Chapter 30
Thirty
They followed the dirt road from the house back towards the road they’d come in on until they reached a fork with a large timber-slab sign with the winery’s name.
They drove down the road a few hundred metres until they came across a huge grey shed with timber windows and large barn doors, which were open.
Wine barrels made into planters sat out the front, filled with brightly coloured petunias, and a scattering of tables filled a small grassed area, where a few couples were seated, eating cheese platters and scones with cream.
They parked off to one side in the carpark and walked inside through the barn doors. Kenzie took a moment to allow her eyes to adjust after the bright sun outside, sliding her sunglasses on top of her head.
Off to one side was a long bar with shelves of glasses and wine bottles.
On the other side was a glass-fronted counter with food and an impressive coffee machine, where people were ordering from a big black chalkboard on the wall behind.
In the centre of the entrance were shelves of produce: honey, biscuits, eggs, sourdough breads, jams and preserves as well as cheeses in a small, refrigerated display cabinet.
‘Wow,’ Kenzie said, trying to take everything in. It was so much more than she’d been expecting.
‘Yeah, Floss is like Mum, never does anything by halves,’ he said fondly.
Another shed expanded behind into a massive open area with vats and barrels filling the space, which she assumed was for visitors to go on guided tours and see how the wine was made.
The interior was a mix of rustic farmhouse and industrial chic and it all worked perfectly. On the walls hung old farming memorabilia—as well as black-and-white photographs of what Kenzie assumed was the original property, noticing the early homestead in one of the photos.
Floss spotted them as she walked out of a door marked Office and waved. ‘I’m glad you made it,’ she said, walking across to them.
‘This is really impressive,’ Kenzie said, looking around.
‘Thanks. As you already know, Joe is the brains and brawn behind the whole thing. I’m just the front desk, so to speak.’
‘Don’t listen to her. Joe may be the man behind the wine, but this one is definitely the visionary behind this whole place.’
‘Well, if it’d been left to Joe, we’d be standing in the paddock sipping wine out of plastic tumblers,’ she agreed with a small wince.
‘This is fabulous. I love how you’ve included the local farm shop,’ Kenzie said, looking around.
‘That’s one of my passions,’ Floss said. ‘Showcasing local produce. We try to support as many local farms and families as we can. All the meat on the cafe menu comes from families in the area—poultry, pork, lamb and, of course, Campbell beef,’ she added, sharing a look with her brother.
‘Of course,’ Ewan grinned. ‘Dad would shut the place down if you used the neighbours’ beef.’
‘The cheeses are all produced locally. We have an amazing local lady who makes all her own cheese, soaps and moisturisers from goat milk. And another who makes all our sourdough and bread, as well as utilising the garden up at the house,’ Floss said, wearing a chuffed look.
They moved across to a side door that led out to a paved patio with more tables and chairs that overlooked long, tidy rows of grapevines.
‘How big is the vineyard?’ Kenzie asked.
‘We currently have thirty acres under vine, producing cabernet and shiraz grapes. After our recent win at the awards night, we’re hoping to wrangle a few extra acres from Dad to put in some more.’
‘Think you’ll get him to agree?’ Ewan asked.
‘If we manage to catch him in a good mood,’ Floss said optimistically.
Kenzie’s recent conversation with Callum in the den came to mind.
She hadn’t mentioned it to Ewan. The previous interactions she’d witnessed between father and son had been tense enough—she didn’t want to add more fuel to the fire, and, since he hadn’t brought it up, she’d assumed Callum hadn’t approached Ewan with his request for a DNA test either.
Yet. ‘Would you like to taste a few of our wines?’
‘I’d love to,’ Kenzie said, eager to sample a few of the vineyard’s different wines after enjoying the ones she’d been having with dinner.
The heady mix of ground coffee, oak and wine hit her as she walked back into the cellar, and she breathed deeply.
Taking a menu from under the front desk and beckoning them to follow her, Floss led them across to the wine bar.
Walking behind the counter, she began selecting a number of bottles and glasses, placing a small amount of the different wines in front of where Ewan and Kenzie were perched on stools on the other side of the bar.
‘Have you had much experience with wine tasting?’ Floss asked Kenzie.
‘I took a weekend course a few years ago on a wine-tasting tour of the Hunter Valley, but I wouldn’t say I’m any kind of expert.’
‘Okay, well, I can give you a quick refresher, or I can do the pretentious knobby version if you’d like?’
