Beautiful Blends: Australia’s Top 50 Red Blends
Blended red wines do it tough in Australia.
All the local glory goes to single varietal wines such as shiraz, pinot noir or cabernet sauvignon. But blends are, in many ways, the epitome of a winemaker’s craft.
Dealing with the idiosyncrasies of a single variety can be trying enough but indulging the vicissitudes of several in a winery can be akin to herding cats. Of course, there are some compensations. Blending can gloss over much of the seasonal variation that afflicts single varieties to produce more consistent wines from year to year. At the lower end, some suggest that blends are not much more than a winemaking convenience that puts a roof over the heads of a vineyard’s orphans.
Perhaps the most compelling argument in favour of blends is complexity. Industry doyenne Jancis Robinson admits she is usually more intrigued by multivarietal wines which she finds more interesting than monovarietal counterparts. Each constituent of a blend should make an identifiable contribution but with sufficient balance to produce a wine that’s greater than the sum of its parts.
Perhaps it is for this reason that winemakers mostly reserve their blended wines for the bigger shows. Bigger shows usually mean more experienced judges who can more justly determine the merits of such concoctions.
Our rankings show blended wines attend wine competitions that are on average four times bigger than the typical show attended by a shiraz, for example.
Despite this stiffer competition, blended reds perform just as well as their single-sex alternatives. Blends had a gold strike rate of eight per cent in 2016 – the same as for shiraz.
Australia’s best-known red blends are cabernet merlot and the home-grown cabernet shiraz. We classify these blends separately as do most large retailers. This leaves an almost infinite number of combinations of other red grapes spanning classical French, Italian and Spanish varieties.
But it is GSM – grenache shiraz mourvedre – that dominates the “other” red blends category in Australia. This papal trinity, exemplified in France’s famous Chateauneuf-du-Pape appellation – combines the Rhone region’s two biggest grapes with mourvedre – also known as mataro or monastrell. Here, GSM accounts for seven of our Top 10 in this category while close variants account for a further two.
Wine lovers looking for a change from their single-varietal habits would do well to give blended reds a break. Here’s our top 50:
| 1 | Robert Oatley Signature Series McLaren Vale GSM 2015 |
| 2 | Sieber Rd GSM 2014 |
| 3 | Bleasdale Vineyards GSM 2015 |
| 4 | Shingleback Red Knot Grenache Shiraz Mourvedre 2015 |
| 5 | Rosemount Estate GSM 2014 |
| 6 | Australian Vintage Limited McGuigan Shortlist GSM 2014 |
| 7 | St Hugo Barossa Grenache Shiraz Mataro 2014 |
| 8 | Tahbilk Grenache Shiraz Mourverdre 2014 |
| 9 | Harcourt Valley Vineyards GSM 2015 |
| 10 | Serafino GSM 2014 |
| 11 | Houghton Small Batch Rojo Grande Tempranillo, Grenache, Touriga 2015 |
| 12 | Millbrook Winery Grenache Shiraz Mourverdre 2015 |
| 13 | De Bortoli Wines Deen De Bortoli Master Blend 2013 |
| 14 | Hugo Wines Grenache, Shiraz 2014 |
| 15 | Wirra Wirra Original Blend Grenache Shiraz 2015 |
| 16 | Hardy?s Tintara Grenache Shiraz Mataro 2015 |
| 17 | Vinrock McLaren Vale G.S.M. 2015 |
| 18 | S.C. Pannell Grenache Shiraz Touriga 2015 |
| 19 | Beresford Classic GSM 2014 |
| 20 | Houghton Wines Jack Mann Red 2013 |
| 20 | Dimbulla Estate Tempranillo, Shiraz 2014 |
| 22 | Grant Burge Virtuoso Barossa Valley Grenache Shiraz Mourvedre 2015 |
| 23 | S.C. Pannell Wines Tempranillo Touriga 2015 |
| 23 | S.C.Pannell Touriga Cabernet Mataro 2015 |
| 25 | Annie’s Lane At Quelltaler Winemakers GSM 2013 |
| 26 | Australian Vintage Ltd Tempus Two Pewter Uno Pinot Noir Shiraz 2014 |
| 27 | Anderson Winery Verrier Durif Shiraz 2013 |
| 27 | Mandoon Estate Surveyors Red Grenache, Shiraz, Mataro 2015 |
| 29 | St Hugo Barossa Grenache Shiraz Mataro 2015 |
| 30 | Matua Single Vineyard Hawke’s Bay Merlot Malbec 2013 |
| 30 | Ross Hill Wines ‘The Griffin’ 2013 |
| 30 | Church Road Hawke’s Bay Merlot Cabernet Malbec 2014 |
| 30 | Houghton Red Classic 2014 |
| 30 | Te Awa Single Estate Merlot, Cabernet Sauvignon Hawke?s Bay 2014 |
| 30 | W Salter & Son Pepperjack Barossa Red 2014 |
| 30 | Willow Bridge Estate Maris Sol 2014 |
| 30 | CA Henschke & Co Johanns Garden Grenache Shiraz Mourvedre 2015 |
| 30 | Ferguson Hart GSM 2015 |
| 30 | Wily Trout Nanima Block 2016 |
| 40 | Mount Majura Vineyard TSG Tempranillo Shiraz Graciano 2015 |
| 41 | St Hugo Barossa Grenache Shiraz Mataro 2013 |
| 42 | Hentley Farm ‘The Stray Mongrel’ Grenache Shiraz Mourvedre 2015 |
| 43 | Chapel Hill ‘The Parson’ Grenache Shiraz Mourvedre 2015 |
| 44 | Margan Family Wines Breaking Ground Tempranillo, Graciano, Syrah 2014 |
| 44 | Brown Brothers Cellar Door Release Tempranillo Graciano 2015 |
| 46 | The Yalumba Wine Company The Strapper Grenache Shiraz Mataro 2013 |
| 47 | Dog Day Wines Rusty Mutt Rocky Ox GSM 2015 |
| 48 | Thorn Clarke Wines Shotfire Quartage 2014 |
| 49 | Kalleske Wines Clarry’s GSM 2015 |
| 50 | Head Wines ‘Head Red’ GSM 2015 |
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