Brash Higgins – CHN (rare)

CHN (rare) by is a Chenin Blanc wine made in McLaren Vale, Australia with grapes.

And Wow! This is a beautiful chenin from Australia! Floral, vanilla-ish, yellow fruit, aromatic and crisp!

Willamba Hill is a relatively steep, south facing 31 year old vineyard in the Blewitt Springs sub region of McLaren Vale. Overlaid with the deep white beach sands distinctive to Blewitt Springs, we attempt to capture some of the salinity and marine fossil notes from the sandy, coastal soils, thus transporting you to the oceanside with each whiff and taste. Blewitt Springs geology begins 50 million years ago at the mouth of what is now Maslin Beach (Australia’s first unclad beach) and runs some 30km Eastward up to the foothills of the Adelaide Hills. The grapes are fermented wild in neutral French barriques for 10 months to help accentuate this maritime effect and to build texture. Only 125 cases of this dry style CHN Chenin Blanc were produced.

The CHN 2020 label is a detail from an oil on linen painting by the gifted Sydney artist, Alesandro Ljubicic, called “Try To Be A Rainbow To Someone’s Cloud”

‘A pale straw in hue, the wine is heady with Chenin perfume of honey, straw, celery, real lemonade and water chestnut. Soft entry with trim acidity, the wine tightens as it flows across the tongue revealing a lick of saline and oyster shell. Good natural acidity with a delicate chalky, lemon pucker and notes of liquorice on the finish that pull you back for another look.’

– Brad Hickey, Vinitor, 09 August 2021.

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