2024 Kooyong Meres Pinot Noir, Mornington Peninsula

As fitting with the cool/wet vintage, this comes out a light garnet hue with lots of herbal inflections, cherries, raspberry leaf and some smoky cured meats. It sets up the barely mid-weighted palate nicely. Some stemmy/whole-bunch flavours infuse the sweetish fruit, the tangy and tart cherries, spicy oak rendering this with a certain charm and appeal. Drink to 2035.

95 points Jane Faulkner for Halliday Wine Companion, August 2026

Medium ruby red colour, with black cherry, smoked pork, and forest floor aromatics. The palate shows dark cherry and black spices, with a hint of dried herbs and mushroom adding complex, deeper savoury layers. It flows long, with subtle silky tannins that envelop it and carry it to a lingering and detailed finish. Drink to 2035.

95 points Stuart Knox for The Real Review, August 2026

This is tight and savoury and, at first, reserved, though give it some air and it’s effusive. It’s peppery, leafy and twiggy and all those things, the underpinning flushed with meaty red and black cherry, florals, woodsmoke and undergrowth. It has the fruit. It’s plenty savoury. It’s like a smoking ceremony of herbs and cherry juice, dragged through earth and whatnot. It’s very good. And it’s firm with savoury tannin too.

94+ points Cambell Mattinson for The Wine Front, June 2026

Brings a striking cool climate Pinot character to the fore, all earthy and fresh with dusty beetroot, green herbals, celery-like, fennel aromas amid dark cherries and plums dressed in wild herbs. Works deep and carries through on the palate in earthy, undergrowth tones, purple fruits, cherry and plum, dark herbs and hints of black pepper which bring a liveliness and lift to the finish. The use of whole bunches (15%) helps drive the al dente tannic influence on the wine and fleshiness, while French oak (16% new) contributes to an overall complexity. Drink to 2036.

93 points Jeni Port for Wine Pilot, July 2026

Delicate but very expressive, welling up with flavour and utterly charming. Cherry blossom, kirsch and a very light note of coffee bean. Tannins as silky and juicy as ripe raspberries. A touch of caraway on the finish. It’s so appetising and gentle that you really want to chill this a little and sip it outside, no food needed.

17/20 points Tamlyn Currin for Jancis Robinson, May 2026

Kooyong is a specialist Pinot Noir and Chardonnay producer based at Tuerong on the Mornington Peninsula, where the Gjergja family has farmed 40 hectares of estate vines since 1996.

The Meres is one of six distinct single blocks vinified separately. This block covers just 0.6ha of Kooyong’s 27-year-old Pinot Noir plantings in an exposed part of the vineyard that features heavier clay soils that supress vine vigour and yields low quantities of highly perfumed fruit.

The hand-harvested fruit was destemmed to a stainless steel vat with a 20% whole bunch inclusion for fermentation with indigenous yeasts. Gently pumped over and plunged over fourteen days, the wine was pressed, racked and matured for twelve months in French oak barriques of which 20% were new. The wine was racked once more ahead of bottling which took place without fining or filtration.