Translation missing: en.Gembrook Hill - Another epic release from Andrew Marks + Mare Nostrum Vini - A fascinating new discovery + Minim Wines tasting this Saturday 3-6PM!: Gembrook Hill - Another epic release from Andrew Marks + Mare Nostrum Vini - A fascinating new discovery + Minim Wines tasting this Saturday 3-6PM!
Gembrook Hill
Gembrook Hill sits in the southernmost, coolest reaches of the Yarra Valley, a high pocket of the Upper Yarra defined by elevation, generous rainfall and deep red volcanic soils. It's one of the most distinctive climates in the region, slow to warm and late to ripen, which is exactly what you want for the kind of finely etched, aromatic Pinot Noir that has made this estate's name. Ian and June Marks searched through almost every winemaking corner of Victoria before finding their pocket of land here in 1983, with views across to Mt Donna Buang, the Warburton ranges at their back, red soil underfoot and a coveted north-easterly aspect. They led the way as part of the so-called "second wave" of Yarra Valley winemakers and today farm some of the oldest vines in the Upper Yarra.
The vineyard is planted in a hilly amphitheatre with perfect north and east exposure on red volcanic loam, the vines unirrigated, hand pruned, hand harvested and kept low-yielding to capture that sweet terroir. Ian and June have always understood that wine is made in the vineyard, so the cellar work is all about minimal handling: little to no filtration and ageing only in French oak across a mix of hogsheads, barriques and puncheons. Burgundian sensibilities on prime Yarra real estate. More recently Andrew has continued to refine what the site can do, replanting a small block to MV6 Pinot on American rootstock to draw a different expression out of the vineyard, and the season just gone was a cracker, a warm dry spring and summer and an early, compressed harvest delivering Pinot with deep colour and ripe, polished tannins and Chardonnay with more weight through the mid-palate while holding onto its bright natural acidity.
I tasted with Andrew a couple of weeks ago and it's always such an enlightening experience to sit down with him and his wines. Not only does he make some of my favourite Pinot Noir in Victoria and the country, they're also some of the best value I know of for Pinot full stop. The 'Gembrook Hill Village' Pinot is, year in year out, one of the best Pinots in the country for around the $40 mark and I genuinely can't recommend it enough. Working up the range, the 'Estate' label just has to be one of the best releases of this wine I've tried, in such stellar form even now and sitting in a lovely drinking window, while the two top wines, the 'IJM' and the 'JKM', will properly reward a little patience in the cellar yet already look so good right now. We've also got the bright, aromatic 'Sauvignon Blanc' and the 'Chardonnay', which carries real body and mid-palate weight this year while keeping that natural acidity. There's a lot of hype around this release and, having tasted through it, no surprises from me as to why, so pick some up before they're gone!
--------------------
Mare Nostrum Vini
Mare Nostrum Vini is one of the more beautiful ideas to land on our shelves this year, a cultural wine project dedicated entirely to the Mediterranean and the landscapes, identities and shared heritage that ring it. It's the work of two people pulled together by a love of that sea: Antoine Isenbrandt, a wine selector and cultural curator who has spent years building relationships with Mediterranean growers, and Athénaïs de Béru, the biodynamic winemaker behind Château de Béru in Chablis, whose cool underground cellar in Béru gives the wines a patient home far from where the fruit was grown.
The thinking behind it is essentially a Mediterranean wine atlas. The wines are drawn from historic, mostly white native grapes grown close to the sea and shaped by everything the coast throws at them, wind, salinity, humidity and light, with every vineyard farmed organically and most of it biodynamically. Each cuvée is named after a local wind that defines its corner of the map. The fruit is all hand harvested into small crates and either vinified on-site or trucked back to Béru in refrigerated transport, then aged slowly for anywhere between 18 and 30 months in a natural underground cellar across barrels, amphorae and glass to keep each variety honest and pure. Even the labels carry the concept through, a monochrome nod to Minimal Art that echoes the shifting surface of the water, each one printed with a small negative map of the Mediterranean that marks the wine's origin while quietly erasing the borders around it.
