Vale Tempranillo 3 months in old French barrels for better structure yet retains the fresh strawberry characters from young Tempranillo. “Light to medium bodied; spice, cherry and strawberry fruit to both bouquet and palate; fine slightly savoury tannins.” James Halliday, Australian Wine Companion, 89 points (2006 vintage). €12.33 on special.

2004 McLaren Vale Tipico (Grenache/Monastrell/Shiraz) Produced from mostly Viña Cascabel grown grapes, with a small addition of Grenache from a vineyard near the winery, only 6500 bottles are produced. “Savoury, spicy, leathery overtones to the black fruits; excellent texture and structure; fine-grained tannins, long finish”, James Halliday, 92 points. €13.60 on special.

2007 Eden Valley Riesling Single vineyard, 40+ year old vines capture clean steely and citrus characters. “Lively, tart, spicy lemon/lemon-rind aromas; excellent minerality and length to the pure bone-dry finish”
James Halliday, 94 points. €14.45 on special.

So go on, try something new – but do beware, your Yabbajabbawabba Creek Chardonnay might never taste the same again.

I’m not sure if you’ve heard, but there’s been some confusion surrounding Australian Albariño of late, and it only came to my attention when I was reading an email from joint winemaker at Cascabel in McLaren Vale, Duncan Ferguson, who was considering planting the varietal himself.

“On the subject of Albarino, there’s a huge fuss here at the moment, it seems that due to a stuff up by the original importers (an Aust. Govt. body), that we don’t really have Albariño in Australia. It’s actually Savagnin (a variety from the Jura in France!). No wonder I hadn’t tasted any here that reminded me of a good Spanish one.”

According to Felix Cabello Sáenz de Santa María, head of the largest vine variety collection in Spain, the mix up can actually be traced back to its homeland. Many years ago Savagnin Blanc and Albariño were confused in some Spanish areas and a wrong sample collected in Orense in 1951 was labelled with the name of Albariño, when it was actually Savagnin. Essentially, all samples sent from the collection between 1955 and 1984 were Savagnin Blanc.

This discovery is partly thanks to advancements in DNA testing. I’ve never actually tried Australian Savagnin Blanc (which I’m sure is very good), but I really hope the Australian government, or whoever is in charge, can sort this out quickly so that wineries, such as Cascabel, can start to produce Rias Baixas quality Albariño alongside their other world class wines. I’m just too big a fan of the stuff.

To view our range from Cascabel, click here, and to read more about their Spanish influence, click here.

Cascabel is a winery that has intrigued me from day one for being that little bit different. Winemakers and owners Duncan Ferguson and Susana Fernandez use very traditional European wine making techniques in their Australian winery to create a fascinating blend of the Old World and New World.

Susana is originally from Madrid, where she did her studies before gaining experience working in wineries in Trentino and Sicily in Italy, Bordeaux in France and Yarra Valley in Australia. After meeting up with Duncan in Australia, she worked with him, making wine in France, Germany and New Zealand.

Duncan studied Oenology at Roseworthy (in South Australia) in the early 90’s and spent several years making wine in Clare Valley before heading off to the Rhône Valley in France, the Mosel region in Germany, and New Zealand.

With all that vast experience, they purchased 5 hectares in McLaren Vale in 1997, and started setting up the winery and vineyards. Cascabel had a definite Spanish influence from the start, with varieties like Tempranillo, Monastrell, Graciano, Grenache and Cariñena making up the majority of the plantings. Spending time in France also encouraged them to plant Roussanne, Viognier, Shiraz and Cinsault. There are plans to plant some Albariño grapes too (music to my ears).

Although not very common in Australia, McLaren Vale is producing top class vintages from the Tempranillo grape, which you’ll be very familiar with thanks to those reds of Rioja. A fairly typical McLaren Vale blend of Grenache, Monstrell and Shiraz is another one of Cascabels specialities, and they produce one of the best Riesling‘s to come out of Australia, with grapes sourced from Eden Valley.

This Australian/Spanish alliance has been turning the heads of the worlds most famous wine critics. Jay Miller has scored many of their wines 90 points and above, and James Halliday described them as one of the ten dark horses of Australian wineries, placing them in his prestigious 5 star category. All bias aside, this is one of my top dogs (or horses) as well.

For a taste of Old & New, click here.