Jauma Like Raindrops Grenache 2016

Ever wonder what it was like to drink wine from the olden days? (You don't hear a lot of 'olden days' after the age of 7, maybe because it's not particularly specific, anyway we're bringing it back.) We're talking like Mesopotamia not the 60s. You may well think it would be gross; they didn't understand yeast strains and weren't able to tweet pictures of their ferment to Mesopotamian Oz Clarke. Well, have a sip of this outstanding Grenache from Mclaren Vale and you may find yourself less of a present snob... modern centric... pastist? Jauma harvest by hand, use no sulphites, additives, enzymes, ferment with natural yeasts and the entire operation is gravity fed instead of pumps, just like your Mesopotamian ancestor use to make it!

Of course, they might use totally natural practices, but head winemaker James Erskine also utilizes a serious amount of modern 'know-how' to create a wine with highly perfumed bouquet evokes smoky raspberry, mulberry, candied rose and spice-cake. Seamless and sweet, with energetic red berry compote flavours and an exotic floral pastille quality. Gains richness and spiciness with air and finishes very long, with clinging sweetness. A beautiful fusion of the past and the future, to be enjoyed in the present.

Each of the vineyards he works with is harvested by hand using only the most sophisticated of grape analysis instruments to select the time of harvest – the senses; no Ph meters or Baume refractometry, here, my friends. His primary passion is working with Grenache (Pinot of the south!) from the McLaren Vale sub-appellation Blewitt Springs but given that he lives in the Adelaide hills he also pays homage to, not Catalonia, but a few of the more interesting growers he has encountered there and produced a couple of locally grown wines. He says that he feels very lucky to have been able to set up a cellar in one of the original, basket range sandstone buildings built in 1841 just around the corner from his family home which formerly housed the Crammond family’s Jam Factory. No quips about jammy Barossa reds here. In the cellar, all ferments are wild and each vineyard’s wine is made without the addition of sulphur, enzymes, fining agents, acid or tannins. None of the wines are filtered or fined and no sulphur was added until bottling when a minimal addition is made to give James the confidence to ship his wines interstate and internationally. The cellar has multiple stories so he is able to work using gravity rather than pumps. By trusting his own palate in the cellar rather than technical instruments he is able to follow and guide the will of each vineyard, the aim being to produce wines that capture both the essence of each vineyard and “my own personal, creative energies”.