Ten wines to try rated Exceptional and Outstanding

If you're looking for an Australian wine (white or red) that you're almost guaranteed to enjoy, you've come to the right place. All 10 of the wines in this list are gold medal standard, meaning that they've been rated Outstanding (95–96 points) or Exceptional (97–99 points) by the Halliday Tasting Team. Quality assured!

However, with every wine receiving a gold medal, it can be difficult to know where to begin. We've made your decision a little bit easier by speaking to the producers behind each wine about why they love it, the influence of their region, and how best to enjoy the wine.

Think yum cha with the Ada Wine Co. Grenache from McLaren Vale, passionfruit meringue with the Brown Brothers Noble Riesling from the King Valley, or a slow-cooked lamb shoulder with the Logan Shiraz from Orange. You can't go wrong here.

 

2023 Ada Wine Co. Gigi Whites Valley Vineyard Grenache, McLaren Vale

Pale in the glass with a faint haze. There’s a serene charm to this, a meshing of spice and savoury drive into the pristine fruit flavours, in a mid-sized frame. It has an Italianate quality, with the fleshy suppleness of variety welling beneath, fine but resolute pumice-like tannins the conveyance. Dried cranberry, sour cherry, warm terracotta, caraway, orange peel, pressed flowers. It’s a thoroughly modern grenache, and quite a delight. – Marcus Ellis, 95 points, Halliday Wine Companion.

Winemaker James Ellis says: The wine has incredible vibrancy and a real "drinkability" factor thanks to a long 90-day maceration on skins in the winery. Everything is in perfect harmony – acid, alcohol and tannin are all there and working in unison.

H. How does your region influence the wine?
JE. McLaren Vale is such a beautiful and vibrant region with warm days full of sun and surf and cool nights spent around the fire. This wine typifies the region; put it in the fridge for a slight chill on a warm day, or enjoy it at room temperature on a cool night and it will warm you up sufficiently.

Best enjoyed: Serve it in nice big glass to open the wine up and enjoy it with friends and family. Pair it with yum cha on a Sunday – you can’t beat it.

RRP $37 | Drink to 2030 | adawineco.com.au | Shop this wine

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2023 Briar Ridge The Gatherer Shiraz

What a beautiful expression of Sweetwater vineyard fruit, with such graceful flow for a powerful wine. The mulberry and blackberry fruit is delightfully supple, with intensity building beautifully as the palate progresses. There's a perfect synergy between the vineyard's character and the winemaking approach. Simply magnificent. – Toni Paterson, 96 points, Halliday Wine Companion.

Winemaker Andrew Duff says: This wine was a pleasure to finish. Alex Beckett, the previous Briar Ridge winemaker, did all the hard work for me to slide in along and finish. We were very proud to see this wine win Best One-Year-Old Shiraz at The Hunter Valley Boutique Wine Show in 2024.

H. How does the vineyard influence the wine?
AD. It’s the first time I have had the pleasure of playing with fruit from the Sweetwater vineyard. The blue-fruit spectrum the wine presents is polar to the red-fruit spectrum our Tallavera Grove vineyard displays. The name “The Gatherer” is a tip of the hat to this – gathering fruit from vineyards not family owned.

Best enjoyed: Best decanted prior to serving and enjoyed from the best glass you can find in your collection. Confit duck on puy lentils would be an awesome match.

RRP $55 | Drink to 2032 | briarridge.com.au | Shop this wine

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2021 Brown Brothers Patricia Cabernet Sauvignon

Patricia employs the best fruit of each vintage and in '21 you have one top year to celebrate. Pristine cabernet berry fruits on display, fragrant, dark fruited with violet florals, gentle spice, leafy notes and roasting herbs. They gather on the palate, beautifully composed, in unison with silky, fine tannins lasting long and deep. Unwaveringly elegant from start to flavoursome finish. – Jeni Port, 96 points, Halliday Wine Companion.