We've brought in all four of the current releases. 'Siróc' is the orange in the range, a skin-fermented Muscat off old vines on ancient riverbed soils up in Roussillon, named for the warm southern wind that drags Saharan sand across the sea, aromatic and floral but with real structure and a thread of salinity running underneath. From a hilltop site above Palermo, 'Grecale' is a Catarratto aged around three years on its lees in tank without a touch of oak, taut and mineral and built around a bright Sicilian acidity. 'Mistral' is Carignan Blanc off old goblet vines in the Corbières, named for the cold wind that funnels down the Rhône, a linear, saline and textural white with restrained fruit and a firm backbone. Last is 'Labech', the sole red, a co-ferment of Carignan and Picpoul that marries the grape's spiced, savoury side to a racy acidity for something fresh and layered with a lively, saline finish. These are seriously thoughtful, low-intervention wines from a genuinely original project, get your hands on them while you can!
--------------------
Minim Wines Tasting
Saturday 6th
3pm-6pm
Join us this Saturday as we taste through the new releases from Minim, the project of Tim Mason (also known to many as Tim the Winemaker), working out of Castlemaine in Central Victoria.
Tim never planned on becoming a winemaker. He has no formal training as a winemaker or viticulturist and has never worked harvests at famous European domaines. He studied geology at university and his first love was always cooking. Then came wine, but for years it was only a passing interest and never really clicked the way food did. That changed at a dinner at Garagiste in 2010, where a D'Meure Pinot, an Occhipinti SP68 and a Philippe Bornard Savagnin alongside some of the most creative regional cooking he'd had finally tied the whole thing together. Wines that were vivid, textural and exciting. His focus shifted after that dinner, and his first release came in 2011 with Xavier Goodridge, a Shiraz Grenache made whole bunch in a milk vat under a tree with an old basket press and old barrels, bottled early in one of the worst vintages in recent memory. A weird, faulty, lovely first wine that started something small and real.
Over the years Tim has leaned on a generous run of vignerons (Jean-Yves Du Mont, Lucy Kendall, Gilles Lapalus, Jarad Curwood, Xavier Goodridge and Pat Underwood) to guide his hand and shape his understanding, and a lot of risks and experiments along the way. Since 2019 he's been growing grapes on two vineyards of his own in Metcalfe, committing deeper to regenerative agriculture with every passing season and pulling glyphosate out as step one. Today he makes small wines from great sites around Central Victoria, sourcing from growers committed to soil health and fruit quality, fermenting with native yeasts and building complexity by working smaller volumes through different approaches. Most of the wines age in old casks, some in stainless. Everything is made at Boomtown Winemakers Co-operative in Castlemaine.
I tasted through the new releases last week and have been watching these wines evolve over years now. They started in that edgier natural space with some faults and harsher edges, but they were fun, vibrant and exactly what we wanted at the time, and customers rightly loved them. As Tim's winemaking has matured the wines have evolved with him, shedding those harsher edges for more purity and character, and his love for Sangiovese keeps coming through more clearly with each vintage. They're still fun, affordable and full of the energy of the earlier wines, but there's a much clearer sense of confidence about them now. Where opening one used to come with a little anxiety, these are now bottles I can comfortably rely on in the shop and suggest to pretty much anyone, especially if they're after something fun and vibrant to drink alongside food.
These are the wines that we'll be pouring on the day:
2025 Minim 'Patsy' Fiano
2025 Minim 'Amber' Fiano / Pecorino
2025 Minim 'Simone' Rose Cabernet
2024 Minim 'New Small Rouge' Light Red Syrah
2025 Minim 'Floyd' Nero D'Avola / Syrah
2025 Minim 'Hitch' Young Sangiovese
Come down to the store on Saturday and try a few of these for yourself. See you there!