Gourmet Traveller WINE Winemaker of the year 2010 finalist: Alex McKay, Collector
With two award-winning new shiraz wines capturing the country’s attention, this is one winemaker who can afford to be quietly confident.
The wine industry is full of egos – winemakers who shout about their wines, and themselves, at every opportunity. And then there are those who let their wines do the talking, which brings us to Alex McKay. “You must have been desperate!” was his response when I told him of his selection as a finalist.
Winemakers can recount many curious first opportunities in the industry, but not many can say “dishwashing”. Sure enough, when washing up at a Canberra restaurant, McKay had a chance meeting with Dr Edgar Riek, the founder of the Lake George Winery. This led to helping on Riek’s bottling line and eventually studies at the University of Adelaide, where he graduated as Dux in 1998. “Any other awards?” I ask. After a pause, McKay replies, “Oh, a swag of prizes, but you tend to collect them along the way anyway.”
In his honours year, he applied for a summer studentship with the Cooperative Research Centre for Viticulture. The director Dr Jim Hardie, recommended him to Garry Crittenden, founder of Dromana Estate, who had been successful in applying for a fellowship with the Wine Press Club of NSW – now Wine Communicators Australia – to study Italian varieties. McKay took to the task readily and the project grew. When the fellowship money ran out, Crittenden funded McKay’s study trip to Italy. The result was the book Italian Winegrape Varieties in Australia (Winetitles 1999).
In 2000, McKay started with BRL Hardy while the company prepared for its new Canberra winery. For two years he worked in its contracted wineries, before the Kamberra winery crushed its first grapes in 2003. Soon the Kamberra wines and their winemaker were getting wide attention.
Things change quickly in the corporate world and Kamberra was sold in 2007. McKay set up his base at the Lake George Winery and launched two shiraz wines under his brand Collector, named after the nearby village. The 2005 Collector Marked Tree Red won the Wine of the Year at the 2007 NSW Wine Awards, and the 2006 Collector Reserve Shiraz took a place in the Top 40.
There was a sense of déja vu at the awards dinner for this year’s Macquarie Group Sydney Royal Wine Show. We judges had been excited by a remarkably fragrant and stylish shiraz that seemed to be reappearing in the various trophy taste-offs. It turned out to be McKay’s 2008 Collector Reserve Shiraz, which won four trophies, including the Gilbert Phillips Trophy for Best Red Wine of Show.
His reticence has occasionally been seen as arrogance, but nothing could be further from the truth. Fellow Canberra winemaker Nick O’Leary has worked with him at Kamberra and the Lake George Winery. “He’s a man of few words,” O’Leary says, “but when he says something, you listen. He mentored me at Kamberra and has built up great relationships with his growers.” This has led to a joint venture between the two winemakers called Bourke Street, which will launch Canberra-region shiraz and chardonnay. McKay has also been working with growers on a marsanne blend and a sangiovese for Collector. He’s now working from his winery on the Kardinia Wines property that is run by Vikki Fischer.
So, what appeals to him about the Canberra area? “The granite and shaly soils that aren’t too fertile but have the right depth and structure are very good, and are making interesting wines with great purity.” And he won’t have to shout about them. His wines speak for themselves.
TEXT NICK BULLEID MW PHOTOGRAPH COLLECTOR
This article is from the June/July 2010 issue of Gourmet Traveller WINE.