Let us pray and be thankful. The tiny vineyards of Barossa Valley old vine Grenache and Mataro took a terrible beating in the vine-pull scheme of the 1980s as desperate growers took desperate measures to survive. What were we thinking back then, why did survival mean pulling out our valuable heritage. Alas the Australian consumers were not ready. Steadily, a small band of smart, adventurous consumers have embraced Grenache while an even smaller group have embraced the merits of Barossa Mataro. Both are now saved, and new plantings of Grenache have commenced.
In some way, and this is hard to quantify, the geographical position of the Barossa Valley brings out the best in both varieties. The wines from both varieties show a dimension and a depth of flavour not found in the wines of other districts except for the Clare Valley and parts of McLaren Vale.
The Goat square wines are about tradition thus we use simple wine making methods which are applied to ripe to fully ripe fruit. The alcohol is one measure and the 15.1% alc/vol is our way of saying thank you to this wonderful vintage.
