While Saturday this week holds a particularly special combined tasting between two prestigious houses that we cannot wait to share, there's to be no shortage of other top tasting highlights with both a midweek tasting tonight, and Friday evening!
Join us later this evening (Wednesday 14th), as we proudly pour the two single vineyard pairs that've just landed from Ten Minutes by Tractor, alongside their go-to 10X Chardonnay and Pinot Noir duo. This team are one of Mornington Peninsula's most prominent names for good reason, with distinct cool-climate vineyards (McCutcheon and Wallis being the two in focus this time) that marvelously capture the natural elegance and precision of these two beloved varietals. Six wines, all showcasing the fantastic 2025 season for the region, pouring between 5 and 7pm - come and grab a glass!
For Friday (16th) evening, our excitement runs high with the latest from Lowestoft! With Tasmania's Derwent Valley as their home, these specialised terroir expressions like the Jacoben Pinot (a tiny half-hectare plot east of the lower Derwent River), La Meilleure Chardonnay (only produced from the best parcels and in the best years, with this 2025 their first in four years), and their flagship La Maison Pinot Noir (the Jimmy Watson winner back in 2023, hailing from a close-planted 3 hectare vineyard close by to Hobart's MONA Museum) each hold crystalline cool-climate charm. They hold a beautiful sense of acidity, tension and aromatic complexity, and this newest row of releases is as good a showcase for the allure of Tasmanian winemaking as any. This will run between 4:30 and 6:30pm, and make for a delicious start to the weekend before the royalty of Saturday's names sweep through. Stay tuned on that one!
"The 2025 vintage was magnificent. Moderate warm days, cool nights and dry conditions throughout the summer and autumn provided ideal ripening conditions. Healthy and balanced canopies across all sites produced wonderful flavours and acidity and excellent fruit quality."
10X Chardonnay 2025
$40 on special this week ($45 RRP)
"Equally refreshing as it is textural, while remaining fruit-driven. Stone fruit and citrus are the main flavours. Some mouth-coating leesy goodness, a little nutty and creamy too, with ginger spice and good acidity. Easy to drink, easy to like and ready to pour." -92 Points, Jane Faulkner, Halliday Wine Companion
10X Pinot Noir 2025
$40 on special this week ($45 RRP)
"At first, this appears all upfront fruit and spice, plush and ripe, and yes, it’s all that, but it unfurls in the glass. There’s a bit more going on. Savoury, supple, fleshy and fuller-bodied with wafts of wood smoke, rooibos, bresaola and twiggy, while the palate is flush with macerated cherries, cleansing acidity and grippy tannins. It’ll last some distance, even if it’s ready now." - 93 Points, Jane Faulkner, Halliday Wine Companion
McCutcheon Chardonnay 2025
$92 on special this week ($105 RRP)
"Pale, almost colourless in the glass. Nose is also ultra-reserved, yet to really develop its full bouquet, while the palate is juicy and taut, showing great depth and intensity but also yet to develop its full complexity. It does respond well to time in the glass. Gorgeous fruit-sweetness at its core, and an immensely long and refined aftertaste. A fabulous chardonnay. And will surely show more in another 6-12 months." - 98 Points, Huon Hooke, The Real Review
Wallis Chardonnay 2025
$92 on special this week ($105 RRP)
"Light, reserved straw-yellow hue; roasted almond and wheatmeal on the bouquet amongst the smoky reduction and toasty barrel aromas. Delicious wine—very intense and focused, with a dab of sweetness in the middle leading into a lingering, refined palate of impeccable balance and style. Lovely wine that really stays with you after it's gone. The most up-front of the three single vineyard Tractor chardies." - 96 Points, Huon Hooke, The Real Review
McCutcheon Pinot Noir 2025
$92 on special this week ($105 RRP)
"Medium-full red-purple; fresh new kid leather aromas combine with freshly turned earth and cranberry to blueberry fruits, the palate sweetly succulent with a juiciness backed by fine, firm tannins in perfect balance, the length of aftertaste impressive. Delicious wine already but one feels that it's just at the start of its journey and has more to show us given the time. It's a already delicious: a wine that grows on you with repeat sips." - 97 Points, Huon Hooke, The Real Review
Wallis Pinot Noir 2025
$92 on special this week ($105 RRP)
"Deep-ish red with a slight tint of purple; briary, earthy and underbush aromas, a little new leather, with what seems like a faint hint of VA, the palate taut and refined, with firm tense tannins that suggest it will reward another year or so to fully unfold. Good intensity and the flavours delve deep in the mid-palate. Fine wine, which begs for more time." - 96 Points, Huon Hooke, The Real Review
Strelley Farm Pinot Noir 2024
