2025 Nick O’Leary White Rocks Riesling, Canberra District

There’s a lovely evenness here with its juicy citrus and melon flavours, spice and florals. A touch estery at first, yet that subsides, and while the acidity is fresh, it’s almost softish. A gentle and pleasing drink. Drink 2026 to 2038.

95 points Jane Faulkner for Halliday Wine Companion (Special Value), May 2026

Nick O’Leary started making wine in Canberra at 26, as winemaker at Hardy’s before they exited the region in 2006. He established his own label immediately, with a simple focus: Riesling and Shiraz from the Canberra District’s best vineyards. The estate vineyard sits in Hall Valley in the Murrumbidgee River corridor, just outside the ACT boundary.

White Rocks is Nick’s old vine Riesling grown in his home vineyard, the Heywood Estate. With an almost cult-like following among the otherwise civilised Canberrans, it is a wine that disappears quickly off the shelves each year it is released.

2025 turned out to be an outstanding vintage for Canberra District wines. Dry warm days with significant diurnal temperature variations typical of this high altitude continued throughout the growing season and the harvest time. Riesling excelled with incredible flavours, crisp acidity and perfectly balanced flavours.

Winemaking is as simple as it gets – it is all about gentle but precise handling of the fruit. The wine is not fined, but it is lightly filtered before being bottled just a couple of months after harvest (late June in 2025).

The 2025 is still a young wine. The lively palate shows citrus and spice. There’s a firm line of acidity set against a smooth, round mouthfeel that suggests perfectly ripe fruit, the combination promising this will be a long-lived wine.

Allow the wine a little air before serving. Good company for lemongrass and turmeric marinated grilled prawns or steamed whole coral trout with ginger and shallot.

White Rocks is the kind of Riesling that will reward bottle age. You will be cooking from very different recipes after five years.