Yabby Lake Vineyard of the Mornington Peninsula has taken out top honours at the 2015 Macquarie Group Sydney Royal Wine Show, with its 2013 Single Vineyard Block Release Block 2 Pinot Noir winning the coveted Macquarie Group Perpetual Trophy Best Wine of Show.
The vineyard had an extremely successful year, with its star Pinot Noir taking home an additional five trophies, including the celebrated Fine Wine Partners Perpetual Trophy.
This trophy is the only one of its kind in Australia and one of the highest accolades a wine producer can attain, as it is judged from the top wines at each of the Capital City Wine Shows. The same wine was awarded Champion Wine of the Show by a different judging panel at the 2014 National Wine Show.
A total of 34 trophies and 1,153 Sydney Royal medals were awarded to entrants, which came from a pool of 2,330 entries. This year, 30 judges tasted their way through wines from 69 different classes, submitted by 344 exhibitors.
Rosé proved to be on-trend, as after being judged with food for the first time in 2014, the class received more than three times the number of entries. A record four Rosés received gold medals, including the Adelaide Hills’s Longview Vineyard 2014 Boat Shed Rosato, which took home two trophies.
In her first year as chair of judges, Samantha Connew said this year’s event highlighted the diversity, both region and variety, of a wine portfolio that continues to draw the attention of wine lovers both in Australia and around the world.
“In 2015, we awarded 28 more Gold medals than we did last year. This reflects both the excellent 2012, 2013 and 2014 vintages and the exceptional quality of some of the older wines coming through,” Connew said.
“It was exciting to see single vineyard wines from small producers win both the Best White Wine and the Best Red Wine trophies – a reflection of how these producers have placed a lot of focus on the quality of their grapes and where they have come from.”
Full results of the 2015 Macquarie Group Sydney Royal Wine Show are available here.