Hickinbotham: some impressive wines from a special site in South Australia’s McLaren Vale
Website: https://www.hickinbothamwines.com.au/
The Hickinbotham Clarendon Vineyard is one of the most celebrated sites in Australia’s McLaren Vale. Although its viticultural history dates back to 1858, the current site was established in 1971 by Alan David Hickinbotham. This was the time when David Wynn was establishing vines in the High Eden, and Alan bought this site because it had the highest elevation in the McLaren Vale. Most of the vines are at 220-240 m, with the highest point 256 m.
The Hickinbotham family were important in the Australian wine industry. Alan’s father, also called Alan, was the first lecturer in wine science at Roseworthy. Alan’s Brother, Ian, was an important winemaker (he bought Wolf Blass to Australia and was the first in Australia to understand and control malolactic fermentation), and Ian’s son Stephen Hickinbotham was widely recognized as one of the brightest lights in the industry until his death in 1986 in a light-plane crash.
This 186-hectare property of rolling hillsides remained under Hickinbotham family ownership for more than 40 years until it was purchased by the Jackson family in 2012. Up to this stage, the grapes had all been sold to a roll list of prime wineries, including Penfolds, Clarendon Hills and Hardys. The only time Hickinbotham appeared on the label was on Clarendon Hills’ wine.
Jackson Family carried on selling some grapes, but with 2012 they began making four wines: Shiraz, Merlot, Cabernet Sauvignon and a Cabernet Shiraz blend, using the old terraced plantings which date back to 1971. Since 2019 the vineyard has been farmed biodynamically, under the control of Michael Lane.
With winemakers Christopher Carpenter (Napa-based, focusing on Bordeaux varieties) and Peter Fraser (Yangarra’s winemaker, handling Rhône varieties), the vineyard began producing its own label wines. Christ makes Lokoya and Cardinale in Napa, and comes over three times a year to Australia. On site winemaker at Hickinbotham is Guillaume Camougrand.
All the old contoured blocks, planted in 1971 at 155 to 230 m altitude, were dry grown from the start, although they have recently put in irrigation just for the Cabernet Sauvignon.
The geology here is fairly uniform. The soils are 50% degraded old rock, based on siltstone, with the parent rock underneath being 750 million years old Belair Subgroup [this is a marine-deposited sediment, a Neoproterozoic sedimentary rock unit in the Adelaide Superbasin of South Australia, consisting mainly of interbedded siltstones, shales, and coarse sandstones, including the Mintaro Shale and Mitcham Quartzite]. These soils can hold moisture quite well, which makes dry growing possible.
There are 70 hectares under vine here and they still sell a lot of grapes. In the future they may sell off some of the vineyard that they aren’t using for their own wines.
In the early days the Hickinbotham wines were a bit oakier and riper than they are now. The oak regime is now around 40-50% new, classic Bordeaux coopers.
THE WINES
Hickinbotham Trueman Cabernet Sauvignon 2012 McLaren Vale, Australia
14% alcohol. Nice dense, sweet spicy berry and cherry fruits. Has some warmth with a touch of blackcurrant character. Dense and quite well structured with a core of sweet fruit and some warm, slightly dusty spiciness on the finish, which is a little warm. Developing in a nice way. 93/100
Hickinbotham Trueman Cabernet Sauvignon 2016 McLaren Vale, Australia
14% alcohol. This is ripe but really well balanced with sweet blackcurrant and cherry fruit with some warm berry notes. Fresh despite its size, with lovely depth of fruit. Has freshness, a touch of florality, good structure and well integrated oak. Warm and slightly spicy, but with harmony and presence. 95/100
Hickinbotham Trueman Cabernet Sauvignon 2018 McLaren Vale, Australia
14% alcohol. This is ripe and concentrated, with lovely dense blackcurrant fruit and some warm berry character. Lovely weight and texture in the mouth: smooth but well defined with fine-grained tannins. Has a hint of Indian spices around the edges. Lovely in a ripe style. 95/100
Hickinbotham Trueman Cabernet Sauvignon 2019 McLaren Vale, Australia
14.5% alcohol. 75% new oak. A dry year with low yields, with tiny berries. This is dense and structured with vivid blackcurrant fruit and some fine spicy detail. The oak integrates well. Good tannic structure here with a core of sweet fruit. So textural and vivid, with great balance and intensity. Ripe but firm, and avoids being at all jammy. 95/100
Hickinbotham Trueman Cabernet Sauvignon 2021 McLaren Vale, Australia
14% alcohol. Aged 15 months in French oak barrels, 60% new. This is the one that was blended remotely by Chris because of lockdown. This shows fresh, floral blackcurrant fruit with nice density but also lovely balance. There’s a sleekness to the fruit, but also some floral perfume and freshness on the finish. Very stylish. 96/100
Hickinbotham Trueman Cabernet Sauvignon 2022 McLaren Vale, Australia
14% alcohol. 60% new oak. Powerful and structured with concentrated blackcurrant fruit and some sweet floral cherry notes around the outside. Pure, structural, with nicely integrated oak. Nice tannins here: they are present but not overpowering, and are resolving really nicely. Powerful and dense but with real finesse. 95/100
Hickinbotham Shiraz 2021 McLaren Vale, Australia
Sweetly aromatic with freshness and florality, with cherries, some green herbal hints and a touch of tar. The palate is very bright with a juicy quality to the sweet berry and cherry fruit, with some silkiness as well as a hint of greenness on the finish. Powerful but still vibrant. 93/100
The Peake
‘I love that Cabernet Shiraz is a thing that only Australia does,’ says Peter. He used the Bin60A to sell the concept to Chris Carpenter and Barbara Banke. ‘It is seamless claret, it’s the only way I can describe it. We also need to believe in our heritage and our story. When we were selling wines as Claret and Hermitage, the Clarets would have been Cab Shiraz.’ They try to make the Shiraz more fragrant to complement the tannin of the Cabernet.