Winemaker Simon McMillian says: 2021 was an excellent year for Cabernet Sauvignon in Victoria, with close to average temperatures for the growing season, without excessive heat or rain events, providing optimal conditions for fruit maturity. 2021 was the first Patricia Cabernet Sauvignon that I’ve worked on from start to finish, so I’ll definitely be putting a few boxes in the cellar at home.

H. How does your region influence the wine?
SM. We work with small parcels of fruit from across Victoria to make the best cabernet sauvignon possible. Each region provides unique characteristics to the blend: King Valley (blue fruits and distinct cabernet tannins); Bendigo (dark berry fruits and structure); Yarra Valley (varietal leafiness and elegance).

Best enjoyed: I like to keep Patricia Cabernet in a wine fridge at home so it’s always opened at the right temperature, and serve it in nice large stemware, like Riedel Vinum Cabernet Sauvignon. The ultimate food pairing for Patricia Cabernet is slow roasted lamb shoulder, with plenty of garlic, rosemary and oregano.

RRP $70 | Drink to 2036 | brownfamilywines.com.au | Shop this wine

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2022 Brown Brothers Patricia Noble Riesling

Botrytis and riesling were made for each other. Here, they deliver another Patricia star performance complex in botrytis characters, but it is the role of fresh, enlivening acidity that really elevates the wine. Light golden colour. Stewed spiced apricots, lime marmalade, dried pear and apple, cumquat and spice. Built in layers of texture and rich flavours, and beautifully crisp and balanced. 375ml. – Jeni Port, 95 points, Halliday Wine Companion.

Winemaker Tom Canning says: Making Noble can be very challenging. Dealing with the climatic conditions to get the ball rolling in relation to the botrytis, then waiting for the exact right picking time, fermenting the wine in stages to get the best characters to shine through. But in the end all this stress is worth it as a beautifully complex wine awaits you at the end. In tasting this wine, I love the beautiful marmalade, honey and citrus characters that form the complex flavour palate and then the salivating acid that cuts through at the end. I also love how, over time in the bottle, this wine will gain more complexity and start to darken in colour.

H. How does your region influence the wine?
TC. The is a single-vineyard wine from our home here at Milawa in the base of the King Valley. The beautifully warm summer/early autumn days help get the riesling nice and ripe. Then, as the nights cool and we get some dew forming, the botrytis infection begins to occur. As the days stay warm and dry the botrytis can infect the fruit over enough time to give the correct sugar/flavour/acid levels in the grapes.

Best enjoyed: This is a classic dinner party wine. It cleanses the palate after the heavier dry wines and always creates great conversations around the table. I like to serve the wine chilled after a meal with either dessert (think passionfruit meringue or orange syrup cake with cream) or a cheese platter (it pairs especially well with blue cheese).

RRP $40 | Drink to 2029 | brownfamilywines.com.au | Shop this wine

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2023 Clonakilla Shiraz Viognier

The flagship is in fine form from this cool vintage, rendering it elegant and exotic. 22 per cent whole bunches in the ferment make an impact. It’s a touch sappy yet laden with heady aromatics – all florals with a dusting of Middle Eastern spices such as sumac. Super peppery. The mid-weighted palate is tight and a touch lean with red fruit accents, bright acidity and fine if plentiful tannins. It’s a wine you keep coming back to. It feels light and ethereal, deceptive. Time will reward the patient as this builds more complexity, but it is hard to resist now. – Jane Faulkner, 95 points, Halliday Wine Companion.

Chief winemaker Tim Kirk says: You really have to smell this wine to believe the intensity and purity of fruit we received in the 2023 Shiraz Viognier. As Clonakilla SV goes, this vintage strikes us as archetypal, style-defining, the essence of cool-climate shiraz. It is certainly beautiful; aromatically thrilling with a classically luminous, elegant palate.

H. How does your region influence the wine?
TK. We celebrate our warm summer days, cool nights, gentle slopes, refreshing evening breezes, complex red brown clays and decomposed granitic subsoil. Our extended ripening season leads to the development of striking, complex aromas, crisp natural acidity and superfine tannins.

