• Delivery
Wine clubWine clubWine clubWine club
  • Gift registry
  • Wishlist
  • FAQs
The mean gravelly soils and invigorating climes of Mount Barker of the Australian southwest, were identified during the 1960s by the world's leading viticulturalists, as a place uncannily similar to the great terroirs and clime of Bordeaux. The pioneering vines of Forest Hill were the first ever planted here, sired from rootstock of ancient Houghton clones, inaugurally vintaged by the illustrious Jack Mann in 1972. The Cabernet and Riesling of Forest Hill were promptly distinguished by multiple trophy victories and praised by gentleman James Halliday as the most remarkable wines to come out of the Australian west. Forest Hill have remained a source of the most profoundly structured, intensely focused, yet softly spoken range of wines. Powerful yet disciplined Cabernet, generously proportioned Malbec, august Chardonnay and mesmerising Riesling, all representing essential.. Softly spoken wonders from the west»
Right around the time that Frank Potts was planting his nascent Bleasdale Vineyards during the 1850s, an eccentric Prussian named Herman Daenke established a homestead along the banks of Bremer River, which he called Metala. The site was planted to viticulture by Arthur Formby in 1891 and became one of Langhorne Creek's most productive vineyards, it continues to supply fruit for a number of prestigious national brands. Legendary winemaker Brian Dolan took the radical step of bottling Metala under its own label in 1959 and won the inaugural Jimmy Watson Trophy in 1962. Two generations later, the brothers Tom and Guy Adams took a similar leap of faith and branded their Metala fruit as Brothers In Arms. The quality of wine re established Metala as a vineyard of global significance and claimed George Mackay Trophy as Australia's foremost export. Cohorts of the stately Langhorne.. The goodly farms of brothers in arms»

Leabrook Estate Chardonnay CONFIRM VINTAGE

Chardonnay Adelaide Hills South Australia
Much of the philosophy at Leabrook centres around creating wines which are excellent as a compliment to good food. The finest Chardonnay are renowned for their innate affinity to cuisine, Leabrook defines the ultimate in styling, immensely food friendly while offering serious palate weight, superior length and remarkable elegance. From the Mawsons Ridge vineyard at Forest Range in the hills above Adelaide, the fruit of low yielding vines is essential, a remarkable wine of impeccable balance, pristine elegance and superior length.
Honey straw hues. Full aromas of stone fruits, citrus, spice and beautifully integrated oak. Ample palate of layered orchard flavours, grapefruits and lyre fruit, nashi and nuts, supported by a fine length of creamy nougat textures. Well balanced and complex, bring your Leabrook to a long lunch of grilled white meats, avocado salad and the freshest seafood.
Leabrook
1 - 8 of 8
1
1 - 8 of 8
1
Leabrook
Leabrook Estate is a family-owned boutique winery located in the cool climate Adelaide Hills at Lobethal in South Australia

Leabrook Estate specialises in high quality Pinot Noir and Chardonnay and produces wines from a range of other cool climate varieties including Sauvignon Blanc, Cabernet Sauvignon, Cabernet Franc and Merlot. The story of Leabrook Estate started in 1978 around bottles of Burgundian wines at dinner parties. The wines had great character and delicacy. This was the beginning of Leabrook estate founder Colin Best's love affair with Burgundy and things Burgundian. These wines had an extra dimension of elegance and intensity.

Leabrook

After a visit to Burgundy, Colin started by leasing a small quarter hectare patch of rocky clay soil in the Adelaide Hills where he planted clones of Pinot Noir and Chardonnay; a hobby block that for several years taught the trials and pitfalls of mildew, weeds and winemaking techniques. The French had close planted for a reason, based on 200 years experience. The resulting wines immediately started to show promise and before long, Colin Best was planning his retirement from engineering to devote his life to viticulture.

Colin approached winemakers already established in the relatively young Adelaide Hills wine region and was overwhelmed with their generosity and assistance. The attitude and friendliness of the Adelaide Hills vignerons contrasted so greatly with the elements of the contract engineering scene, that Colin became a full time vigneron. A historic former woollen mill in Lobethal was ideally suited for winemaking, with thick walls and connections to effluent disposal, within a kilometre of the vineyard, this became Leabrook Estate Winery.

The Leabrook Estate vineyard lies in the Onkaparinga Valley in the Eastern area of the Adelaide Hills. The climate is well suited to most cool climate varieties and ripening is usually reliable, provided the fruit is exposed to light and there is no over cropping. The vineyard lies on a gentle slope with relatively shallow soils. The soil profile consists of clays over dolomite and is reasonably well drained. The vineyard is protected from the prevailing winds causing good fruit set from flowering.

Leabrook

Hedge pruning exposes the fruit to light, necessary to achieve grapes of the highest quality. If the season has been too favourable for the vine, and foliage is excessive, workers are dispatched to the vineyard prior to harvest, plucking leaves from around the bunches to expose the fruit, and cutting away excessive growth. Fruit quality can also be affected by other factors. All Leabrook Estate vineyards are netted to minimise bird damage. A large fan has been installed in the lower lying frost prone area of the vineyard to circulate air on frosty mornings and protect the young growing shoots.

Leabrook Estate's policy is to achieve the best possible quality fruit. Vines are stressed with water levels kept to the minimum, while still providing healthy leaves to aid ripening. Spraying for mildew are kept to the very minimum; pesticide sprays are non existent, relying on natural predators to control pests. Picking time is a very complex affair. Up to 30 small batches of grapes are sampled and tested for taste and physical characteristics from the 2 hectare vineyard, and a picking strategy is developed over several weeks to provide the particular flavour profile designed for Leabrook Estate Wines.

All fruit is hand picked with any damaged or unripe fruit discarded in the vineyard and during a final sorting during the crushing process at the winery. Great care is taken during picking and transportation such that the fruit arrives at the winery in exactly the same condition as existed on the vine. A small group of pickers are employed to ensure a constant flow of fruit from the vineyard to the winery for immediate processing. The same care extends through the winemaking process, when only gentle crushing is performed and there is no rough pumping of must, relying only on gravity to take the grapes into their fermentation stage.

Boutique winemaking has a number of inherent advantages, mainly to do with quality control associated with small quantities. Every barrel can be hand nurtured during the year and crafted into a style based on the same fruit source each year. Techniques can be fine tuned, both in winemaking and possibly more importantly in the vineyard, where the vine's balance can be determined to give the best quality fruit for the particular site.

Leabrook