Booze Brothers

Tyrrell's was founded and 1858 and remains one of Australia's oldest family owned wineries. There are few names more famous in the Australian wine industry and none that have done more to put the Hunter Valley on the map as one of the worlds great wine regions. Tyrrell's make arguably Australia's best white wine; the Vat 1 Semillon but have also made consistently excellent shiraz and chardonnays over the years. More recently they have branched out to make wines from McLaren Vale, Heathcote and the Limestone Coast.

Is this Australia's greatest white wine? The sheer weight of medals and trophies it has won over the years suggests it should go close and whilst I don't know for sure, I'd hazard a guess that it's won more than any other Australian white wine. The best part is that it's only a fraction of the cost of our dearest chardonnays. According to Tyrrells, since the first vintage in 1962 to 2002 this wine has won 107 trophies, 25 top gold, 327 gold, 182 silver, 240 bronze and 2 blue gold medals.

This is a classic Hunter Valley Semillon showing a tightly structured palate with considerable length and breadth of citrus fruit flavours. This wine is beginning to display toasty bottle aged complexity. Whilst drinking well now, it will continue to develop delicious bottle age characters until at least 2012.

96 points - James Halliday, winecompanion.com.au
95 points - The West Australian, 28/02/09
94 points - Gary Walsh, winefront.com.au