Bryan Martin

As a talented food writer, cook and forager, Bryan Martin thinks deeply about textures and flavours. This combined with over a decade’s experience at Clonakilla, has resulted in a suite of distinctive Ravensworth wines.

At the International Riesling Challenge in Canberra in 2012, Bryan Martin’s 2012 Ravensworth Riesling hit the jackpot, beating all comers to win the challenge, an amazing achievement for a small-production local wine in international company.

It was no flash in the pan: the 2013 was judged the top wine at the 2013 Canberra and Region Wine Show (as well as best Canberra District wine at the International Riesling Challenge), and the 2014 was champion wine at the NSW Small Winemakers Wine Show.

The wine is deliberately made to taste quite different to Clonakilla’s. Some batches are fermented with solids, some in ceramic eggs, and ambient yeasts are used, so it’s a bit wilder and less pristine than Clonakilla riesling.

In case you hadn’t picked it up by now, there’s a connection: Bryan Martin is the right-hand man of Clonakilla boss Tim Kirk. Martin is Clonakilla’s secret weapon, he’s been the full-time operations winemaker/winery manager since 2008 and has worked every vintage since 2004.

Martin makes the Ravensworth wines at Clonakilla, though he and wife Jocelyn have their own vineyard at Murrumbateman. Not surprisingly, the Ravensworth style has a lot in common with Clonakilla – the wines are aromatic, light- to medium-bodied, soft of tannin and modest in alcohol. They are beautiful, seductive wines that emphasise fragrance and texture. The reds, led by sangiovese (the first wine Martin made for himself), have very gentle tannins.

As at Clonakilla, the main wine is a shiraz viognier, made in the same way: co-fermented with about five per cent viognier and one-third whole bunches, but slightly less new oak. The key difference is that Ravensworth’s vineyard is 50 metres higher, at 650 metres above sea level, and picking starts after Clonakilla’s has finished. The wine is also slightly lighter and lower in alcohol. This is partly because of the cooler site and also because Martin likes to preserve natural acidity by picking early. “I try to make as few additions as possible, such as yeast, nutrients and acid, and in some cases I don’t filter,” he explains.

Ravensworth also grows the whites which are blended to form The Grainery – a superb, loosely Rhône-styled blend of marsanne, viognier, roussanne and chardonnay. Most Ravensworth wines are estate grown, although nebbiolo is bought in from Hilltops and some chardonnay from Tumbarumba.

Martin’s involvement in wine began with a job in a London wine bar, where he discovered French wines. Coming home, he worked as a manager of a hotel in Tasmania. He returned to Canberra when Jocelyn, a teacher, was transferred. Martin was primary carer for their children and cheffed at the Hyatt at night. He also taught cookery. Looking for something else to do, Martin embarked on a viticulture course while working at a local winery, Jeir Creek. This led to a wine science degree and the decision to plant vines. “Land was cheap then, so in partnership with my brother and my wife’s father, I bought a site at Murrumbateman and planted vines,” he says.

He met Tim Kirk after getting viognier cuttings from his father Dr John Kirk. He and Tim had children the same age and their friendship flourished. “At the same time, another vineyard popped up,” he says. “It had cabernet and sauvignon blanc, was well set-up, had water, but the wrong varieties.” With partners, they bought it in 2002 and Ravensworth was born. “I was buying fruit and experimenting with winemaking by then. We realised we didn’t need two vineyards, so we sold the first vineyard to Lark Hill,” he explains.

In 2004 he began grafting or replanting the cabernet and most of the sauvignon blanc over to four clones of shiraz, three of sangiovese, three of riesling and smaller plots of viognier, marsanne, roussanne and chardonnay. The total planting is now 2.8 hectares. This is boutique stuff, notwithstanding about half the 2015 crush was bought-in fruit.

As an accomplished cook, forager and writer of books and columns on the subject, food is critical to Martin’s aesthetic. “I cook more than most people, and I’m always trying different things, new techniques. It’s the same with winemaking. Drinkability is uppermost. I don’t want extraction in reds, but mid-weight, savoury, food-ready wines,” he says. Happily, the region suits the style.

Of the Canberra District, he says “The biggest surprise is what we can do here. We have hero varieties, such as shiraz and riesling, but we can do others. The world is our oyster.”