Pikes Il Premio Sangiovese 2021

The progression of Sangiovese into Clare Valley’s top tier wines continues with this high quality, premium wine from one of the region’s best vintages in years. The Italian grape variety is looking smart indeed, and just a little quiet in the glass. It’s got that just-released reticence, but give it a swish or three and watch it open up. Captures the grape’s varietal aromas and character in a perfume swirling in black cherry, blackberry, roasted tomato, dried herbs with thyme and sage out front and lingering florals. Tightly-formed, its cherry pip tannin dryness, in the form of a fine line of tannin running through the wine, is a particularly appropriate Sangiovese feature. Too many Australian winemakers treat the grape in a sweet-fruited Shiraz style, rather than allowing its Italian firmness and structure with a touch of savouriness to shine through. The Pikes succeed where quite a few others have failed.

Jeni Port

Wine critic at Winepilot

Jeni Port is one of Australia’s top wine communicators. Based in Melbourne, Jeni created the first wine column in the (then) Sun News-Pictorial before moving over to The Age and becoming that paper’s longest-serving wine writer. Over the years she has written for most Australian wine magazines and these days calls WinePilot home. She is also a Tasting Panel member on the Halliday Wine Companion. She was named Wine Communicator of the Year and Legend of the Melbourne Food and Wine Festival in 2014 and in 2018 Legend of the Vine. She is a founding board member of Australian Women In Wine and is the co-deputy chair of Australia’s Wine List of the Year Awards and China’s Wine List of the Year Awards.

Wine writer and critic