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How a winery helped turn a town into a destination
Jasper Hill is small, family owned organic vineyard and winery in Heathcote, Victoria that’s achieved much in its 40 years. And its 2023 releases are terrific.
I’m sitting at a white-clothed table in Chauncy, a fantastic new(ish) French-inspired restaurant in the town of Heathcote, central Victoria. It’s in a Georgian-style sandstone house built in 1854 for goldfields surveyor Philip Chauncy which has been painstakingly renovated by the Laughton family of renowned local vineyard Jasper Hill.
Late winter sunlight streams in through a large-paned window and falls on my main course: medallions of local venison, cooked perfectly rare and topped with preserved blueberries, sitting on a silky cauliflower purée, surrounded by a sticky reduction. Alongside is a bowl of the richest silverbeet gratin I’ve ever tasted. It’s hard to imagine a better match with a glass of bold purple Jasper Hill shiraz.
Chauncy restaurant in Heathcote is in a 19th-century house that the Jasper Hill family owned and renovated. Simon Schluter
The last time I was here, in late 2020, Ron and Elva Laughton and their winemaker daughter Emily McNally showed me around the then-empty building. Having just finished a 10-year renovation, including a commercial kitchen out the back, they were looking to find someone – preferably a young hospitality couple keen to move to the region – to run it.
They found the perfect couple in Melbourne sommelier Tess Murray (ex-Supernormal and Cutler & Co.) and her partner, French-born chef Louis Naepels (ex-Grossi Florentino), who were looking for their own place after time spent working together in Europe and on the Bellarine Peninsula.
Louis Naepels, chef and now owner, with his sommelier partner Tess Murray, of Chauncy restaurant in Heathcote. Simon Schluter
Since opening Chauncy, the couple have had a steady stream of food and wine lovers lining up to dine at this exquisite place. In fact, the reaction has been so positive that Murray and Naepels, who initially leased the building, have bought the property from the Laughtons.
It’s exactly this kind of leap of faith, of investment both financial and cultural, that helps build long-term viability in regional towns such as Heathcote. Think how the Lake House helped transform Daylesford; how Stefano’s helped make Mildura what it is today; how the Royal Mail changed Dunkeld; how Brae (and Sunnybrae before it) brought people to Birregurra. In Heathcote, the locals are already beginning to talk about “the Chauncy effect” – how having a destination restaurant is encouraging the development of other businesses.
Ron and Elva Laughton founded Jasper Hill over 40 years ago. Catherine Black
Last year, as well as seeing their “field of dreams” restaurant come true, the Laughtons celebrated 40 years of winemaking in Heathcote. The family and their Jasper Hill label have been instrumental in building the region’s reputation, particularly – but by no means exclusively – with their intensely flavoured, long-lived shiraz.
This year, Ron and Elva both experienced what Emily describes, in typical deadpan fashion, as “hiccups to their retirement”. About three months ago, Ron underwent emergency open-heart surgery, and then Elva had a hip operation.
L-R: Ron Laughton, his winemaker daughter Emily McNally and her husband Nick McNally. Nick also works at Jasper Hill. Catherine Black
But when I visit their vineyard home (on the way to lunch at Chauncy) both are full of their usual spark, obviously feeling that, as Emily puts it, “there’s nothing like serious medical issues to give you a kick up the bum and remind you you’re mortal”.
Not surprisingly, Elva is in a reflective mood.
“Look, it feels a bit pompous to say this, but when I look back at the last 40 years, I do feel particularly proud about three things. One is how we influenced other wine people to come here because of the special soil in this region. Two is bringing Chapoutier here [the famous Rhone Valley winemaker set up a joint venture with Jasper Hill over 20 years ago]. And three is Chauncy. I feel really proud that we helped make that happen.”
A selection of Jasper Hill wines, including the 2023 Lo Stesso Fiano and the 2022 Occam’s Razor Shiraz.
This is the first time in three years that the full complement of estate-grown wines has been released under the Jasper Hill label.
Severe drought conditions leading into the 2020 vintage saw the unirrigated vines here really struggle: hardly any grapes were picked, and only one red wine was made that year, a “Georgia’s and Friends” shiraz, supplemented with fruit from other vineyards.
To help rejuvenate the vines and improve sap flow, Emily McNally decided to prune hard that winter using the “poussard” method. Although this resulted in heavily reduced crops again in 2021 – and, once more, just a single red release of “Georgia’s and Friends” – the vineyards bounced back beautifully in 2022 (a year when, ironically, other growers were struggling with low crops). These are the reds to have just been released, along with the 2023 estate riesling.
This release also includes the 2023 Lo Stesso Fiano ($33), a slightly leaner, more savoury expression of this typically textural and layered white wine, and a glossy, black-fruited, cocoa-tannined, dark-cherry-pippy 2022 Occam’s Razor Shiraz ($48), made from fruit grown in a vineyard further north in Heathcote.
Tasting the latest releases from Jasper Hill
2023 Jasper Hill Riesling [Heathcote]
The long, slow ripening of this cool, wet 2023 vintage really benefitted this gorgeous riesling: there’s plenty of the ripe, textural, grape-pulpy, almost tropical, makrut-lime flavour I usually find in this wine, but it’s carried by a thrilling, super-focused and lingering acidity heralding a long life in the cellar. $43
2022 Jasper Hill Nebbiolo [Heathcote]
First planted back in the 1990s, this is consistently one of Australia’s best nebbiolos – albeit with an unmistakable and (for nebb purists) unconventional thumbprint of both region and producer. Quite dark in colour (for a nebb), it starts out generous and dense and licoricey – almost shiraz-like – and then delivers more typical varietal characters as it progresses across the palate: layers of floral perfume and fine, grippy, earthy tannins. Bloody good. $71
2022 Jasper Hill Georgia’s Paddock Shiraz [Heathcote]
The 2022 Emily’s Paddock ($114) will, I think, prove to be the better of the two single-vineyard Jasper Hill shirazes in the long run, but it is quite closed and tightly wound at the moment. There are some pretty spicy aromas, and a touch of dried herb (there are cabernet franc vines planted alongside the shiraz in Emily’s Paddock), but it’s quite sinewy and restrained. The Georgia’s, by contrast, is dangerously ready to drink: heaps of seductive black berry fruit tumbles out of the glass, swaddled in a sweeping blanket of supple tannin. Plenty of oomph and structure for the long haul in the cellar but oh so glorious now $86
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