Kingston’s 2002 Reserve Petit Verdot gained equal top gold medal in Class 23 and was one of the 19 one-year-old dry reds in the taste-off for the Jimmy Watson Trophy — the only non-mainstream straight varietal red to achieve that status (the others were four cabernet sauvignons, eight shirazes, two merlots, one pinot noir, one merlot cabernet, one shiraz cabernet and one shiraz viognier).

The just-released Kingston 2000 Empiric Selection Petit Verdot was one of just three gold medals in Class 40.

Another Kingston 2002 Petit Verdot won a bronze medal in Class 23.

“I’ve long regarded petit verdot as a natural variety for Australia’s warmer regions,” said Bill Moularadellis, Kingston Estate’s founder and chief winemaker.

“In its Bordeaux homeland, it can be an important component in some of the best wines, but it only ripens to its full potential role in the warmest of vintages. It’s not known as ‘the little green one’ for nothing.

“In South Australia’s Riverland region we can fully ripen petit verdot every year and that’s why I’ve always seen it as a premium varietal in its own right — a variety able to deliver an elegant, long-living red with extremely attractive nuances of violets and blueberries.

“We now have Australia’s most significant plantings of petit verdot, and we’re learning all the time about how to best handle the variety, and I more confident than ever about regarding it as one of our future star wines.”

Kingston Estate returned a very solid overall performance at the 2003 Melbourne Wine Show, returning 25 medals (two golds, six silvers and 17 bronzes) from its 28 entries.

“That’s a significantly better result than the show average — and all the more meritorious because most of the successful wines will retail in the $13-14 price bracket,” said Bill Moularadellis.

“It shows that our grapegrowing and winemaking teams are very much on the right track.”