Little Reddie Bootleg Red 2022

The Wine

Certified organic, Grenache 60% and Mourvèdre 40%. The fruit was sourced from two parcels in the Nagambie Lakes region in Central Victoria, where the soils are a combination of clay, sand, silt and gravel with topsoils rich in iron oxide. The Grenache was hand-picked in late March and fully destemmed, then fermented wild in cement at warm temperatures with regular pump-overs for two weeks. It was aged in old hogsheads. The Mourvèdre was hand-picked in early April and whole-bunch pressed to stainless steel for a cool ferment before resting on gross lees for a few months. The two wines were blended in early summer, then bottled unfined and unfiltered in late December.  

 

The Details
Variety - Grenache, Mourvedre
Country - Australia
Region - Victoria
Sub Region -Nagambie Lakes 
Extra - Screwcap
Year - 2022
Volume - 750ml

Pat Underwood has always been on our radar... Firstly as that incredibly jovial sommelier at Melbourne’s City Wine Shop (THE guy to ask what one should drink), and now as the still-incredibly-jovial winemaker of Little Reddie. Pat runs his negociant winemaking project out of Colbinabbin and Malmsbury, Victoria (he also co-founded the Boomtown Co-op, an urban-style country winery in Castlemaine, known for their gorgeous vin de soif). His first vintage was 2015.

The strength in this tiny label is talent and exuberance of Pat himself: he's dedicated to uncovering unique vineyards in Central Victoria, whether it’s tiny dry-grown plots in Malmsbury, obscure plantings of indigenous Venetian varieties or deep red, iron rich sites planted to beautifully bloody and mineral Nebbiolo. His relationships with his growers are fierce, in part due to his charming personality, but also because he works alongside them wherever he can, sharing ethics and values on the land and in the cellar.

Pat’s wines are made with passionate intuition and minimal intervention across the board—not necessarily with the aim of producing 'low fi' wine he says, but to give a truer representation of the season and terroir. He thus calls it 'hi-fi'—we like it. Due to the negociant-style nature of the Little Reddie beast, the wines available change as frequently as the vintage and places from which they derive. There are some mainstays, like his NEW! Nebbiolo Refosco (a play on the French nouveau and representing an immediately digestible style of red), the luscious “Super Juice” rosé, his cheeky Pét-nat, and Pinot and Chardonnay from the Rush Brothers vineyard in Malmsbury. Added to this are his SYR (Single Year Release) projects, which are always rare and exciting things. They have recently included a bottle fermented Prosecco from Nagambie and a Shiraz carved from a small parcel off Bannockburn Vineyards’ Winery Block.