First Creek Hunter Valley Shiraz 2014

"Own label wine brands." Words which, rightly or wrongly, send a shiver down many a spine. A phrase which sounds like a four-word Gothic novel, but really it depends on whose own label it is. Mickey Tipton's Fowl Emporium may arouse suspicion, for instance, as might King-size Tony's Sweetbread Parlour.

But in Hunter Valley, New South Wales, the First Creek Winery was making wine under contract for local growers. And they were so good at it that in 2008 they started a range of their own, including this gorgeously satisfying, concentrated, medium-bodied Shiraz, and within a very short time it was winning all manner of awards.

Mickey Tipton's Château Gazunder, alas, couldn't get a Food Hygiene Certificate.

First Creek is a family business established in 1998 by the Silkman family, Greg, Shaun and Liz. It served initially as a contract winemaking company, but they have developed their own label over the last ten years, ensuring quality through the most rigorous fruit selection. Liz Silkman was appointed Head Winemaker in 2008, and since then she has built and developed a strong quality-focussed team.



The Hunter Valley, in New South Wales, just 100 miles or so north of Sydney, is not one of Australia's more obvious winemaking regions. The climate is subtropical, summers are unrelentingly hot and more than half of the annual rainfall occurs during the harvest season, making vintages as unpredictable as they are in parts of France. However, the regions proximity to Sydney makes it remarkably popular to tourists, restaurants, hotels, golf courses and all the other trappings of tourism proliferate every bit as much as vineyards and wineries.



Liz Silkman joined the industry as a Lab Technician at Brokenwood Wines in 1999. She joined Tempus Two as an assistant maker in 2002, staying there for six years whilst she completed her Graduate Diploma in Oenology from the University of Adelaide. Since then her career has soared - she was awarded the Dux of the Len Evans Tutorial in 2006, was a finalist in the Young Winemaker of the Year competition in 2007, and in 2008 took the reins of First Creek's own brand in addition to looking after the winemaking for a further 27 companies. Among her other accomplishments are a host of awards from within the Australian wine industry along with medals and trophies too numerous to list.