Avani Amrit Pinot Gris 2025

After their estate-grown Syrah, this skin-contact Pinot Gris is the other wine through which I came to know Avani. I first tasted it years ago in Adelaide and the smell of turmeric was electric. Suddenly I was back in Mauritius, in my mother’s kitchen just before she cooks masala fish. I have tasted the wine across vintages since, and that spice has never really left: turmeric, saffron thread, tangy yellow mustard seed, alongside hibiscus, blood orange and cranberry. Even Rohit Singh can’t quite explain where it comes from. It simply keeps turning up.

The fruit comes from Manton’s Creek vineyard around Shoreham and Main Ridge, at roughly 160 metres on the cooler Western Port and Bass Strait side of the Mornington Peninsula. Grey clay and loam sit beneath vines that are hand pruned and harvested, with no systemic sprays and considerable attention paid to keeping the canopy open. It isn’t Avani’s own vineyard, but the farming matters to them because there isn’t much hiding fruit once you leave it on its skins for a month.

Rohit’s inspiration for making orange wine came from tasting traditional Georgian examples, but Amrit was never intended as an imitation. Pinot Gris goes through a month of whole-bunch maceration before pressing, with fermentation completing in old barrels and maturation continuing there for 11 months. The point is texture and spice, and a wine built to sit at the table.

That intention is obvious on the palate. There is the structure of a light red rather than a conventional Pinot Gris, initially gritty and tightly folded, with youthful tannins pulling against blood orange, cranberry and hibiscus. Give it air. Like taking a summer outfit from the wardrobe after a long winter, some creases need to fall out before it sits properly. The wine takes on flesh as it opens, the tannins becoming silkier while citrus and that unmistakable spice spread through the palate. Its luminous amber colour might suggest something more hectic; the structure is far more measured.

This is also one of those wines I prefer on its second day, sometimes its third. Air amplifies rather than diminishes it. Sardines, anchovies, capers, Alpine cheese and whatever constitutes a girl dinner would disappear alongside it, but there is enough freshness for grilled vegetables or goat’s cheese, and enough spice for a Moroccan salad scattered with pomegranate, currants and roasted nuts. That turmeric is still there. 

Liinaa Berry

Liinaa Berry is a Melbourne-based wine critic and consultant with over a decade of experience as a sommelier and wine buyer across Australia and around the world where she has built award-winning wine programs and championed independent producers with conviction. Now focused on reviewing and writing, Liinaa brings a floor-trained palate and commercial insight to her assessments. She is also the Melbourne Ambassador for Star Wine List and serves on the committee of Sommeliers Australia. An advocate for site-driven wines and thoughtful farming, Liinaa is particularly drawn to producers who articulate a clear sense of place. Her tasting philosophy centres on structure, balance and context — always asking not just how a wine tastes, but why it matters.