Testimonials

The Backyard Shed Cru packs represent the boutique vintners that make Mclaren Vale world famous. Each pack contains 6 wines that even industry insiders would find hard to obtain. Now, these rare and spectacular wines can be delivered to your door and by joining the club they’ll turn up every 3 months at 10% off.
Heath & Michele Suskin
Adelaide, South Australia

Shane's passion for the Vale clearly comes through in the quality of his wine selection. I love that I get to taste some of the gems of the Vale that I can't get to unless I visit buy a dozen from the winery so this way I can taste wine I would not normally have found. The CD tutorial on the wineries was a great unexpected bonus Keep it up Shane.
Colin Sadlier
Sydney, New South Wales

 

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Sourcing the most amazing wines from little known McLaren Vale Artisan winemakers and delivering them directly to you.

The Backyard Shed Cru packs are 6 wines from 6 different Artisan McLaren Vale producers and delivered to your door freight free.

 

10% Membership discount available for quarterly deliveries*

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Featured Winery

Five Geese

Sue Trott is one of Australia’s few long established women vignerons. After many years of growing grapes for some of Australia’s best known wineries, she decided it was time to select some of her best parcels of fruit in Blewitt Springs for her own label. In July 1999, she established Hillgrove Wines Pty Ltd.  Hillgrove is committed to the production of premium McLaren Vale wines.

On Sue’s Blewitt Springs vineyard, five wild geese have lived for many years, foraging for feed between the rows of vines. Each night they sleep on the waters of the dam, seeking refuge from marauding foxes - hence the name five geese.

The Trott family has had a long-standing tradition of growing grapes in the McLaren Vale district. Sue’s son Jonathon has been working in viticulture for over 20 years and has managed his family’s vineyards for the past 15 years. Together, Sue and Jonathon have worked tirelessly to produce premium fruit for the five geese label. As Sue says, “good wine can only be made from good grapes.” Much to the disappointment of his mother, Jonathon doesn’t actually drink wine. He leaves the tasting to Sue. As Sue’s children have grown and started families of their own, she is hoping that some of her grandchildren will someday join her in the business.

The Vineyards

Sue Trott has 32 Hectares of vineyards in the McLaren Vale region of South Australia. Hillgrove is making wines from her Blewitt Springs vineyards. Nestled in the northeastern end of the Willunga Basin, Blewitt Springs lies about 180m above sea level. This slightly higher elevation provides a cooler climate than nearby McLaren Vale and Willunga. With cooler temperatures and moderating afternoon sea breezes, the grapes grown here enjoy a long, even ripening season. Vintage in Blewitt Springs is often some two to three weeks later than the rest of the district. These extra weeks give the fruit time to develop more complex flavour ripeness, without the excessive baumes found in warmer areas. The grapes develop a beautiful balance of flavour, acidity, and sugar, which then translate into complex, but not overly alcoholic wines.

The five geese Shiraz is sourced from Sue’s Blewitt Springs vineyard, planted in 1965. The soil is deep sand over clay and is minimally irrigated from a small amount of available surface water.

The five geese Grenache Shiraz is sourced from her dry grown, old bush Grenache vines, planted in the 1920’s. These gnarly old vines produce a very intensely flavoured Grenache. These vines are some of the oldest in the district.

Featured Wine

Marius 2006 Simpatico Shiraz

This is the third release of the Simpatico and, I suspect, it will prove to be the best yet.
There is no release of the premium Symphony label for the 2006 vintage so that fruit has been shared between the Simpatico and the Symposium.
Fresh berries with a hint of cedary oak on the nose.  Red and black fruits with a little chocolate and those Marius trademark silky tannins.  Lovely structure and balance and some of that "minerality" which sets apart the wines from the Marius terroir.
Philip White:
Like the vineyards halfway up the Hermitage hill in the south Rhone, this one has round river stones, but it’s halfway up the piedmont of the Willunga escarpment near McLaren Vale.  It smells just plain friggin gorgeous.  It’s rude and sassy with whole messes of fresh, vibrant, black and blue fruits; really neat fired oak, and an acrid, nose-itching edge that can only come from the country in which it grew, and the plethora of yeasts and microbial troops that live there.  It has a British Racing Green aroma: crows in the pines; a worn-out E-type decaying in the tractor shed, wondering whether it’ll go to the chooks or a restorateur.  It’s slender and tight at first sip, with a sharp carbon base.  But given the chance to properly slither in and unwind, it teases like that serpent that suckered Eve.  And as my aboriginal friends say, bugger the apple -- they woulda eaten the snake every time.  The finish is all the Bible black things mentioned above and more, with wicked juice and deadly nightshade tannins and really stony, slithery acidity.  Twenty years, please.  Or grainy pecorino.  With a snake.   93+++ points

James Halliday - winecompanion.com.au - May 2009:
A powerful, full-bodied wine which abounds with black fruits, licorice and bitter chocolate; while initially confronting, the appeal grows on retasting. Screwcap.14.5% alc.   Rating 94 -  Drink 2021
Winefront Double Take -August 2008:
CAMPBELL MATTINSON: The Marius name has fast become synonymous with reliable quality. The grapes for this wine are hand-picked (and not all at once: numerous passes are made in an attempt to pick all grapes at their optimum), basket pressed, fermented and then matured in French and American oak hogsheads. The resultant wine is soft, medium-bodied, deliciously ripe and attractive, with even-tempered blackberry and raspberry flavours. There's very little sign of oak flavour here and a silken set of tannins. It should start drinking at its best in about two years time. Drink: 2010-2014. 91 points.
GARY WALSH: There's no Symphony this year as all the fruit went into Simpatico, and it goes without saying (almost) that I agree with Mattinson, that yes, Marius is a producer that's fast become synonymous with quality, but I'd add that they are also one that shows a bit of extra flair too. The wines offer that little something extra, although I'm not quite sure exactly what it is. This is a touch ferrous and has something hard to describe - a sort of stone and earth character over the raspberry and blackberry fruit - a little bit of Priorat meets the Vales - and there's a chunk of chocolate and new leather in there too. Subtle oak allows the fruit to express itself clearly.  In the mouth medium to full bodied and loaded with ripe berry fruit, chocolate and again some of those ferrous stone and earth qualities. Lovely tannins, soft and fine grained, and they contribute to the nutty toothsome texture and pop up again on the finish to do a little dusting. There's a touch of warmth too, but it's not disruptive, and the longer the wine is open the better it looks. Decant it for an hour if drinking now or better still give it a couple more years to show itself to best advantage. An authentic wine that offers plenty more interest than many of its peers. ABV: 14.5% Drink: 2010-2016. 92+ points.
The 2009 Penguin Good Australian Wine Guide - Nick Stock
The name says it all - this is about easy drinking and it shows, well, simpatico between the region and the variety.  Ripe dark berries and plum fruits, gently supportive tannins that don't interrupt the flow of flavour or compromise the soft mouth-feel.  91 points