2023 Rieslingfreak Riesling #2 Polish Hill River Clare Valley 750 ml

With a name like Rieslingfreak, you know what you’re getting. Winemaker John Hughes is single-minded in his pursuit of greatness with the grape.

He makes a stunning range of Rieslings from across South Australia, and he’s collected the accolades to match, regularly placing multiple wines in Wine Advocate’s top five of the vintage. He’s also earned five “red” stars from Halliday Wine Companion, which called him “one of the finest winemakers of the variety.” 

Yet of Hughes’s brilliant bottlings, the #2 stands out. It’s produced from vines in the Clare Valley’s Polish Hill River—the most coveted region in Australia for Riesling—by a winery that “sits at the apex of Riesling producers,” according to Halliday Wine Companion. Bone-dry and absolutely packed with mineral intensity, it scored only a point lower than Grosset’s Polish Hill ($60), Australia’s most iconic Riesling and one of its two greatest white wines. 

That’s because it’s sourced from the Polish Hill River area of the Clare Valley. There’s no more coveted area to grow the grape in Australia. The soils there are young by Aussie standards—more shales, slates, and sandstones that mimic some of the great regions in Germany and Austria—and there is plenty of wind, which promotes thick skins and intense character.

2023 was a later-ripening vintage, which suits Riesling’s character perfectly, and Hughes started picking right around the date that harvest concluded the year before. That shows in the tension and energy in the wine, which is only a remarkable 11.5% alcohol for as intense as it is. Like Australia’s other top bottlings, it’ll age beautifully for at least a decade.