At my dinner with the Adelaide Hills Basket Range guys, it was great to meet Monique Millton (daughter of Gisborne, NZ’s James and Annie Millton) and Tim Webber. They are making wine together under the Manon label. One thing they are doing that is, as far as I know, pretty unique, is to make wines from abandoned vineyards. This pair of red and white, called Wild Nature, are picked from vineyards that are no longer cultivated.

How does it work? They find these abandoned vineyards and speak to the land owners. They ask to use the grapes if they can get some wine in return. Abandoned, unpruned vineyards have lots of tiny bunches of grapes, rather than big bunches in the fruit zone. Some will be in full sunshine, and some will be more hidden away. The wines are made with no added sulfites.

Manon Wild Nature White 2015 Adelaide Hills, Australia
This is from an abandoned vineyard that’s now a horse paddock. The vines have been uncultivated for 5 years. It’s Sauvignon Blanc. Cloudy yellow/orange colour. Lovely fresh lemon and tangerine notes. Delicate and savoury with a lovely texture and fine-grained tannins. Finishes fresh with nice acidity. 92/100

Manon Wild Nature Red 2015 Adelaide Hills, Australia
This is Pinot and Merlot plus a bit of Riesling. Lovely cherry and plum fruit with fine-grained tannic structured. There’s some strawberry and sweet cherry fruit, but also a bit of savouriness. Refined and quite long. 92/100

I’ll write up the other Manon wines separately. They’re really good.