NEWS
Oakdene Stay at Home Wine Packs
It's time to close the doors for a short while......
We have decided to close the doors at the Upside Down House Cellar Door, but our team is still available for all of your ‘Stay At Home’ wine needs and shipping everything straight to your door!
We have a number of ways you can place an order, with 10% off and free delivery Australia wide on purchases of 6 bottles or more.
ONLINE – Just click here and we will take you straight to the website (or select any of the items below).
VIA EMAIL – Click here for our email template and let us know which wines you want. Someone from the team will call you for credit card payment over the phone.
PHONE – Call our cellar door on 03 5256 3886 (extension 1) and we will take the order for you. Please leave a message if no one answers and we will get back to you ASAP.
STAY AT HOME WINE PACKS
Take the guesswork out of your order and let us make a selection for you. We have these Oakdene wine packs all ready to go. You can choose from any of these or simply make your own selection on our website.
Please note, discounts automatically apply at checkout. Not available with other offers.
Single Vineyard White Wine 6 pack
2 x 2017 Single Vineyard Jessica Sauvignon
2 x 2018 Single Vineyard Ly Ly Pinot Gris
2 x 2018 Single Vineyard Liz's Chardonnay
With discount $163.80 - RRP $182
Single Vineyard Red Wine 6 Pack
2 x 2018 Single Vineyard Peta's Pinot Noir
2 x 2017 Single Vineyard William Shiraz
2 x 2017 Single Vineyard Bernard's Cabernets
With discount $208.80 - RRP $232
Oakdene White Wine Taster
2 x 2019 Bellarine Peninsula Sauvignon Blanc
2 x 2017 Single Vineyard Jessica Sauvignon
2 x 2019 Bellarine Peninsula Pinot Grigio
2 x 2018 Single Vineyard Ly Ly Pinot Gris
2 x 2019 Bellarine Peninsula Chardonnay
2 x 2018 Single Vineyard Liz's Chardonnay
With discount $289.80 - RRP $322
Oakdene Red Wine Taster
3 x 2018 Bellarine Peninsula Pinot Noir
2 x 2018 Single Vineyard Peta's Pinot Noir
3 x 2018 Bellarine Peninsula Vineyard Shiraz
2 x 2017 Single Vineyard William Shiraz
2 x 2017 Single Vineyard Bernard's Cabernet
With discount $ 338.40 - RRP $376
A Christmas Turkey Feast, Matched with Oakdene Pinot Noir
Our very own revered Chef Marty, from Marty at Oakdene has shared with us two mouth watering recipes to make your Christmas Turkey a little bit fancy.
Complete with all the trimmings, slow cooked escalope with bacon and chestnuts or Malaysian style turkey breast with aromatic spices and saffron potatoes. Sounds delicious right?
Turkey is the perfect match for Oakdene Peta’s Pinot Noir and our Bellarine Pinot Noir. This lighter style of red wine pairs beautifully with it's subtle oak spices and would also be well enjoyed with roast chicken.
You can download Marty’s recipes here and try it for yourself!
Spoil Dad this Fathers Day!
FATHER’S DAY RED WINE & CHOCOLATE PACK
Father’s Day is only around the corner and we have put together a special 'Oakdene RED Wine & Cuvee Chocolate Pack’ which sure to make Dads day.
Spoil him with our special pack which includes one bottle of Oakdene 2015 Bernard’s Cabernet, matched with Cuvee Chocolate, 70gm - Amphora (65% Cocoa) and one bottle of Oakdene 2016 Bellarine Peninsula Shiraz matched with Cuvee Chocolate, 70gm - Grand Cru (75% Cocoa), all packed in a gift box.
For only $80,this delicious treat is available from our Cellar Door and website right through until the big day,* don’t let Dad miss out!
*Please allow time for shipping if purchasing online
Geelong Wines
In the Feb/March edition of Haliday Magazine, Casey Warrener has written a lovely article about Geelong wine and its surrounding wine regions. She had a little bit to say about Oakdene throughout the acticle but this is a little snipet she wrote about us called 'Broad Appeal.'
Featuring accomodation, a fine dining restaurant, an unfussy cafe and a quirky orchard, there is something for everyone at Oakdene. Oakdene's wine is crushed and produced at what wine director Steven Paul affectionately calls 'Scotcho's.' Steve manned the cellar door at Scotchmans Hill for a number of years. "Scotcho's have always made crazy wines. They're looked apon as quite mainstream because they are the largest producer in the region, but as long as I've known them they have played around with new styles."
Experimental winemaking has worked in Oakdene's favour. Their Jessica's Sauvignon, modelled on an age-worthy style produced under Scotchman's Cornelius label, is a best seller at the cellar door and has been well received by industry. "We started selling our barrel-fermented style into Melbourne and sommeliers said it is a Sauvignon Blanc they actually wanted to drink," says Steve.
Like Robin, Steve is of the opinion that shiraz is on the march in Geelong. "Bellarine shiraz is spice and pepper, sinilar to a Rhone style. It's differnet from your traditional Australian styles. Our shiraz is a clone from the Best's vineyard's 1860s plantings, which gives it a generosity of red fruit," says Steve. "The 14 William Shiraz has been in 4 shows and already taken out 3 gold medals."
Since this has been written the 2014 William Shiraz now has 4 gold medals from Ballarat, National, Royal Melbourne and Victorian wine shows. For more information about our wines just visit oakdene.com.au.
The Right White (Ruby Magazine - Summer 2015)
The sun is shining, warm winds are gently blowing and it's the time when we finally catch up with all those people we've been meaning to see all year. The entertaining season is upon us, and when it comes to serving up a white wine, we want it to be the right white.
