Rockford’s Timepiece – The Basket Press

Sometimes you find a wine that does much, much more than just represent its maker. Some wines, through their heritage and the steadfast purpose of those whose ideals they represent, become flagbearers for regions. Rockford’s Basket Press Shiraz is one such wine.

In a way that the classic Lindemans Hunter River Burgundies of the late 1950s and 1960s have defined the concept of the Hunter Valley red wine, the way the Moss Wood Cabernet Sauvignons of the mid 1970s did the same for the Margaret River, Rockford’s Basket Press Shiraz has done the same thing for the Barossa Valley.

The first Basket Press was made in1984, when the Barossa’s fortunes were at an all-time low. Ancient vineyards were being uprooted under the South Australian Government’s vine pull scheme, and you could hardly give Barossa shiraz away. It was even finding its way into Shiraz Muffins. It seems a lifetime ago today, but it was only five years before that Peter Lehmann had left Saltram to set up Masterton Wines, today known as Peter Lehmann Wines Ltd, to extend a lifeline to the generation of Barossa fruit growers which had suddenly found itself without a market.

It was the height of the cool climate fad, and the Barossa and its wines were about as popular as a shark in a seal colony. Barossa-based wineries were ‘blending away’ the warm climate character of their region, and none of the larger Australian companies with bases there were selling any significant volumes of 100 Barossa red wine.

Robert ‘Rocky’ O’Callaghan, a former winemaker at Seppeltsfield in the Barossa, is not a native of the Valley, but might as well have been. With a passion for the region’s insuperable resource of ancient low-yielding dryland red vineyards that only a born-again religious convert could really understand, his determination to preserve what he rightly saw as an endangered species has seen him become a true hero of the region. The Basket Press Shiraz, of 1984 remains a wonderful wine in true Barossa style.

‘My philosophy has been to use the Barossa’s old vine vineyards and to make wine in the traditional style that has been here for a hundred years’, he explains. ‘I’m not interested in chardonnay or merlot. I try to make wines faithfully – and I know those words are flogged to death so I don’t really want to use them any more – but my wines are made to represent the nature of these vineyards.

‘This is the only genuine European community in Australia. There’s a very genuine and European backbone to the Barossa. It’s always been here and it’s reflected in the area’s small vineyards and the stoic nature of its people, the Barossa Deutsche, only growing half a tonne to the acre.

‘In Victoria earlier this century, when dairy cows created a bigger return, out came the grapes. During the 1940s when things were really desperate for the Barossa’s Lutheran community, people were so committed to the region that they worked for years for nothing; they have a sense and commitment to the region well beyond growing grapes and making wine. That’s why these vineyards survived in the Barossa, through desperately hard working, stoic people, who had the capacity to withstand hard times. They would live on nothing other than what they brought with them from Europe. They made their own smallgoods, cheese, furniture, music and culture; they were totally self-sufficient. You can see why by nature they tend to be isolationist. They have incredible self-reliance, and sat it out for forty years. Back in the 1950s the Barossa had as much area under vine as in the 1970s; only now have we gone back beyond the vine-pull days.’

Like Peter Lehmann, O’Callaghan saw that the larger companies and their more industrial approach to viticulture were not the solution for the Barossa’s small traditional vineyards. So at Rockford he began to purchase the otherwise unwanted fruit from some of these sources, steadily growing to its present size of around 20,000 cases.

The Basket Press Shiraz is his purest expression of the Barossa’s inherent strength and quality. It’s made in true traditional fashion each year without thought to prevailing trends in the wine marketplace, trends in the media or even trends in price. In fact, given that the wine is virtually on allocation the moment it is released, Rockford could easily charge several times more than what it does for the wine. It hasn’t always been this way, but O’Callaghan is indeed financially secure at Rockford, and has no interest whatsoever in milking his brand for something even approaching its true worth. He’s much more deeply involved in creating a wine company with integrity and a set of values that his family can continue to operate for generations ahead. His son Travis is presently taking on more responsibility in the day to day management of the business.

The incredible thing about the Basket Press Shiraz is that irrespective of the emotion and commitment that it represents, it can stand alone as a classic wine. As long as Rocky O’Callaghan has his way it will not be made any differently – not that it needs to be – but it is one of the few ‘timepiece’ wines around the world of such stature and integrity. The world is full of wines that are made they way they are today because that is how they always have been; while most of them would be better off if they received more modern attention. The Basket Press is no such wine; but to appreciate it fully is to understand much, much more than that it is simply a very decent dry red. Please login to post comment