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d’Arenberg was awarded with the Winestate Busby Perpetual Trophy for Australian Wine Company of the Year at a black tie dinner at the Adelaide Hilton on Thursday November 27. 

The trophy is awarded to the winery that performed the strongest in Winestate’s tastings throughout the year. Previous winners include Yalumba, DeBortoli, Southcorp and Orlando Wyndham. 

Chief Winemaker and Viticulturist Chester Osborn said that winning the award was a considerable achievement. 

“It is a prestigious award to win because it is very fairly judged and based on the whole range of wines,” he said. “It was a great night and an absolute surprise to win the wine company of the year award. 

“We’ve had a successful year on the show circuit in 2008 and have been very happy with the performance of our white wines, which are starting to get a reputation and accolades to match our reds.” 

The prestigious award was presented by Winestate Editor and Publisher Peter Simic, who was quick to congratulate d’Arenberg on its success. 

“To win this award a winery needs to be producing high quality wines across the whole range and at all price points,” he said. “With over 10,000 wines tasted in the last 12 months, including the rarest and most sought after wines in the country, to come out on top is a significant achievement.” 

Winestate apply an unbiased approach to their awards based on the scores achieved at regular tastings throughout the year. 

“It is determined by the quality of the wine alone,” Peter said. “It does not come down peer review or reputation, the producer making the most consistent high quality wines wins. 

“All wines are tasted blind under the international 20 points system used in national wine shows by a panel made up mainly by winemakers, many of which have extensive judging experience.” 

The Winestate Magazine award tops off a very successful 2008 for d’Arenberg which has included to date:
• Four gold medals at the Royal Adelaide Wine Show
• A gold medal at the Royal Melbourne Wine Show
• A gold medal at the National Wine Show
• Two gold medals at the New Zealand International Wine Show
• Three blue gold awards at the Sydney International Wine Show including one wine in the Top 100 wines of the competition

The doyen of Australia's wine media has named the 2006 The Custodian Grenache in his Top 100 wines for 2008.

The annual publication published in The Weekend Australian is  split into categories. The Custodian made the grade in the ultra competitive section of red wines under $20.

The soon to be released 2006 The Custodian Grenache from McLaren Vale is another stunner from an outstanding vintage. The generous winter rainfall and cool ripening period has produced reds that are showing outstanding balance.

Don't miss your chance to fill your cellar with this great vintage by purchasing online through our Buy Our Wines section.

In addition to awarding the The Custodian 93 points Mr. Halliday had this to say:

The Osborn family has vast experience in making Grenache from old McLaren Vale vines, with foot treading and basket-pressing techniques. The wine has fragrant red-berry aromas, and the structure and intensity lacking in many Barossa Grenaches, offering red and black berry fruits with spice and chocolate nuances.
From: McLaren Vale, SA
Drink: Now to 2013 with lamb kidneys

The 2008 Royal Adelaide Wine Show was the most successful yet for d'Arenberg, with four gold medals, four silver medals and seven bronze medals.

The gold medal wines were the 2007 The Lucky Lizard Chardonnay, 2006 The Derelict Vineyard Grenache, 2006 The Twenty-eight Road Mourvedre and 2006 The Laughing Magpie Shiraz Viognier.

The silver medal wines were the 2008 The Dry DamRiesling, 2005 The Coppermine Road Cabernet Sauvignon, 2007 The Twenty-eight Road Mourvedre and the 2005 The Vintage Fortified Shiraz Chambourcin.

Bronze medals were awarded to 2006 The Footbolt Shiraz, 2006 The Galvo Garage Cabernet blend, 2006 d’Arry’s Original Shiraz Grenache, 2008 The Money Spider Roussanne, 2006 The Coppermine Road Cabernet Sauvignon, 2006 The Dead Arm Shiraz and 2006 The Ironstone Pressings Grenaches Shiraz Mourvedre. 

Both whites and reds performed strongly, with all gold medal winning wines achieving a score of 18.5 out of 20.

With only limited stocks the annual release of the d’Arenberg Icon Wines, The Dead Arm Shiraz, The Coppermine Road Cabernet Sauvignon and The Ironstone Pressings Grenache Shiraz Mourvedre is highly anticipated each year. The 2006 Icon’s are destined to be one of the best vintages yet with some real developments in the vineyard and superb growing conditions in 2006, which Chester explains in his vintage report

Chester's 2006 Vintage Report
With average winter rainfall and a wet spring vines were healthy and vigour abundant in the growing season of the 2006 vintage. After 10-15 years of no fertilizer or cultivation and this year no mowing on any of our vineyards vigour was kept in check to ensure quality and flavour intensity. 

Small evenly spread showers through autumn and summer kept the mid rows green all season and required no irrigation, though most of the icon wines come from un-irrigated vines anyway. 

February was cool and March was warm with cool nights. The results of this ‘non stress’ season produced wines with great fruit purity with focus on flowery fruit characters and balanced vibrant tannins. Whilst young, the Icons can appear quite closed, but the 2006’s are quite aromatic already. With careful cellaring it is clear that tonnes of fragrance will come out of these wines, which should hold up for some time. The 2006’s are somewhat more like European wines with great purity, preciseness and length. 

The wine style of the Icons has evolved each influenced by yearly climatic conditions. As we get further away from the time of fertilizing (10-15 yrs) the tannins in the wines show a greater influence of soil, are more varied, appear more in tune with the acid and are tighter and more plentiful. 

More than ever we need to watch the extraction of tannin and colour from the skins and from two thirds through fermentation we taste twice a day to ensure that we drain and basket press each fermenter at precisely the right time. Included in this is the understanding that some grapes from certain soils can’t be foot trod or else the tannins may become overbearing. 

Our ferments are whole berry, submerged cap with no plunging or pumping over. This extremely gentle technique is very good for these ancient, very low yielding, and intense grapes.
I hope that you enjoy these special wines that are made from selected vineyards from some unique corners of McLaren Vale. Careful cellaring will only add to the experience.

Cheers, Chester.

There has always been a friendly rivalry between d'Arenberg and Wirra Wirra. it's only  heightened by the fact that there are a number of marriages that cross over these two great McLaren Vale wineries.

Whether in a wine show or on the sporting field both sides never miss an opportunity to win some bragging rights. The most recent competition took place on Sunday September 21 with the City to Bay 'fun run'. There was a fierce competition to see who could raise the most amount of money for charity and whose runners could cross the line in the best time.

We are pleased to report that the d'Arenberg Footbolts beat the Wirra Wirra Churchblockers on both accounts. Thanks to some generous support from friends, family and associated businesses d'arenberg managed to raise over 3,000 for the Starlight Foundation which helps brighten the lives of seriously ill children.  

For the month of September 2008 The Stump Jump Red will be the wine of the month at Happinez, an intimate wine bar in downtown Saint John's in Canada.

Peter Smit from Happinez  had this to say: "we feature a number of your delish wines (The Hermit Crab, The Dead Arm Shiraz, d'Arry's Original) and hope that you will keep them coming!"

Cheers Peter, we will mate, don't worry about that! So if you are in the area drop in and visit the crew at Happinez or look them up at www.happinezwinebar.ca