This year marks the 20th anniversary of Centennial Vineyards, and though the boutique Southern Highlands winery is at the top of its game, owner John Large said there would be no resting on laurels.
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“If we were just going to sit around and make ordinary wine, then I’d just sell the place. We haven’t done what we’ve done without being very serious about making great wine,” Mr Large said.
It was recently announced that Centennial Vineyards retained their 5-star red rating in the 2019 Halliday Wine Companion – an industry benchmark for Australian wine.
Centennial is one of only three wineries in the region to be featured in the Halliday Wine Companion, and the only one with a red star rating, which indicates both quality and consistency.
“We’ve crawled up the ladder to get to the top. Our 5-star red rating puts us in the top 8.2 per cent of wineries in Australia,” Mr Large said.
Winemaker Tony Cosgriff said the painstaking process of cultivating wine in the Southern Highlands was a pursuit of passion that has created unique advantages and challenges.
“The climate here really suits sparkling wines. It’s cold, we retain really nice natural acidity in the fruit, but there are always risks associated with winemaking, last year we were completely wiped out,” Mr Cosgriff said.
If we were just going to sit around and make ordinary wine, then I’d just sell the place. We haven’t done what we’ve done without being very serious about making great wine,
Read more: Centennial rezone proposal
Incessant rain in the early 2017 wiped out the most of the vineyard, but the dry 2018 has seen Centennial bounce back.
“When our crop didn’t come in last year, we still had all that labour, all that pruning, managing the growth, crop thinning and managing the grass only to lose it all. But we’ve tapped into something this year and in honour of our 20th anniversary, we’re releasing a special sparkling this Christmas that we’ve had resting for 10 years,” Mr Large said.
“We’re not standing still. We have a winery that is designed to do small batches and winemaker that likes to do them and does them very well,” he said.
Centennial Vineyards sells primarily through their cellar door, wine club and the restaurant on site. Visit: http://www.centennial.net.au for more information.
