New Arrivals from Mac Forbes

This release is a touch softer around the edges compared to the 2017 release. Perhaps it is all the better for it, as the ‘Yarra Valley’ range is intended to be the immediate drinking wines of the Mac Forbes range. There is certainly plenty of enjoyment here: stone fruit character, some green apple and hints of citrus with no obtrusive oak at all visible. Watch this fly out the door. – Ches Cook, FWC.

Coming off the back of the Hoddles Creek Chardonnay, Yarra Junction has a touch more fruit weight and a slightly bigger frame overall. Flavours are primarily based around green apple, lemon balm and orchard fruit. These wines of Mac’s are not big, rich and creamy Chardonnays – quite the opposite. They are wines of tension, precision and high-toned acidity bringing lively, racey flavours and energy. The back half of the palate here has a slow build of chalky texture which I particularly like and I see this developing some nutty complexity over time. – Ches Cook, FWC.

Mac was in Sydney in late August with a bag of new releases. An invitation to lunch at Mr. Wong was never going to be turned down so it was there where a group of us tasted through all of the new 2018 releases, plus a range of back-vintage wines to get a sense of how they age with time in bottle. 

For the first time ever, Mac has made more single vineyard Chardonnays than Pinot Noirs. This is the tightest of the bunch, driven forward by citrus tones (lime leaf, lemon pith) in conjunction with great natural acidity and saline flavours. It’s this salty/rockpool character that I love most about this wine, and trying it next to the 2012 over lunch gives me great confidence in the way that this will develop over time. The 2012 was similarly salty and had fleshed-out quite a bit in the mid-palate, with a nice waxiness to the green apple fruit. – Ches Cook, FWC. 

Generally Mac’s best performing vineyard site in my eyes (for both Pinot and Chardonnay) – although Mac will explain that it is simply a unique expression of site, as the other wines are too. Primary fruit here is again made up of orchard fruit, melon, white peach and crunchy nectarine. It is in the second half of the wine though where oat and nut notes begin to reveal themselves, adding a savoury edge to the wine that has a slow build of texture and palate weight. It’s the most expansive of the Chardonnays, and my preference for this reason. – Ches Cook, FWC.

Customers by now are very aware that this is our favourite Pinot Noir in the shop around the $30 mark. Time and time again it overdelivers and it is no different in vintage 2018. Only light to medium bodied, I expect this to fill-out a touch within the next six months in bottle. Nonetheless, it is already its aromatic, pretty self, showing pronounced red-berry fruit, red floral notes and youthful energy on both the nose and palate. Acidity is bright due to the consistently early picking dates that Mac favours and tannins are placed nicely in the background. It is the fruit that does the talking, but slightly darker undertones are there as you look more closely at the wine. Another winner from Mac. – Ches Cook, FWC.

A slightly riper, fuller style of Pinot compared to the Coldstream. All relative of course – this is still very much in the delicate/fishbone style that Mac works within. It’s very precise with flavours tucked into every door you open. There is dried raspberry, boysenberry and more of that acid tang. There is some spice black cherry and a fine ripple of tannin through the back half of the wine. Darker, black soil/turned soil elements linger below the prettiness of the youthful fruit and it is these flavours that brings the savoury components of the wine. It’s got plenty there, and I see more being revealed over time. – Ches Cook, FWC.

Lots of sour cherry and tangy acidity with red fruit backing. Built within a light to medium bodied frame but I see this putting on weight with time in bottle. It’s slightly bony at this very early stage, but watch it flesh out and soften within the next twelve months. – Ches Cook, FWC.