Vickery Eden Valley The Reserve Riesling 2019

The Vickery name alone is reason to get excited. It belongs to arguably the greatest riesling maker Australia has produced – John Vickery, now retired – and his superlative Leo Buring wines of the 60s and 70s. The wines were made to last and so they did. Magnificently. That is also the rationale behind the Vickery wines made by Keeda Zilm with the imprimatur/approval of John Vickery. The 2019 Eden Valley off the Zander Quarry Block rocks it in an old-school brown bottle. What’s inside also rocks. The alluring scent of aromatic florals, of lantana and lavender, mix with herbal notes, citrus and musk.

I spy some developing toastiness coming into the picture as the wine has aged. It’s still a youngster, of course, but I like that hint of a bright future to come. Time in bottle so far has brought excellent concentration and a real Eden Valley-style beauty and sense of place, not to mention attractive textural qualities. Quite seamless and that length? It’s soooooo long and lasting. Acidity is the quiet star. You know it’s there, you know it will keep the wine going for a good 10-15 years, possibly more, but it’s far from strident.  It just, is.

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