Boutique winery hits the mark

For a large-ish, small-ish winery, Howard Park sure has a lot of wines in its portfolio.

When former Wynns Coonawarra Estate winemaker John Wade started Howard Park in Western Australia's Great Southern region in 1986, he had just two wines: a riesling and a cabernet merlot.

There were only two wines when Jeff and Amy Burch bought their initial share in Howard Park in 1993.

Today, Howard Park operates two wineries and two cellar doors, one in Margaret River, the other in Denmark in the Great Southern. It owns a substantial vineyard in each region: 76 hectares in Margaret River and 62 hectares in the Great Southern. And it farms three other vineyards.

The wine range has grown upwards and outwards as well as sideways. Even the mid-market Mad Fish brand has expanded and budded like a happy yeast cell. You would have to assume it's a sign of prosperity.

There are now four levels of Mad Fish: Gold Turtle at the top, Grandstand and Sideways in the middle and the original Mad Fish at the base.

There's a range of $45 single-vineyard reds (Leston shiraz and cabernet from Margaret River and Scotsdale shiraz and cabernet from Great Southern) and, covering all the marketing bases, there's also a regional range. It comprises a Great Southern chardonnay, pinot noir and shiraz under the Flint Rock label, and a Margaret River cabernet sauvignon and sauvignon blanc semillon under the Miamup label.

At the top of the tree, the two original wines reign supreme: the cabernet is now named Abercrombie and has passed the $110-a-bottle mark; the Great Southern riesling has been split into two bottlings, the newer one being Porongurup riesling, the other remaining a Great Southern regional blend.

Recently, a clutch of $30 sparkling wines joined the act.

As if all this were not enough, Howard Park – or, rather, the Burch Family Wines – came out with a whole new range a couple of years ago, Marchand & Burch. This is a collaboration between burgundy-loving friends Jeff Burch and Frenchman Pascal Marchand, who lives in Burgundy and has been the director of winemaking at Domaine Comte Armand and Domaine dela Vougeraie. Marchand has sourced red and white burgundies from basic bourgogne appellation right up to grand cru status, all packaged under screw caps. There's also a mighty fine Porongurup chardonnay and pinot noir under the same label.

I'm on record as saying the 2011 Marchand & Burch Porongurup Chardonnay is one of the great Australian chardonnays of the moment. It's tremendously tight and refined, powerful and long and wonderfully detailed, with the potential to age and grow in complexity for many years.

Its style probably owes more to full-time chief winemaker Janice McDonald than to absentee winemaker Marchand. McDonald has been in charge of winemaking at Howard Park for two years, before which she made a highly respected name for herself at Stella Bella and Deep Woods Estate. She has more than 25years' experience in winemaking and started out as a brewer with Phil Sexton at Matilda Bay and Little Creatures. Mention should be also made of Michael Kerrigan, her predecessor, who made the wines during the company's massive growth phase. Kerrigan is still in Margaret River but is his own master, having bought Hay Shed Hill.

The top Howard Park wines have always been made to cellar. The current-release 2010 Abercrombie is a case in point: don't try to drink it now because you might not get $110 worth of pleasure: it is closed and tight. Put it in the cellar and leave for at least a decade. Irecently opened a bottle of the 1996 (cabernet merlot) and it was absolutely sublime: a great wine at 17years, and still at least a decade of life in it.

Likewise, the Great Southern riesling. The 2012 is fairly tight and closed, although I fancy these wines are being made in a less formidable, more approachable style than they were in the 1980s and '90s. In those days, their acidity was frighteningly high. In 2012, I happened to taste the 2006, and it had mellowed into a great wine, albeit still with some way from full maturity. The fruit purity and finesse of this wine are hallmarks of the style. The region is cooler than any of South Australia's riesling regions and I suspect its fame for riesling in the future will be at least as great as any of the South Australian regions. Porongurup makes even finer riesling than MountBarker or Frankland, which is why Burch has focused increasingly on that subregion, and released a Porongurup riesling as a companion to the Great Southern riesling. Both are outstanding.

On its website, Burch Family Wines claims to be "Western Australia's largest boutique family-owned winery". The wines are most impressive. There's seldom a wine that doesn't live up to its claims, and the lower-priced wines often surpass expectations.

It's often said that a boutique winery is one that crushes no more than 500 tonnes of grapes per vintage. Howard Park crushed 1600 tonnes for its own brands this year. Contract winemaking for third parties boosted the grape intake by another 2000 tonnes.

Burch Family Wines is very much a family business, with three of Jeff and Amy Burch's family are now involved in the business. While Amy is general manager and Jeff is chief executive, Natalie is operations manager, David W. is in sales and marketing, and Richard is brand manager for the east coast. And Jeff's brother, David P. Burch, is vineyard manager. That's about as ''family'' as you'll find anywhere.

huon@huonhooke.com

Correction: In last week's column I said the late Cyril Henschke was a Rhodes Scholar; in fact he was a Churchill Fellow.