“Beautiful spot for wine tasting - and lovely wines. We had an excellent time with Ben who taught us a lot about their wines and made the experience fun. Great value getting the premium wine tasting selection.”
ANISHA, Google Reviews
18 July 2019 | Zoe Crittenden
Aperitivo in August
Every Friday, Rollo will head into the cellar of over 1000 wines to open back vintages of our acclaimed Pinot Noir, Chardonnay and Cri de Coeur collection, plus some Italian & Spanish wine varieties.
Wine lovers will enjoy the chance to try limited release and museum wines not normally available at usual cellar door tastings. Order by the glass or sample a wine flight of Rollo’s selections that he’ll pick each Friday, alongside an antipasto plate of cured meats, olives and cheese from our favourite local producers on the Peninsula.
FRIDAYS IN AUGUST
4.30pm-6.30pm
Cellar Door open late for wines from the ‘Old & Rare Cellar’, current releases
Wines from $12 per glass
Antipasto plate for two $20
Drop on in….
18/07/2019 at 9:40 AM
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31 May 2019 | The Winemaking Team
Our vintage wrap up
The 2019 vintage on the Mornington Peninsula was warm and dry. It was a year which reinforced the importance of walking the vine rows, drawing on experience and intuition to mitigate the extremes of mother nature. Our mature vines drew on their deep root systems to stay productive and we left the canopy un-trellised in parts, offering shade to our precious fruit. We are happy (and a little relived) to say that the vintage is looking very promising at this early stage!
Bucking the trend of a hot year, our fruit came in with lovely natural acidity and a good balance of sugar and flavour ripeness. This was particularly true of the whites, which possess great ripeness paired with persistent acid through the palate. The reds are juicy, spicy and lively with some blocks showing wonderfully fine, lingering tannins.
As the rain falls and the cold sets in, the memory of vintage seems more distant than usual. It’s reassuring to know the Chardonnay and Pinot Noir batches are now tucked away for the winter. The next phase will be preparing the Rosato and Saludos for bottling in late July. Until then there is still plenty to do in the winery, even if the urgency has eased a little.
31/05/2019 at 10:39 AM
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29 May 2019 | Renee Street
Our vegan friendly wines
More and more, we are getting asked from our customers, is your wine vegan friendly? To make it a little easier to determine, here is a list below of all our current Vegan friendly wines.
29/05/2019 at 2:19 PM
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22 May 2019 | Renee Street
Chardonnay – the winemakers blank canvas
Chardonnay continues to hold a special place among Australian wine lovers, and remains the nation’s top white variety, second overall behind Shiraz.
The Crittenden family have been making Chardonnay on the Mornington Peninsula for 35 years. As you enter the estate, you drive past the vines that were planted by the family back in 1982. These vines are some of the oldest you’ll find in the region.
Chardonnay is one of those wonderful grape varieties that allows for interpretive winemaking techniques. Its versatility means it’s almost like giving a winemaker a blank canvas to create a Chardonnay to their taste and style. A Chardonnay made in the Napa Valley would most likely taste completely different to one made on the Mornington Peninsula. Perhaps surprisingly though, two wineries in the same region could also produce Chardonnays that taste completely different depending on each winemaker’s preferred style, taste and techniques.
Crittenden Estate creates several different Chardonnays from the original family plantings and also with grapes sourced from other local growers. All of these are hand harvested and whole bunch pressed, however the nose and palate characteristics vary from wine to wine.
One of our premium Chardonnays, ‘The Zumma’ is traditional blend from the oldest plantings on our vineyard. It’s a rich and complex wine that retains a level of finesse due to the Mornington Peninsula’s cool climate. On the nose you’ll find lemon zest and fig with almond notes providing savouriness to the palate.
The ‘Kangerong’ Chardonnay, also from the home vineyard, is a blend of 3 individual blocks ranging in vine age and aspect. Its aroma shows more robust characters of white stone fruit and citrus whilst still retaining a beautiful core of vibrant acid which is again attributable to the cooling effect of the region’s maritime influences.
Chardonnay is one of the many examples of how a wine can take you on a journey you didn’t expect. We have a lot of people who say to us, “Oh I’m not a Chardonnay drinker”. They then taste and compare a few of the different Chardonnays we have in our wine centre and discover it’s a variety they enjoy after all - they just preferred one over another. Perhaps it was a more rich or complex style versus those that have more acidity or fruit drive. That’s the advantage of the Crittenden Wine Centre tasting experience, you’re able to compare wines and styles and no doubt discover at least a few wines that suit your personal palate.
If it's been a while since you've tasted a Chardonnay, why not come and discover how the variety may have changed from what you last remember...
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22/05/2019 at 2:43 PM
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