Agricola Vintners
Agricola Vintners is a Mattinson 10-Star Winery — Campbell Mattinson's highest honour.
Barossa Valley.
Callum Powell was raised in the Barossa; he knows the Barossa and Eden lands, and their peoples, as well as any; both his local landscape and the world at large are his oyster.
The case.
When I sat down to the 2024 release of Agricola Vintners K Sands Shiraz, these were the first words to spill out: “Shake the hand of the future because here it is. This Barossa Valley shiraz is just, simply, wildly good.” I wrote these words for The Winefront site, where I concluded with the words: “The Barossa and its old vines are treasures of the world. Drink this wine and know.” These comments followed the comments made of Agricola Vintners 2023 releases, which were a landmark. The Barossa Valley is a benchmark region for shiraz and grenache. There’s too much to the Barossa for it to ever be redefined. But the excitement being generated by Agricola Vintners and a limited few others, with old vine vineyards in tow, is a lava-flow revolution for the region. This is not a revolution of rules or counter-rules; it’s a revolution of quality in its sheerest form. These wines are different and the same. They are the ultimate honour of their land and of its peoples. These wines are not the Barossa as the outstretched frontier; they are the Barossa brought home.
The wines that prove the case.
Agricola Vintners Ebenezer 2024 (Barossa Valley): I love how different this wine is. I love its fine-grained tannin, which seems to stretch longer than the 90-mile beach, and which pulls such juicy, mouthwatering acidity along with it.
Agricola Helen 2024 (Barossa/Eden valleys): A creamy, vanillin, boot polish note is the sleigh to a ride built on red, black and blue berried fruits, nuts, salted licorice and assorted twiggy spice notes. Emphasis here on those nutty characters, which then seem to weave into the silt of the tannin. This is upper echelon Barossa/Eden Shiraz, polished, fine-grained, elongated, its bunch notes serving to cool the smoulder of fruit, its creaminess presenting its spice notes as a paste. I could barely be more impressed. 96 points – Campbell Mattinson.
—
See also [42 Reviews of Agricola Vintners wines on The Winefront]
Agricola Vintners is a Mattinson 10-Star Winery – the highest honour awarded by Australian wine critic Campbell Mattinson. 10-Star status recognises one thing: the quality of the wine in the glass, every glass, across the range. The full list of 10-Star Wineries constitutes Australia's Best Wineries.
