2015 Shadowfax Minnow Red

Shadowfax

Australia / Werribee / Shadowfax

Shadowfax planted the first vines at the Werribee Vineyard in 1998, and for a long time Matt Harrop and the team have been perfecting their work with southern French varieties. The Minnow project has, excuse the pun, really started to bear fruit in recent years, yielding bright-fruited, spicy and highly distinctive blends of Mondeuse, Mataro, Grenache and Cinsault. The vines are trained on a single wire and are shoot thinned by hand each spring to maintain low, simple yields.

April, 2017

Ben Thomas

The Weekly Review

92 points

If you have kids, Shadowfax is an easy cellar door to combine with a trip to Werribee Zoo. Its food makes it a good lunch stop, too. The grapes in the Minnow are all grown in the vineyard next to the winery. It's funky and perfumed, with raspberry, spice and earth flavours, sandy tannins and a lengthy finish.

June, 2017

Mike Bennie

Gourmet Traveller WINE

A blend of Grenache, Mataro, Roussanne and Mondeuse with splashes of Cinsault, seems quite exotic, but the sum of its parts works superbly. This is a pitch-perfect bistro wine that offers medium weight, juiciness and just a touch of crunchy acidity for freshness. It shows dark cherry, cola, green herbs and peppery spice character, with the mesh of those flavours and aromas completely seductive and moreish. A light chill wouldn't go astray, but it'll also warm the cockles in the colder weather.

May, 2017

Dave Brookes

Adelaide Review

The 2015 Shadowfax Minnow seems to me quite autumnal drinking. It’s a bit of a fruit salad; a blend of red and white grape varieties – Grenache, Cinsault, Mataro, Mondeuse Noir and Roussanne – from down Werribee way in Victoria. It is one of those dangerously drinkable blends that seems to tick all the boxes.
For starters, the colour is very Pinotesque. The aromatic profile is awash with redcurrant, cranberry and red cherries with some grapefruit lift for good measure. It is fragrant and musky-edged with a light dusting of Asian spice and amaro herbs to fill things out.
At the lighter end of medium-bodied, it features plenty of space and detail on the palate which shows bright fruit and a spicy flick to its tail with a sapid acid line and gentle tannin wash. The wine finishes with a sexy Aperol spritz herbal tweak.
I challenge anyone not to have a glass of this over a dish of pasta and not come out smiling.

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About Shadowfax

Shadowfax has taken tremendous strides in recent times, with the team refining the range and proving their prowess with Chardonnay and Pinot Noir. Their single-vineyard Chardonnays have taken out Best Chardonnay at the Macedon Ranges Wine Exhibition no fewer than five times. Especially noteworthy have been the Little Hampton Vineyard in Macedon's high-altitude plantings of Pinot Gris, Chardonnay and Pinot Noir, in the chilliest region of Australia’s mainland. These are the vibrant future of Australia’s cool-climate wine scene. The counterpoint to this is the dynamic Minnow project, based around the Werribee vineyard’s southern French varieties. This is the source of bright, spicy, textured rosé and reds, with the micro-make Mondeuse immediately becoming a delicious cult hit. With long-serving vineyard manager and assistant winemaker Alister Timms taking the helm in October 2017, these are hugely exciting times for Shadowfax.

About

Shortly after completing this second degree, Alister started working at Shadowfax as Assistant Winemaker, a position he held for three years before moving back home to run his family’s winery, Kilgour Estate. In 2008, Alister returned to Shadowfax to manage the winery’s various vineyards and establish the Little Hampton property in the Macedon Ranges, whilst working as Assistant Winemaker to Matt Harrop. When Matt decided to leave Shadowfax in October 2017, after almost 20 years as winemaker, Alister was the obvious choice as his replacement. “I look forward to building on the foundation that we’ve created over the years and seeing our vineyards reach their full potential, and to follow that through in the winery.”