Press Reviews
By selecting from the menu items at left you can read what some of the most respected wine scribes both in Australia and overseas write about De Bortoli wines. Select your favourite wine to see what the critics think of it.
De Bortoli Wines Press Reviews
"De Bortoli: From their $6 job right through to their expensive Yarra Valley stuff, they concentrate on making wines that go with food. I think their head wine maker is spending a lot of time in France which is rubbing off."
Greg Duncan Powell, Weekender (Sunshine Coast), 6 September 2007
2007 Winery of the Year - Quaff
"An amazing performance by De Bortoli across the range from cask wines, through bubblies, whites, pink and reds of all kinds, sweet wines and fortifieds. They won 10 Bloody Goods and 14 Good out of 56 wines entered. And many of these were in the ‘Sacred Hill’, ‘Montage’ and ‘Deen’ labels that sell for less than $10 a bottle. The wines represented in Quaff came from the Griffith winery in the Riverina where Darren De Bortoli is Chief Winemaker and the Dixon’s Creek winery in the Yarra where Steve Webber is in charge."
Peter Forrestal, Quaff 2007
2007 Winery of the Year - don't buy wine without me
"This award was almost impossible to judge, with so many wineries offering so many incredible value-for-money wines in 2006. But De Bortoli get the nod for the sheer depth and breadth of their offerings - even their casks are terrific. De Bortoli makes great wine under the Sacred Hill label, brilliant Victorian wines under the Windy Peak label and some of the sexiest cool-climate styles under their own Yarra Valley label. This is a family winery that is showing the way forward. Every winery in Australia could learn something from De Bortoli."
Stuart Gregor, Don't buy wine without me 2007
"It's also worth saying that outfits like De Bortoli Yarra Valley show the way forward for lots of folks...which is: understand the wine styles of the world, rather than just the wine styles of your backyard, and you can make truly interesting wines that will garner a lot of free promotion...and result in a sales momentum...at all price points.
Actually, De Bortoli Yarra Valley probably sum up where Australian wine is at the moment better than anybody: those people who really do understand wine, and the style of it, and the possibilities of it, are generally doing well."
Campbell Mattinson, quoted in The Key Report - Directions Project Edition, 3 May 2006
De Bortoli's Yarra Valley High
There's been a cultural and winemaking change at De Bortoli's Yarra Valley winery in the past few years - and the thing is, the wines were good to start with. But during the past year, a stream of quite exceptional wines has poured forth: sauvignon blanc, pinot noir, rosé, chardonnay, shiraz.
Steve Webber, winemaking chief at De Bortoli Yarra Valley, says that "2002 was the turning point. We looked at what we were doing, and we were totally unhappy; at our results, at how we were going about it, at where we seemed to be heading. From that moment on, we've moved away from herbicides, not for certification, just for us, just to have healthier land to grow our vines in. We've graded all our (vineyard) sites: if the vines were on an A-grade site, were they producing A-grade fruit? In some cases we've changed viticulture, in others we've grubbed the vines out totally and replanted."
De Bortoli decided it was better to spend on the vineyard than on the winery. Webber says it was about making the fruit better, not throwing in more oak: "All of this is a whole change of philosophy for us - and it's working. You want to see the [vineyard] blocks that have been changed over to organics, the organic blocks seem to want to balance themselves; the conventional blocks are far more vigorous. And the soil is better.
"We're not fooling ourselves" he adds. "We know about Yarra Valley cabernet, we know that...pinot noir still has a lot of potential. And we know that shiraz in the future could be better than the lot of them."
Campbell Mattinson, Gourmet Traveller Wine, April/May 2006
I also drank a lot of De Bortoli wines leading up to Christmas - thanks Leanne and Steve! I made loads of notes but have binned the lot; as TKR readers are in the business, I assume most of you will have noticed the huge amount of good reviews that De Bortoli wines received from all sections of the wine media in 2005? If not, start taking note of reviews of wines other than your own. Believe me, De Bortoli is doing well. Tasting across the range it's obvious why - from the sub $10 to the plus $40, every wine I have tried has been a cracker. Guys take this non-tasting note as the greatest compliment I can give.
Tony Key's The Key Report (Online Newsletter, Victoria, Australia), 12 January 2006