The making of Liebich Lovely Sparkling
While the first Liebichwein sparkling wine project began as simply producing a wine for the family, it is now available as a limited release. We are over the moon with this Lovely Sparkling wine!
You may be asking, why have we made a sparkling and why has it taken us so long?
It’s no secret that Janet’s favourite wine style is fizz and our whole family enjoy sharing bubbles with friends and family.Ron has been experimenting with growing a variety of Pinot Noir clones and making the odd dry red which he’s been pretty happy with, but he was up for a new challenge. A trip to the Champagne region in 2014 was the inspiration needed for Ron to explore the realm of Traditional Method sparkling.
We knew we needed help with this project so we enlisted the support of Sean and Sue Delaney of Sinclair’s Gully and Simon Greenleaf who make fine wines in the Adelaide Hills. They all encouraged us to have a go and were willing to share their tips and provide access to their equipment. Excitedly, we embarked on the collaboration.
The Lovely Sparkling story started early in vintage 2014 when we handpicked our own Pinot Noir destined to be the sparkling base wine. This was then blended with fresher Pinot base wine from vintage 2016 to build complexity. In late 2017, we arranged a few rounds of dedicated tasting trials to get the balance of body and sweetness just right. The wine is hand-disgorged, dosaged, capped and labelled to order. We decided to use our own Ruby Fortified Grenache for dosage to add sweetness and a pink hue.
The next steps were to think of a suitable name and package. We chose the name ‘Lovely’ for a number of reasons. Our family name Liebich is very close to the German word ‘lieblich’ which means ‘lovely’, the Barossa Valley maintains strong German heritage, and of course the wine is pretty lovely to look at, sip and savour.
Taste Notes
Inspired by love and heritage, this blushing beauty offers tantalising strawberry and toasted brioche aromas leading to a lively palate that finishes dry to semi-dry. Simply lovely!
Quantities and strictly limited as each bottle is disgorged and labelled by hand.
