SC Pannell Sunrise 100 Grenache 2023

SC Pannell Sunrise 100 Grenache 2023

Stephen’s interest in Grenache stretches back to the mid-nineties. Upon arriving in McLaren Vale, a preference for making medium bodied wine led Stephen to Grenache and the love affair began. Given the region’s warm Mediterranean climate and proximity to the ocean Grenache is ideally suited to McLaren Vale and perfectly at home with our food and lifestyle.

In 2021 the opportunity to purchase a nine-hectare Grenache vineyard planted in 1922 in the heart of Blewitt Springs including two bush vine blocks one facing the morning sun and the other warmed by the setting sun, was too good to pass up. Finally, Stephen had a home for S.C.Pannell Grenache.

Block 5, Little Branch Vineyard, Blewitt Springs, 104-year-old bush vines grown on atypical Blewitt Springs sandy loam with ironstone and quartz at 140m above sea level facing East. Unirrigated, managed organically, pruned and harvested by hand.

The third year of a La Nina cycle; a rare weather event that delivers wet winters and cool summers, favourable conditions for dry-grown vineyards. The yields were small, concentrating flavours, and long hang times delivered tannin intensity resulting in complex, age-worthy wines. Stephen favours these cooler years, and believes they will be ones to watch.

Sunrise block’s 100th vintage began with harvest on the 20th of March. Whole berries were gently shaken from the rachis and sent to a seasoned 4000L French oak fermenter for twice daily pump-overs. Gently pressed on the 31st of March and settled in tank for 19 days before racking off gross lees and transfer to seasoned French oak puncheons for malolactic fermentation and maturation. Racked once and bottled on the 4th of July 2023, unfined and unfiltered.

Last years release saw rave reviews - with 100 points from the Wine Advocate. I was immediately taken when first seeing the wine, and knowing and having tasted many Italian wines with Stephen, it felt like this was a wine that had been in his veins for a long time, the culmination of all those years here and abroad experimenting and falling in love with Italianate structures and shapes. It was reminscent of Barbaresco in weight and line, with this sinewy nature and al dente tannin composition.

One of the staff members asked me on return from the tasting whether it stacked up for the money, and the response was absolutely - we often see wines in this bracket that don't carry anywhere near the level of complexity or detail on hand here, and Sunrise 99 pushed the upper echelon of what can be achieved in the global perception of qualitative Australian winemaking. This was breaking the glass ceiling of Blewitt Grenache.

Just this week, we were fortunate enough to sit down with a few more of our staff and taste the latest 2023s with Stephen. It seems hyperbolic to go harder than what we saw with the first release of the 2022, but this takes everything contained in the previous release and just adds this layer of extra intensity and vibrancy seen from the cooler, longer vintage. Sunrise 100 is a what every industry individual has been talking about with Australian Grenache, the serious side of Grenache, a low pH wine with natural angles and tension, lithe, ferric tannins and a coiled, sinew drive through its core.

When talking with Stephen, the Italianate references are often leant into, it's a natural progression from his time spent overseas and work with the Vaira family in Barolo, but it's also inspirational in it's influence to his style and education on the feel and flow of wines. Sunrise 100 feels like Grenache with that Italianate inspiration - taking the playbook from Nebbiolo, another low pH, structural variety - and giving it the Blewitt Springs treatment, finding it's feet straddling the line of lifted sandy Grenache and lithe, tensile Barbaresco. Stephen says he's never made better wines than his last 5 years, and I'd tend to agree - this is knockout!

The second release from this home vineyard in Blewitt Springs. The 100 here references 100 years of vintages from these vines (omitting the fledgling unproductive years). All destemmed fruit, old oak, frugal quantities. This sits in a moodier, brooding zone – refined and unadorned, though – with dark red fruits corded into a structure of assertive natural tannin and energetic acidity. Air reveals dried cranberry and cherry, raspberry leaf tea, subdued souk spices, tobacco leaf, rusted iron, dried rose, bergamot, a brooding malty note, like dark rye bread. It’s a wine of many layers, so closely serried that they are initially easy to miss. That compression, the complex weave of tannin, the vibrant drive of acid all mark this as a wine that will age spectacularly. 98 Points – Marcus Ellis, Halliday Wine Companion