While I like the new Cabernet more, this First Foot Forward Upper Yarra Pinot Noir 2022 has some character. Sourced from the Lone Star Creek Vineyard, which always make me think that there must have been some Yarra Valley cowboys. Then you go there (Lone Star Creek is in Woori Yallock), and it’s just hilly Aussie countryside with vines and eucalypts.

This Pinot is anything but cowboy wine. It’s ripe, though, with this Cherry Ripe and glacé red fruit power to it and a little whole bunch spice. I haven’t seen power like this in one of the First Foot Forward wines. Maybe a little warm to finish but there is this rippling volume here that is quite interesting, if still placed in the context of a medium-bodied Upper Yarra Pinot.

Best drinking: now to six years. 17.7/20, 92/100. 14%, $38. First Foot Forward website. Would I buy it? Worth a few glasses.