SA Wine Guide 2025

EDEN VALLEY RIESLING 2024 VINTAGE SUMMARY TONY LOVE

It’s early October in the Barossa and the annual Taste of Spring gathering of Eden Valley Riesling winemakers is underway. It’s a much-anticipated ritual where the current vintage is revealed for all to taste and ponder what nature has provided for the year. This year there are close to 50 new wines, lined up alphabetically on a row of long tables in the Peter Lehmann Winery’s Old Redemption Cellars, while to one side another 20 museum and special releases provide a longer perspective, stretching back as far as 2006. The mood is buoyant. The 2024 vintage has been considered a superb season for Eden Valley Riesling, the benchmark white wine from the Barossa zone, grown and nurtured in the higher altitude reaches to the east of the main Barossa Valley floor region. The Eden Valley tells a different story climatically to the rest of the greater Barossa, especially during summer’s growing season when cooler nights temper the ripening of the riesling grapes, preserving their natural acidity and extending their beloved citrus flavour enhancement. On and underground, dramatic hilly country can determine specific vineyard conditions, while nutrient-poor soils, and plenty of rock and gravel promote a distinctive minerality in the wines of the area, according to many of the growers and winemakers connected to the region. The country itself, settled in townships like Angaston and smaller hamlets such as Eden Valley, Springton and Keyneton, and marked by mysterious rocky outcrops as well as magnificent gum trees across quite varied topography, conjures a land of struggle against the elements and stoic resilience. Riesling, as well as many distinctive Shiraz wines, are the hard-working vinous heroes of this unique environment, the former now synonymous with Eden Valley. Across a huge diversity of styles and winemaking techniques – from free-run juice only to the addition of pressings, from cultured to wild yeast, from subtle use of residual sugar to austerely dry – Eden Valley’s Riesling has a recognisable character.

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The Vintage Journal – Regional Focus

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