Best enjoyed: Best served in a large Burgundy glass to bring out the aromatics. Pairs perfectly with duck.

RRP $130 | Drink to 2040 | clonakilla.com.au | Shop this wine

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2022 Flowstone Queen of the Earth Sauvignon Blanc

A powerhouse of a wine and regularly one of the best SBs from Margaret River. It’s complex with juicy acidity matched to a textural palate, lots of stone fruit and citrus, a touch of feijoa and freshly cut herbs plus some smoky sulphides. The palate feels tight yet there’s a succulence throughout and it opens revealing expansive flavour. An excellent drink with or without food. – Jane Faulkner, 96 points, Halliday Wine Companion.

Winemakers Stuart Pym and Janice McDonald say: Our passion for serious and sophisticatedsauvignon blanc has driven us to make stunning wines like this. From a vineyard we lease, and hence manage, in Karridale, the coolest part of Margaret River, comes the stunning grapes used for this wine. After 18 months in a single demi muid (600-litre barrel), this wine is bottled and then held back for another year before being released. It is a serious commitment to show just what sauvignon blanc can be.

H. How does your region influence the wine?
SP & JM. Margaret River does have a lovely climate for growing grapes. Good rainfall, at the right time, and lots of warm sunshine during the ripening and harvest period. The vineyard for this wine is in the coolest part of the region, which does add an element of restraint, while still showing that classic Margaret River focus.

Best enjoyed: Slightly chilled, and in a special sauvignon blanc glass. Best on a warm afternoon, or the early part of a meal… or both. Serve with salmon gravlax with a Dijon crème fraîche dressing, or plain and simple pan-fried scallops.

RRP $63 | Drink to 2035 | flowstonewines.com | Shop this wine

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2022 Logan Ridge of Tears Shiraz, Orange

Pomegranate juice, cranberry and raspberry coulis. A sliver of carob and coffee grinds. Some blackberry leaf and thistle. The palate is succulent and the intensity of both mulberry and cherry come forth. Tannins are powdery and fine. The wine drinks with purity of fruit but real sensation of Kalamata olive and terracotta earth. It's truly a wine with presence. This will age beautifully over the next decade. – Shanteh Wale, 96 points, Halliday Wine Companion.

Winemaker Peter Logan says: This is a true cool-climate shiraz with depth and character. It’s more elegant than its blockbuster cousins from down south, but that doesn’t mean it lacks power. We’ve been growing premium shiraz in Orange for over a decade now, but people are still discovering this little beauty.

H. How does your region influence the wine?
PL. It’s such a unique terroir in Orange. We’re growing shiraz at almost 1000m above sea level in ancient volcanic soils, which gives the wine its spicy and fruity characters.

Best enjoyed: Like all good shiraz, this is best served with good company and some cool jazz in the background. You can’t go wrong with a slow-cooked lamb shoulder on a bed of seasonal vegetables, garlic, rosemary and thyme.

RRP $60 | Drink to 2040 | loganwines.com.au | Shop this wine

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2023 Paul Nelson LOAM Chardonnay

When we talk about world-stage aspirations for Australian chardonnay, perhaps our initial pin on the map isn’t Denmark, but this fits the bill and then some. Freshly baked bread, white peach, nutmeg, grilled stone fruit – nothing linear here, rather a reverberation of sensory delight – honeyed pear, clotted cream and schist. Power, pools of depth. Lime zest. Repeat. Tensile and precise yet effortless, oyster shell and brine, the beginning and the end hard to finalise, such is the gravitas of balance. A wine I won’t easily forget. – Katrina Butler, 98 points, Halliday Wine Companion.

Winemaker Paul Nelson says: This wine reflects the beautiful diversity of our Karriview vineyard in Denmark, Western Australia. It showcases the evolution of our site and its ability to produce a wine that is comparable to some of the best examples of chardonnay in Australia.