In the same way that chardonnay was out-cooled by sauvignon blanc, now the prevailing sauv blancs are being out-trended in the it-wine stakes by pinot grigio, or is that pinot gris - well, either way, it's fast becoming the new it wine, or is that wines?
Even wine, it seems, can have an identity crisis these days.
When it comes to pinot gris and pinot grigio, it can be hard to tell what you are buying, which is why we gave Steve Paul, resident wine buff at Oakdene, a call to give us the inside line on the Pinot Gs.
You may have heard or been told that the only difference between the two is that gris is French and grigio is Italian; and that's sort of true, but really misses the story of the Pinot G wines.
What is the same about the gris and the grigio is the grape. The greyish-red grape is a mutation of the noble pinot noir grape (or pinot nero grape, as it is called in Italy), and both 'gris' and 'grigio' are translations of grey in reference to the colour. On another translation note, the name 'pinot' is a reference to pine, because pinot grapes grow in a tight cluster that vaguely resembles a pinecone.
Pinot grigio is a style of wine traditionally produced in northern Italy, around Mogliano and Alto Adige. An earlier harvest with higher acidity and lower alcohol, it tends towards crunchy fruit characters like Nashi pear flavours. The lower alcohol comes from the early harvest, as the grapes haven't developed the high sugar levels of later harvests. These wines are made to drink young and are a lovely light style for summer drinking.
Pinot gris is traditionally produced in northern France, around Alsace, close to the German border. The cooler region means grapes are picked later to allow them to ripen, making for a lower acidity, fuller bodied, rich white wines that tend to be higher in alcohol. Traditional pinot gris make good food wines, matching well with the German-influenced food of its native region like spicy sausages and sauerkraut. The higher alcohol content tends not to be as much of an issue in a culture where a small - and we do mean small - single glass of wine with dinner is the usual consumption limit.
"In Australia, we do either, or both," Steve said, adding that there has been a tendency in Australia to label the wine as gris or grigio based on nationality preference - or just the sound of the name - rather than the style being produced, which has added to the general confusion when it comes to the Pinot Gs.
But the truth is, with our warm climate, Australian Pinot Gs tend to be true to neither of the gris or grigio styles, but will fall somewhere across a very broad spectrum in between.
Here in Geelong, pinot gris (or grigio) is now the fourth most planted grape after pinot noir, chardonnay and shiraz.
"Local wine makers are investing in the variety because we have one of the most suited climates for planting it, which you can see from our success with pinot noir," Steve said. "Here at Oakdene we do both a grigio and a gris style of wine, with the grigio a lovely, crisp drinking style while the gris is a fuller style that is better with food. We have one vineyard of 5 acres of pinot gris and 80 per cent of all of our fruit goes to the fruit-driven style pinot grigio.
"But, like all wines, the best way to choose the right wine, or in this case the right white, is to try it and see what you like."
The Sparkling Season (Ruby Magazine - Spring 2014)
Every year, the arrival of racing and event season means sparkling wines are centre stage. But apart from the bubbles, do you really know what goes into that delicious glass of joyous fizz?
Steven Paul from Oakdene says that when we're talking sparklings, it's not all about bubbles.
In Australia, we produce and drink sparkling pinot, sparkling chardonnay, or sparkling pinot chardonnay. Ever wondered about the pinot element in those light-filled golden wines? If you're a novice quaffer - and there are plenty of us - here's why. All grape juice is clear. The colour comes from the press and how much of the skin is allowed to pigment the juice. In fact, well over half of the Champagne grapes grown in Champagne are black grapes.
Sparkling wine can be made in several ways and it is the method that changes the finished product. For all sparklings, the base wine is made of just ripe grapes with low levels of sugar and high acidity.
The quickest and therefore cheapest method is carbonating. This is the SodaStream of the wine world - literally injecting CO2 into the base wine. This simple and aggressive method of producing fizz results in large bubbles that dissipate quickly.
Our better quality sparklings take you into the more traditional production methods. The Charmat Method, also known as the Italian Method (Metodo Italiano) is a traditional method producing lightly sparkling wines.
The Charmat Method involves a second fermentation of the base wine in a pressurised tank, which is where the bubbles are made. The wine is then clarified, additional sugar may be added if a sweeter wine is desired, then aged. Wines produced by this method have not spent much time on yeast, and will generally be fresh, fruit driven styles with reasonable persistent bubbles.
The Champagnes produced in France are made under the Classic Method or Methode Champenoise. These wines are characterised by yeast-derived characters and very fine, persistent bubbles.
The most complex method of producing sparkling wine, the Classic Method sees the base wine decanted into bottles for the second fermentation and aged 'on lees', meaning on yeast. The curiously termed 'riddling' is the next step, whereby the bottles are rotated on an angle toward the neck of the bottle. The bubbles are made by the yeast feeding on the sugars, producing carbon dioxide.
During disgorgement, the yeast that has gathered in the neck of the bottle is removed, usually by freezing it into a block using liquid nitrogen, and removed. The wine may or may not then be dosed with extra sugar for sweetness, bottled, corked and aged. When ready, sparklings made by the classic method will have those incredibly fine bubbles that sing on your tongue and last throughout the glass (or the bottle!).
What is the difference between vintage and non-vintage? Vintage means the wine has been produced using grapes from a single year, while non-vintage, often shown as NV on the bottle, will be produced using wine from different years. These complex and savoury sparklings shine with food.
And there you have it, our insider's guide to sparkling wine, so when the conversation at this season's events turn to wine, you can shine.
Steve's suggestion: When buying a quality local sparkling, drink it now while it's fresh and lively. All the ageing and hard work is done in the production for you to enjoy the wine when you buy it.