Description
TASTING NOTES:
Nose — Melon. Peach. Spice.
Palate — Juicy. Textural. Lively.
Drink — Within 1—8 years
TECHNICAL DATA:
Alc -14.5%
TA – 5.6 g/L
RS – <1g/L
pH - 3.43
Harvest date - 15.04.2023
VITICULTURE:
2023 will be remembered as a rare three-peat of La Nina - effectively this means a
benign summer with decent heat and not too much rainfall. This continued until
mid-March when we experienced a switch to
almost spring-like weather. The upshot was a cool and elongated ripening phase
which allowed all varieties to reach peak flavour and ripeness. Mint.
— Grower, James Dicey
WINEMAKER'S NOTES:
The fruit was hand harvested. On the afternoon of picking it was foot stomped. The grapes were left overnight. Whole
bunch pressed, to horizontal fermenters. Kept cold until the indigenous yeast starter got
going then the juice warmed and fermented on full solids. The wine fermented to dry,
was then left on full solids for
6 months, no stirring of lees.
— Caretaker, Matt Dicey
Producer Profile
DICEY WINES
Take a chance. Roll the dice.
Wine is about place. Dicey is a place that is a rocky pocket of Central Otago: Bannockburn. It’s not easy to make wine here. Hoar frosts. Wind. Bitter cold and crackling heat. The land is unforgiving and the wines express that struggle.
The fruit comes from three vineyards started by three families transcending two generations. James and Odelle have The Inlet. Matt and Ali belong to Black Rabbit. Their pioneering parents, Robin and Margi, own their Swansong.
Dicey Bannock burn wines pay homage. They tell the annual story of the region and share the colours of each season. The Single Vineyard wines have an even sharper focus.
LAND
The land was arid and deserted. The brothers made wine.
On first approach, Bannockburn seems brown but it’s cut by a myriad of colours. James’ partner Odelle, an artist, took her paint brush and went wandering to capture the palette — to share what can be seen when you really know the land. These colours form part of the language of Dicey.
The brothers want to tell their story in all its complexity. A story that captures the essence of collaboration and conflict, struggle and reward, work and play, family and rocky ground.
There is a diametrical synergy between Odelle’s soft, coloured brush strokes and the pleasing strike the landscape provides with its severity. There’s a playfulness about the name Dicey too. The very idea of making wine in a place like that.
BROTHERS
James is the grower, Matt, the caretaker. Two brothers. Two neighbours. James and Matt live and work side by side. The middle where they meet can be a place of inspiration and friction. ‘Unpredictable and potentially risky’
dictionary definition for the word Dicey. Fierce about wine, family and Bannockburn — the land where they’ve put down roots. Wine runs deep for the Diceys. In the dirt and in the veins.
‘Unpredictable and potentially risky’
dictionary definition for the word Dicey.
