Chicagoan Brad Hickey's travels as a sommelier led him, via New York, Europe and South Africa, to Chris Ringland's Rockford for a three-month stint in 07 where he was particularly taken by Basket Press Shiraz. He was then introduced to Nicole Thorpe and her Omensetter Vineyard (McLaren Vale) planted to shiraz and cabernet in 1997 and Brash Higgins was formed. Sicilian red variety nero d'Avola (clone Matura 1 grafted to own rootstock shiraz) makes up the final hectare of the vineyard. The first harvest of nero d'Avola was in 2011. Each harvest, the juice from the grapes is matured on its skins and seeds to express as much of the vineyard as possible. The young wine stays like this for seven months in 200 litre clay amphoras hand created for the winery by Adelaide master potter, John Bennett, from local clay soils very similar to Omensetter. Small, 300-case annual production.
