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AFR 22-24 September 2017www.afr.com | The Australian Financial Review L13Life&Leisure

The car proved nicelybalanced on the twistystuff, able to burst outof corners with verve.

There were times, though, when therewere clear roads, and some lovely twists andturns. The car proved nicely balanced on thetwisty stuff, able to burst out of corners withverve and push deep into them. Yes, you feelthe weight – even with the lighter enginethis small roadster is 1545kg in barest form –but it’s not setting out to be a hard-edgedsports car, more a luxurious andcomfortably riding ‘‘sporty’’ car. There aretougher versions in the range for those whowant something extreme, including the320km/h V8-powered SVR.

Because the sound is important, and it isnigh on impossible to make a four-cylinderturbo sound as sonorous and at timesmenacing as the V6 and V8 versions of thissame model, the Jaguar engineers have,well, cheated. Under acceleration, some ofthe noise comes through the loudspeakers.Somewhere in the engine managementsystem is a chip with a recording thatadjusts to engine speed. Despite that, thesound is good when working hard, thoughwith this slightly artificial top note.

The thing about a convertible is that, evenwhen cruising around slowly, it tends to bespecial. Particularly when you choose alocale like this, with endless shoreline,many bridges, switchback mountain passesand tunnels. Lots of tunnels.

The facelifted model year 2018 F-Typesbring various electronic driver aidsincluding autonomous braking and lane-keeping assistance. Another advantage withthe revised roadster is the boot has beenreworked. It’s horribly irregular in shapebut liberates every bit of space available. OK,it’s not much space, but more than before.

For a bit more practicality and a bit lessopen air, the coupe is equally beautiful andhas decent carrying capacity.

For all the reasons at the start of this story,and heavy taxation in Norway, there werefew sports cars around. One was a circa2000 Porsche 911. I chatted to the driver,Tomas, as we parked side by side on a carferry. He told us he’d imported his 911second-hand from Japan because new onesare simply too dear.

If you are caught going more than26km/h above the speed limit, he said, youlose your licence. The minimum fines are1500 krona ‘‘just for not signalling a turn’’and 3000 krona for speeding. That’s about$240 and $480. ‘‘But it is income adjusted,and someone like me could pay 50,000[$8000]. Also, in these parts it is snowy foreight months of the year.’’

One good, if bittersweet, change is afoot:Tomas says it is getting hotter every year, sohe can use his Porsche and motorcycle formore months than in the past. L&L

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The writer attended the international launchas a guest of the manufacturer.

Riesling meisterEarly lessons in terroir.

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Max Allen

Above: Jeff Grosset, the hipster, in 1981.Below: the Clare Valley winemaker today.

Jeff Grosset has broughtalong a slideshow to thewine tasting today. Aswe sit and sniff and sipthrough the newest releases and some backvintages of his two great single vineyardrieslings, Springvale and Polish Hill, heshows us some pictures to help tell his story.

There are bucolic vineyard landscapeshots. A map of the Clare Valley showingwhere the grapes for the two wines weregrown. A photo of the striking difference inthe size of the bunches of riesling grapesfrom each site.

It’s all fascinating. Illuminating. Andhelps us appreciate and better understandthe wines we’re tasting.

But the picture that grabs my attentionmore than any other is a black and whitephoto from 1981 of Grosset aged 26, in beardand straggly hair and what look like velvetflares, standing in front of tanks holdingthe first four wines he produced thatvintage under his own label. All 800 dozenbottles worth.

Now, of course, 36 years later, Grosset isregarded as arguably the best maker ofriesling in Australia, and a leading producerof almost every other grape variety he layshis hands on.

He makes a bit more wine now, too: 11,000dozen bottles this year, spread across ninewines. And these days he looks more like anarchitect than a hipster. It makes mewonder how today’s bearded, straggly-haired young winemakers will evolve overthe next three decades. How will theirinnovations, ideas and energy be viewed

in the future? How will they maintaintheir focus, drive and commitment?

Grosset was lucky, in a way. When hestarted out, the concept of terroir – the ideathat wines taste of where they’re fromthanks to differences in soil, aspect, vine ageand a million other little things – was rarelydiscussed in Australia. When he decided tomake two rieslings from different sub-regions in Clare, he says, he wasn’t settingout to deliberately explore or express thisconcept. But as soon as he fermented thewines the differences were so clear that hecouldn’t help but use the reality of terroir tohelp tell the story of the wines.

Everything he’s done since then has beendriven by the desire to better capture thesedifferences in the glass. That has meantplanting his own vineyards rather thanrelying on bought-in fruit; converting tocertified organic viticulture; planting avariety of different clones of riesling to seewhich is best suited to the differing sites.

As a result, he says, the vines areproducing better fruit now and are moreresilient than ever. And they’ve needed to beresilient over the past few vintages, too, withpicking dates swinging wildly fromincredibly early in 2015 to very late this year.

The proof, as ever, is in the glass, and I cansafely say that the new vintage wines(reviewed here) are truly outstanding.

Not that some of the older vintagesGrosset has opened for us aren’t delicious: ifyou have any bottles of the 2011 Springvaleor Polish Hill in your cellar you are a verylucky person: these are both classic Clarerieslings with incredible intensity and poise,destined for a long life of slow, languidflavour development. It’s just that the new,young wines, seem to have extra depth andvitality. And I feel confident in predictingthat they’ll age better than theirpredecessors, too.

It’s a long game, wine. It takes decades togain the perspective, both as maker and

drinker, to see the changes, to adapt tovariable external influences, to tweak andtweak again until you get things right.

Take the development of Grosset’s thirdriesling, the Alea, a subtly off-dry style that –unlike the dry Springvale and Polish Hill –has about 10 grams per litre of residualunfermented sugar.

Grosset got the idea for this third winewhen he was walking through his vineyardand tasting grapes in the lead-up to harvestin 2007. The fruit on one patch of rieslingvines planted in soil sitting atop hard redrock tasted different – more like thearomatic grapey flavours he’d tasted in off-dry German rieslings. So he fermentedexperimental batches of the fruit from thatblock separately for three vintages to besure his hunch was correct, then startedbottling and selling it on its own – simplylabelling it Off-Dry at first, then giving it thename Alea (after the Greek god AthenaAlea), and finally, in 2017, producing astunning wine that is a worthy companionto its revered riesling siblings.

That’s a 10-year project from first inklingto fruition. But as Grosset points out, in thegrand time scale of wine, it’s not that longat all. L&L

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max@maxallen.com.au

Contemporary hat-trick2017GrossetAleaRiesling(ClareValley)Ihaven’tbeenhugelyimpressedbypreviousvintagesofthiswine,butthelatestreleaseisagem,withmouth-wateringfreshnessbalancinghintsofroundsweetness.Itstartswithawake-upcalloflip-puckeringlimejuicefollowedbyawhisperofspringblossomhoney.$35

2017GrossetSpringvaleRiesling(ClareValley)Oh,thisissogood.There’sjustsomuchflavourinhere–alltheclassicyoungrieslingcharactersofgreenappleandcitrusandhintsofmuskyperfume–butit’snotoverthetoporcloying,anditleavesthemouthcleanandrefreshedandwantinganothertaste.$45

2017GrossetPolishHillRiesling(ClareValley)WheretheSpringvaleisallinstantgratificationandabandonmenttopleasure,thePolishHillisallfocusandprecisionandreserve:ithasascintillating,crystallinepurityandanincrediblelaser-lineofcitrusalongthetonguethatlastsandlasts.Outstanding.$55grosset.com.au