Pooley Chardonnay Cooinda Vale 2018 1.5L

Cooinda Vale began in 1985 as little more than a retirement hobby for Denis and Margaret Pooley — just seventeen rows of Riesling and Pinot Noir planted on their own roots at Campania, in Tasmania's Coal River Valley. What followed was anything but casual: further plantings through 1998, 2000, 2013, 2018, 2020, and 2022 have grown the site to around 18 hectares, sitting on north-east-facing slopes at 130 metres, on sandy loams over clay, sheltered from prevailing winds yet still shaped by maritime influence. For close to a decade, the vineyard's Chardonnay quietly played a significant role in one of Australia's most celebrated white wines — Penfolds' famous Yattarna blend — before Anna Pooley, the family's third-generation winemaker, began keeping the fruit separate from 2016 onward to make a genuine single-vineyard expression in its own right. Each vintage is hand-picked and whole-bunch pressed, then given meticulous barrel fermentation and extended maturation in fine-grained French oak.

The result has been described by Halliday's Dave Brookes as showing "slinky texture and elegant line," earning a striking 95 points — praise entirely in keeping with Cooinda Vale's reputation as the more graceful, refined sibling to the powerful, structured Butcher's Hill. Expect juicy white peach, nectarine, and citrus fruit meeting soft spice, clover blossom, crème fraîche, oatmeal, and almond paste, with crushed riverstone and a touch of lemon curd carrying through to a long, stony, savoury finish.