Award winning wines
Tahbilk has a long history of producing fine wines with the help of ferric-oxide/sandy loam soils and temperate climate. With over 160 years of winemaking experience, you are sure to find some absolute gems in the repertoire. Home to some of Australia’s most iconic and rare single vineyard wines you are sure to find a story in every bottle.
5 Star Halliday Winery
Throughout its career, Tahbilk has obtained over 1000 awards for wines produced on the Estate at all the world's principal exhibitions. These awards include the Diploma of Honour, the highest award obtainable at the Greater London Exhibition of 1899. Also, first Order of Merit and Medals in London, Philadelphia, Paris, Bordeaux, Calcutta, Brussels, Amsterdam, Melbourne, Adelaide and Dunedin.
Tahbilk’s commitment to making wines of exceptional quality has been recognised by many in the Australian Wine Industry. The most notable recognition comes from Australia’s best known and most respected wine critic James Halliday.
James Halliday has spent decades at the forefront of wine writing and judging. Known for his stylish yet authoritive writing style Halliday has been tasting Tahbilk wines since the 1970s.
Tahbilk continues to hold an underlined 5 red star rating as a part of James Halliday’s annual winery reviews. Red star, underlined wineries being recognised for producing outstanding wines of exemplary quality and typicity with at least two wines rated at 95points or above, and typically have held a 5-star rating for the previous three years. In Tahbilk’s case, as underlined, we are acknowledged as also having a long track record of over a decade of excellence. The best of the best.
1860s Vines Shiraz
Amongst some of the oldest Shiraz plantings in the world is the 1860 Vines Shiraz. Surviving the phylloxera plague that decimated many vineyards, we continue to produce limited quantities of wine from a ½ hectare of original un-grafted, pre-phylloxera Estate vines. The 1860 Vines Shiraz has incredibly strong regional provenance and is made for long term cellaring. These wines are the pride of the Purbrick family and are amongst some of the rarest in the world.
It is amazing how this unfurls in the glass. As if those old vines have a point to make – not so much ‘look at me’ rather, ‘I am all about grace’. Everything us just so. The red and blue fruits, the dash of spices and the cedary oak that’s tucked in as well. It’s medium-bodied yet there’s length once the supple tannins finish gliding across the palate – Jane Faulkner, Halliday Wine Companion 2021.
1927 Vines Marsanne
This limited release single vineyard wine, crafted from vine cuttings planted in 1927, was first released from the 1998 vintage. The fruit is harvested early at high natural acidity levels with no additions, the juice becomes fully oxidised. The clean juice is fermented at low temperatures with the resultant wine ‘water’ clear, flavourless and with high acidity. The wine is then bottled and that’s where the magic happens.
‘Once bottled, all the magic happens over time as it evolves into a wonderful textural, mineral wine. It’s a classic ugly duckling to beautiful swan story. By making the wine this way it develops in the bottle slowly and has long term cellaring potential.’ - Alister Purbrick
The impressive character and complexity of these wines continues to grow from both wine writers and critics through to Wine Show judges with the Trophy and Medal tally increasing year on year.
Eric Stevens Purbrick
Eric Purbrick was the driving force behind Tahbilk in the early days, steering the business through the depression and assuming the role of winemaker with much help from industry friends and his influential mentor, Francois de Castella. The change from fortified to table wine came in due course and the winery entered the boom times of the 1960s with a spring in its step, celebrating their centenary to much fanfare in 1960, and Eric became a pivotal figure in the Australian wine industry. – Wine Selectors
Eric was one of the first to place his faith in the future of Australian table wines and was at the forefront of varietal labelling. Perhaps his greatest legacy was to create the ‘Special Bin’ range of reds, beginning with a Shiraz in 1948, even Penfolds (Grange Hermitage) did not release a wine of this kind until the 1990s.
Selected from the most outstanding casks produced on the Estate from a particular vintage, these wines became known as ‘Reserve’ in 1985. Then, in celebration of Eric’s foresight, from 2002 they fittingly now carry his name and signature.