Hickinbotham The Peake Cabernet Shiraz 2013 McLaren Vale, Australia
14% alcohol. 57% Cabernet Sauvignon, 43% Shiraz. Spicy and tarry on the nose with nice brightness and a bit of earthy development. Old school palate is spicy and tarry with nice acidity, some spiciness and some softness on the mid-palate. Ripe, sweet blackcurrant fruit with some sweet cherry and strawberry notes. In a really nice place now, showing development. 94/100
Hickinbotham The Peake Cabernet Shiraz 2016 McLaren Vale, Australia
14% alcohol. 57% Cabernet Sauvignon, 43% Shiraz. 100% new oak. Grippy and focused with sweet blackcurrant fruit and some appealing berry notes. Firmly structured with a hint of mint and some nice grippiness, with gravelly notes and tar and pepper savouriness on the finish. Still quite grippy. 94/100
Hickinbotham The Peake Cabernet Shiraz 2018 McLaren Vale, Australia
14% alcohol. 55% Cabernet Sauvignon, 45% Shiraz. 50% new oak. Concentrated, dense and textural with sweet black cherry and blackberry fruit, showing some notes of tar, ash and spice. Real concentration here: rich, spicy, vivid and bold. There’s a real concentration to this wine, and a core of sweet fruit. 94/100
Hickinbotham The Peake Cabernet Shiraz 2020 McLaren Vale, Australia
14% alcohol. 52% Cabernet Sauvignon, 48% Shiraz. 60% new oak. Fresh, floral and dense with lovely sweet blackcurrant and blackberry fruit. There’s a sweet core to the fruit and a purity. Generous with a twist of ginger and dried herb sitting under the sweet, generous, floral, expressive fruit. A really lovely, complete wine. 95/100
Hickinbotham The Peake Cabernet Shiraz 2021 McLaren Vale, Australia
14.5% alcohol. 60% Cabernet Sauvignon, 40% Shiraz. 60% new oak for the Cabernet. This is powerful and structured with lovely sweet floral cherry fruit as well as some blackcurrant. This is structured and focused with floral aromatics combining with dense fruit. Such grippy structure under the fruit, with nice finesse. This has lots of potential but you can drink it now. 96/100
Hickinbotham The Peake Cabernet Shiraz 2022 McLaren Vale, Australia
14% alcohol. 52% Cabernet Sauvignon, 48% Shiraz. This is firm, grippy and dense with a wide dynamic range with sweet blackberry and blackcurrant fruit, with a nice tension. Grippy and expressive with massive potential for development, with the ripe fruit hemmed in by nice acidity and firm tannins. 95/100
Also, a sample:
Wholebunch Shiraz 2024
Just one puncheon made, from a ton of fruit, 100% whole. Complex, fragrant, perfumed with sweet black fruits and some nice green hints as well as pepper and cured meat. Such concentration and freshness with nice tannins and acidity, and such focus. Very fine indeed – potentially one of Australia’s great Shiraz wines! Remarkable stuff. 96-98/100
Hickinbotham Shiraz 2023
Picked at potentially 12.5% alcohol, finishes at 13.5% alcohol. Dark, brooding, sweet cherries and spicy grip with nice concentration and freshness. Real depth, freshness and complexity. So lovely. 94-95/100
