“The 2021 vintage in South Australia delivered near perfect conditions for growing beautifully balanced, ripe grapes,. As is often the case in exceptional vintages, yields were also good as the vines were happy and healthy. The Nero d’Avola was hand harvested on 6th March, Mataro on the 29th, the Fiano and Arneis on March 2nd and the Zibibbo on March 9th.

The Zibibbo was given 24 hours pre-ferment skin contact to extract greater aromatics, the Nero and Mataro were taken from the press after just a few hours to provide colour, then co-fermented with the Fiano and Arneis. Interestingly the wine always goes into bottle a bright candy pink colour which transforms into the classic peachy orange over winter, a result of us not using any sulphur so the brighter red and pink colour compounds fall out of solution. After eight years of making the Astro Bunny we’re pretty happy with how it works out and don’t meddle too much with a winning recipe.

The wine is bottled with 12 g/L residual sugar and completes its fermentation in the bottle over the winter becoming fully dry and resulting in a final pressure of around 3 bar, producing a gentle foam rather than an aggressive fizz. Wild yeast, no adds, no filtration, no fining, zero sulphur = 100% natural goodness. “

- Tim Wildman MW