Spring has arrived at Tahbilk and the place is buzzing. At this winery on the banks of the Goulburn River near Nagambie, not only have the buds burst but the billabongs are booming with spotted march frogs, Murray River turtles and the river red gum forest is alive with echidnas trailing after one another on the forest floor as koalas graze quietly on leaves in the canopy. This soundnatural drama unfolds in front of your eyes in the Tahbilk Café, a beautiful modern, wood-lined dining room overlooking a billabong fringed with blue flowering lilies.
‘This is my workplace,’ says chef Jonathon Mackeson. A polite and erudite Englishman, he cooks food that partners Tahbilk’s wines perfectly. He presents a plate of ancient grains with freshly harvested spring radishes, rocket, mizuna, seasonal greens and potato. This light yet delicious dish makes the most of an organic market garden just the other side of the Goulbourn River. ‘If the grower delivered by boat, what you’re eating would only have travelled 150 metres,’ says Mackeson with a laugh. Mackeson’s food can be as simple and delicious as a mushroom, parmesan and truffle croquette, a plate of the best smallgoods in the country or something more substantial such as half a pot roast free-range chicken with ‘What’s in the Garden?’ seasonal vegetables.
Not only has he embraced local suppliers but Mackeson has incorporated the wines of Tahbilk where appropriate, making the batter for the barramundi and chips with marsanne and adding the Eric Stevens Purbrick Shiraz to the osso buco to enrich the sauce spooned over beautifully wide pappardelle. ‘In vintage I make a summer salad with grapes from the 1860 shiraz block,’ he says.
Mackeson inisists that his food match Tahbilk wines, such as the 14-hour slow-cooked lamb shoulder pairing with the estate cabernet sauvignon or the pulled pork with coleslaw on Turkish bread with the Tahbilk roussane, marsanne and viognier blend.
These wines are all on tasting in the Tahbilk cellar door, among the most characterful in the nation. Built as the winery shortly after the vineyard was planted in 1860, and crowned with a muted red and white tower, this thriving, bustling 150-year-old building has one wall covered in wine awards stretching back to Queen Victoria’s reign. The roof is made of hand-hewn hardwood shingles. Although there is a state of the art winery next door, some wine is still pressed in the great old basket presses and much of the Tahbilk wines are aged in the cellar below.
‘The cellars are my favourite part of Tahbilk,’ says Hayley Purbrick. ‘We used to play down here when we were children. We used to hide behind the barrels and jump out and scare the customers.’ She is the fifth generation of her family to have been involved in the operation since her great-great-grandfather Reginald Purbrick bought Tahbilk in 1925. Hayley, the wine club and cellar door manager, is passionate about Tahbilk. ‘We want people to come and enjoy our family winery, restaurant and wetlands as much as we do,’ she says.
The cellar below is cool, musty and warmly lit. Great roughly hewn iron bark beams support the floor above. Winemaker Neil Larson remarks that we are surrounded by 600,000 litres of wine silently ageing in oak. Some casks hold almost 6,500 litres and date back over a century. Larson points out the solera system in which Tahbilk’s fortified wines are made. The technique stacks barrels, with new wine added at the top, above barrels of older wine which are themselves above racks of even older wines. As wine from the lowest rack is bottled, wines from the racks above are progressively fed down to replenish the barrels below, creating a living, constantly evolving blend comprising elements of many wines of many ages. Those ancient blended wines are among Tahbilk’s most popular, namely the Tahbilk Liqueur Muscat and Tahbilk Grand Tawny (once known as tawny port).
More than a quarter of this 800ha property is under vine, including one half hectare block that has been declared one of the ‘25 Great Vineyards of the World’ by Wine & Spirits Magazine in the US. Planted in 1860 when the ‘chateau’ was founded, these great dark gnarled ungrafted Shiraz vines are some of the oldest on the planet and amazingly still produce grapes. These are made into the winery’s benchmark 1860 Vines Shiraz. Another very special block of vines are Tahbilk’s 1927 Marsanne planting.
This Northern Rhone variety has found a special home at Tahbilk, where it is made into a crisp, clean and affordable everyday wine. The secret to these wines is patience. Although they can be remarkably good value-for-money quaffers, they reveal their potential after being cellared. Larson pours a tasting range of the marsanne from bottles spanning a decade and more. The marsanne from last year’s vintage is fresh and crisp with a pleasing earthy note. The marsanne made in the same manner from the same vineyard only six years earlier still bears that hallmark crispness but the fruit aroma has matured into a honeysuckle perfume. The 2003 Marsanne is again crisp and clean but with a rich cumquat marmalade character.
Those complex and delicate aromas linger on the palate as we stroll through the grounds. The roads are lined with venerable mulberry trees planted by the founding manager, Frenchman Ludovic Marie, who envisaged the development of a silk industry (mulberry leaves being the favoured food of silk worms). The grounds manager Paul Lewis joins us as we explore the Eco Trail, a network of paths intersecting the river red gum forest that bring visitors up close and personal with the local wildlife. Tahbilk actually feels like a historic village in the middle of a forest, surrounded by moat-like waterways.
Lewis leads us along the path, his pride and passion in the environmental work done at Tahbilk contagious. As we walk he points out the different frogs, the species of fish that live in the billabong, and the marsupials that live in the forest. The path leads over an old wooden bridge into the heart of the river red gums, home to the occasional koala and a clan of echidnas. We pass a flat-bottomed boat used to take visitors on cruises on the billabong.
‘It’s amazing the number of birds and other animals you see from that boat,’ he says with a grin. Allow about half a day to explore the historic buildings, walk the trail, taste the wines and relax into lunch.
Cellar Door opening hours:
Mon-Fri 9am-5pm Weekdays;
10am-5pm Weekends/Public Holidays
Closed Christmas Day
Tahbilk Café opening hours:
Thurs, Fri, Mon 11am-4pm,
Sat-Sun and Public Holidays 10am-4pm
Bookings essential
The Tahbilk Eco Cruises
Currently avaliable for pre-booked groups only; please call to enquire further.
254 O’Neils Road, Tabilk (via Nagambie)
Melway Map Reference 610 M3
Tel 03 5794 2555
www.tahbilk.com.au
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