From the ashes of the Cudlee Creek fire in the Adelaide Hills five years ago has emerged a brandy created from the damaged grapes.
Article by Cassandra Hough posted on ABC News Adelaide, 08 January 2025.
All of the vines in fifth-generation grape grower Simon Tolley’s vineyard were either burnt or smoke-tainted by the fire, which swept through the region in December 2019.
About 500 tonnes of grapes were damaged on his property alone, while about 1,100 hectares of grapes were affected throughout the region.
“The smoke came at this time of year when the berries were hard green and there was very little experience with making wine with grapes that were so hard green,” Mr Tolley said.
After the Black Summer bushfires affected many wine-producing regions around the country, a lot of research effort went into various ways of dealing with smoke-taint, from preventing the smoke entering the grapes to removing the smoky flavours.
PhD student Hugh Holt was investigating the effect of climate change on brandy production in Australia and was keen to see if it was possible to make brandy from the smoke-affected grapes.
“There’s a pedigree of these flavours being acceptable in whiskey products, whiskeys from Ireland and Scotland are noticeably smoky, they’re sold on that basis,” Mr Holt said. Mr Tolley was keen to be a part of the research so he donated 20 tonnes of grapes to the project.
Click below for the full article, which includes quotes from A/P Paul Grbin as well as more information on the research project.