$30 on special this week ($34 RRP)
"2024 was a dream growing season for Tasmanian Pinot Noir, and this blend of 16% Tasman Peninsula, 41% East Coast and 43% Coal River Valley fruit takes full advantage. The wine is deep garnet in colour and exudes perfumed aromas of wild thyme, ripe plum, raspberry and dark cherry supported by subtle oak spice. The palate shows bright, juicy red fruit flavours upfront, matched by a dense core of dark cherry and supple tannin." - Winemaker Notes
Lowestoft Estate Chardonnay 2024
$62 on special this week ($69 RRP)
"A grower-driven chardonnay; Coal River Valley with East Coast and Tasmanian Peninsula fruit. Light straw with ripe white peach, nectarine and citrus fruits veiled in soft spice, nougat, clover blossom, meadow flowers, vanillin oak, grapefruit pith, crushed stone and ozone. A stunning saline, briny mineral cadence drives the wine forward. The fruit is gorgeous and the flavours draw out nicely. A great release from a very strong vintage." - 96+ Points, Dave Brookes, Halliday Wine Companion
Lowestoft Estate Pinot Noir 2023
$62 on special this week ($69 RRP)
"Pinot noir sourced from the Lower Derwent Valley (95%) and East Coast (5%), 25% whole bunch, and matured in large-format French oak (30% new) for 10 months. Lowestoft wines and winemaker Liam McElhinney have been on a roll lately, and the 2023 release sees that form continue unabated. Pure red cherry and red plum fruits daubed in fine spice, amaro herbs, forest floor and light gamey tones. Sour cherry coming through on the palate with fine, chalky tannins and a bright, lingering exit." - 95 Points, Dave Brookes, Halliday Wine Companion
Lowestoft Jacoben Pinot Noir 2024
$92 on special this week ($105 RRP)
"Sourced from a tiny 0.5ha vineyard on the east side of the lower Derwent River. Deep ruby with aromas of dark cherry and plum fruits with a sheen of wild strawberry and raspberry pip, veiled in exotic spice, dried meats, leaf litter, caraway, roasting game, crushed herbs, judicious nutty oak and citrus blossom and an expression of orange oil. More depth here yet not sacrificing tension and cut. Structured with fine, chalky tannins and a beautiful stony flair on the finish. A cracker from a superb vintage." - 96+ Points, Dave Brookes, Halliday Wine Companion
"Cherry, spice, earth, pencil, dried rose perfume, orange peel. Medium-bodied, a good sweep of graphite tannin, a rose oil and thyme perfume, cool balanced acidity offers a good bit of crunch, there’s some juicy strawberry in the mix too, then nutty and long with a fine tannin grip to close, and a little Earl Grey tea on the finish. Really good. So distinctive." - 95+ Points, Gary Walsh, The Wine Front
Lowestoft La Meilleure Chardonnay 2025
$92 on special this week ($105 RRP)
(Limited availability)
"Not produced since 2021 as it’s the best parcels of Chardonnay and only when they’re good enough. Lime, grapefruit, white peach, floral, light vanilla and almond, salted pistachio, spice and a whisper of fennel. Very fine and fluid, a fine powdery texture, a little savoury and saline, very long closing with a certain juiciness and quiet grip. Beautifully made, nothing out of place, yet it offers distinct character. Wonderful." - 96 Points, Gary Walsh, The Wine Front
Lowestoft La Maison Pinot Noir 2024
$120 on special this week ($135 RRP)
(Limited availability)
"Sourced from several individual slices of the Lowestoft vineyard; 50% whole bunch and matured for 10 months on French oak, 20% new. Mid-ruby with finely honed aromas of dark and red plum and cherries, wild strawberry and raspberry coulis with hints of fine, souk-like spice, crushed minerals, an expression of orange oil, citrus blossom, amaro, shiitake broth, charcuterie, judicious nutty oak, dried citrus rind and a wisp of undergrowth. Gorgeous fruit but man ... that savoury line is fantastic, all tension and stony purpose with melt-in-the-mouth crushed rock tannins and a super-long draw of flavour on the finish. A great release from a superb vintage." - 97+ Points, Dave Brookes, Halliday Wine Companion
"The 2024 La Maison Pinot Noir leads with waxy white flowers, sweet tobacco and red cherry notes. The wine has an exotic patchouli, raspberry, red apple character. The tannins are one of the features by which this wine is defined. The tannic load borders on immense, yet it serves to add gravitas and impact to the wine. I like this; I like the way it performs, but I would suggest that some further time in bottle—even if only a year—will help this to integrate even further. This was tasted at the Tasmanian Wine Show, where it achieved a well-deserved gold medal. I love the 2024 vintage, and this wine typifies it." - 95 Points, Erin Larkin, Wine Advocate
If you wish to purchase any of these wines, please use the links above
Otherwise, if you have any questions, please contact us on (07)32521117 or email sales@thewineemporium.com.au
// Special prices valid until Wednesday the 21st of October