Kenzie grinned, having witnessed a number of those kinds of people during her time in the wedding industry. ‘Just the basics will be fine,’ she assured her.
‘If you insist,’ Floss sighed in mock resignation. ‘My talents are wasted in this place, I tell you.’
‘Yeah, right,’ Ewan teased. ‘Everything you’ve learned, you learned from Joe.’
‘Nobody else knows that, do they?’ she shot back. ‘Anyway, let’s get started, shall we?’ she added brushing aside her brother’s remark.
‘So it’s all about the senses: sight, smell, taste.
First, we look at the wine and judge its colour intensity.
The darker the colour, usually the fuller-bodied the wine.
Then we move on to smell,’ she said, ‘where we’re looking for the intensity of the aroma and then what we can smell or identify.
In our wines, you can usually taste hints of plum and mulberry, and in our sauvignon, there’s delicate floral accents of violet and minty hints as well as forest berries.
Then there’s the oak hints; savoury and cherry oaks, French oak baroque’s—’
‘I thought this was supposed to be the non-knobby version,’ Ewan cut in drolly.
‘Oh, stop it. You used to hobnob with the best of the knobheads not so long ago,’ she pointed out haughtily.
‘Then we move on to taste,’ she continued.
‘This is where you can choose to either swirl and swish the wine and then spit it out, or swallow.’ She sent a sidelong glance to her younger brother, ‘And don’t even bother with the innuendo.
I’ve heard it a million times,’ she said in a bored tone.
‘Then you can do an analysis, where you check to see if the taste matched with the smells that you identified or if you discovered even more. There’s the complexity of the flavours, and if it’s balanced and yadda, yadda, yadda,’ she said waving a hand in the air. ‘That’s the basics.’
‘Great,’ Ewan said, rubbing his hands together, ‘let’s get into the drinking.’
‘Such a heathen,’ Floss said with a sniff. ‘Okay, the first wine is a 2012 Swagman Creek Wines shiraz. You’ll note the bright rich red with purple hues and hopefully detect the flavours and smells of dark spices, cherry oak and hints of liquorice.’
They went on to sample a cabernet sauvignon with its floral undertones and fruity flavours. Followed by a late-harvest shiraz. ‘It reminds me of something,’ Kenzie said after tasting it, but couldn’t quite put her finger on what it was.
‘Could it be pudding?’ Floss asked.
‘Christmas pudding,’ Kenzie said, looking shocked. ‘That’s exactly what it is.’
‘Wow, you could be quite the hobnob yourself. You’re good at this.’
Kenzie wasn’t so sure about that. For the most part, she could only identify some of the flavours and most of them she’d got wrong.
They went on to sample another shiraz and another cabernet sauvignon.
Kenzie was feeling quite warm and a little bit tipsy, but in an entirely pleasant way.
They took photos, admired the views and ordered afternoon tea, which went a long way to helping sober her up by the time they decided to head back to the main house.
‘This seems like the perfect business for your sister. She’s great at what she does,’ Kenzie commented as they left, and Floss wandered over to another couple to welcome them to the vineyard.
‘She’s definitely found her niche,’ Ewan agreed.
Kenzie noticed they weren’t taking the same road back to the house, but she wasn’t complaining.
The scenery was beautiful, and she still had enough of a gentle buzz to feel relaxed and happily tired.
They passed more fat cattle grazing in paddocks and, now and then, caught glimpses of the little creek that meandered its way through the property.
‘Why’s it called Swagman Creek?’ she asked, rolling her head sideways to look at him as he drove.
‘Back in the gold rush days, this whole property along the creek was filled with prospectors trying their luck. Some people reckon that’s how the creek got its name, but then there’re others who say it was named after they found the body of a swaggy beside the creek one day, and no one knew who he was, so he was buried in an unmarked grave somewhere out here. ’
‘That’s sad,’ Kenzie said.
‘Probably happened a lot back then. Thousands of people came to this area during the height of the gold rush, people from all walks of life. Lots of people looking to make their fortune and disappear.’
She spotted the main house off in the distance. ‘Where are we going?’ she finally asked as he continued down the road.
‘Do you mind if we make a stop somewhere before we go home? I’ve been meaning to come out here since we got here. I’ve just been putting it off.’
‘Sure,’ she said, about to ask where exactly and what exactly he was putting off, when the answer appeared before them.