H. How does your region influence the wine?
PN. Our vineyard is situated in the coastal Great Southern town of Denmark, in the GI of the Scotsdale Valley. Our unique clos benefits from its southerly location, tempered by the icy waters of the Southern Ocean (5 kms away). The soils of the Scotsdale Valley are dominated by fertile karri-loam substrates. Rich in nutrients and minerals, these soils drive vine vigour and impart the hallmark intensity seen in only the best appellations around the world. You could argue that our region is one of the few in Australia to be benefiting from more favourable wine growing conditions due to the changing climate. In this bottle you can taste the power and finesse of the Scotsdale Valley.

Best enjoyed: Serve the wine no colder than 14°C to allow its complex aromas to fully reveal themselves and pair with natural oysters from the Great Southern seaside town of Albany.

RRP $250 | Drink to 2038 | paulnelsonwines.com.au | Shop this wine

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2019 Robert Oatley Limited Release Barossa Shiraz

A plush and polished shiraz from grapes sources from the Barossa and Eden Valleys. Aromas of ripe blackberry, Doris plum, vanillin oak, violets and roasting meats. A beautiful roll of ripe fruit on the palate and, sure, oak plays a role in this wine, but it's sexy and fades back into that ripe black fruit core nicely. Superfine, powdery tannins lend support and the finish is long and well balanced. It's got poise and impressive fruit depth and pureness and a distinctly contemporary Barossan feel to its form. – Dave Brookes, Halliday Wine Companion, 96 points.

Owner Sandy Oatley says: Traditionally, we focus upon McLaren Vale for shiraz as we believe it to be an exemplary region, and our personal favourite for the variety. That said, it must be acknowledged that the Barossa is Australia’s best-known wine region and amongst our nation’s greatest for the grape. Our winemaker, Larry Cherubino, has identified some outstanding parcels of fruit for this exceptionally ageworthy example that also drinks superbly right now.

H. How does your region influence the wine?
SO. The Barossa tends to deliver richly flavoured and textured shiraz worthy of cellaring.

Best enjoyed: This wine benefits from decanting – more to allow the wine to breathe than to remove any sediments, as they’ve yet to form. Aeration enhances the aromatics and flavours enormously. A decent swirl in a larger glass will do the job if you don’t have a decanter handy. Pairs well with char-grilled dry-aged rib eye on the bone.

RRP $70 | Drink to 2034 | robertoatley.com.au | Shop this wine

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2023 Tyrrell's Wines Estate Grown Shiraz

This classy Tyrrell's shiraz will bowl you over with its fragrance, brightness and length of flavour. The quality of the fruit is undeniable, being sourced from the Tyrrell's Black Ridge, Weinkeller and Baulkham vineyards, the latter planted in the '60s. A chiffon-like layer of fragrant oak drapes over the gorgeous fruit, adding nutty interest and intrigue. This is a serious wine with impressive layers and vitality, offering subtle richness and juiciness at the front and satisfying succulence on the close. – Toni Paterson, 96 points, Halliday Wine Companion

CEO Chris Tyrrell says: This wine is the epitome of our Tyrrell’s house-style shiraz; it is textbook Hunter Valley, and it is from one of the best vintages in recent memory.

H. How does your region influence the wine?
CT. Sourced from three key vineyards within the Tyrrell estate: Baulkham planted in 1962, Weinkeller planted in 1970 and Black Ridge planted in 1998. All the vineyards are planted on iconic red dirt (red clay over limestone) unique to the ridgeline within the Tyrrell family estate. Traditional hand winemaking techniques are used: whole berry fermentation, gentle extraction, enhancing brightness and fruit purity. Matured in older large format French oak casks (2700L), this oak selection is a signature of Tyrrell’s red winemaking, enabling the fruit characteristics to be primary feature of the wine. The resulting wine is a modern interpretation of the Hunter River Burgundies made famous in the 1960s. Medium bodied, fruit-driven with pure and bright acidity, soft, savoury tannins with minimal oak character.

Best enjoyed: Serve at 15°C in a shiraz-specific varietal wine glass. Pair with a charcuterie and cheese plate.

RRP $40 | Drink to 2028 | tyrrells.com.au | Shop this wine

 

Top image credit: Clonakilla