Hoddles Creek: New Vintage Release

“If you love Australian chardonnay and/or pinot noir, then Hoddles Creek in the Yarra Valley is your ground zero. Every year, for the past twenty years, it has been the only must-buy producer of chardonnay and pinot noir on the Australian market….both the quality and the value consistently on offer… is so striking. A Ten Star Winery”, Campbell Mattinson, Australia’s Best Wineries, 2025. 

Here is what is becoming our annual offer of the latest vintages from Franco D’Anna.  These wines are amongst the jewels of our portfolio: winemaker Franco D’Anna’s wines are hugely applauded both in Australia - see the reviews quoted below - and whenever we send samples to journalists here. All vines are hand pruned and harvested; and all grapes are crushed at the family’s winery, constructed for the 2003 vintage.

The family owns ten hectares of Pinot Noir (five clones) and six of Chardonnay, plus Pinot Gris and other reds. Winemaking is determinedly non-interventionist: some whole bunches are put in the tank; almost always fermented with wild yeasts, without additions of enzymes or acid; and bottled without fining or filtration. These are cool climate wines: note in particular the lowish alcohol levels. All but the Wickhams Road Pinot Noir (13.7%) lie are between 12.5% and 13.2%, reflecting the influence of both the chilly southern ocean and the altitude on the family’s vineyards in the highest district of the Upper Yarra.