By James Atkinson
The Hunter Valley should ignore the "wine industry wankers" and do more to promote the region's popular Verdelho wines, declares Jay Tulloch, who was honoured last week for his family's long-running support of the variety.
Tulloch had the trophy for Current Vintage – Verdelho renamed in his honour at the region's wine show lunch on Friday.
In accepting the honour, the Tulloch Wines patriarch echoed daughter Christina's sentiments in hitting back at the Hunter Valley identities who continue to look down on Verdelho.
"Some people might think that to have a Verdelho trophy named after you is not very good, but my family's been making wine from Verdelho since the early 1900s, and we've gone a long way since then," he said.
"Verdelho has been denigrated by this wine show by past judges and present and we've seen that today unfortunately."
"I'll take [chair of judges] Jim Chatto to task – he should bloody wake up to himself."
Tulloch, whose family also won the prestigious Wine of Provenance award (pictured above) for their Hector of Elgin Shiraz, said Verdelho is the most reliable variety in the Hunter, benefiting from early ripening, general hardiness and resistance to disease pressure.
"It does not need lengthy maturity and she gets your money in the bank sooner!" he said.
"The preoccupation we have in this valley with… Semillon is ridiculous."
"I suggest that because of the attributes Verdelho has, you don't listen to the 'WIWs' – wine industry wankers – make up your own minds and support it," Tulloch thundered.
He challenged Mike De Iuliis, president of the Hunter Valley Wine and Tourism Association, to "get off your backside and promote Verdelho and Chardonnay as well as Semillon".
I agree with the Tulloch family on this. Verdelho is a great variety to produce lighter bodied drinkable whites. While the Australian industry was busy shooting itself in the foot over this the Kiwis have stolen a large slab of our domestic and international market with sauvignon blanc.