Who we are and what we do.

We make award winning wines from Tropical Fruit.

No this does not mean they are sweet and sticky. Many people ask us how we can make dry wines from sweet fruits like Mango and Lychee, being unaware that Grapes are the sweetest of all fruits. Grapes have the highest sugar level of any fruit.

We have about 12 wines to taste including from 4 dry wines, 3 full flavour medium, 3 port wines and a drier style LemonCello.

We make single-fruit wines, not blends. We have established that people enjoy having a wine actually tasting of the fruit that it is made from. All the fruits we use have big flavours, so that unlike most grapes, the flavour of the fruit isn't lost in the fermenting process. Tropical Fruit Wines are an ideal companion for foods.

The fruits we use include Pineapple, Passionfruit, Mango, Jaboticaba, Lime, Ginger, Lychee, Oranges, Araca, Grapefruit, Black Sapote and Kaffir Lime. We have made wines from Caimito, Acerola, Figs, Jakfruit, Paw Paw, Plantain, Purple Mangosteen, Carambola, Yellow Mangosteen, Water Cherry and Guava. Depending on fruit supply we are likely to make more of these wines in the future. The fruit is grown in the organic way and in our own orchard. No chemicals are used on the fruit trees.

We are a boutique winery which means that we grow the fruit, make the wine, bottle and label the wines on the farm. We have chosen to limit the volume of wine that we make to a maximum of 12,000 litres and currently all of our wine is sold at the Cellar Door and through our Mail Order.

We are located in the centre of the Shannonvale Valley, just 15 minutes north of Port Douglas, 5 minutes south of Mossman and 70km north of Cairns in Tropical North Queensland, Australia. We have 17 acres which includes 12 acres of Timber Plantation and most of the remainder under Fruit Trees. The climate is "wet" Tropics which means it can rain any time but most of the rain happens in the "wet" season, effectively from December to April, giving us an average of 2.2 metres each year. Our lowest temperature in winter is about 14 degrees C and our maximum in summer is about 35 degrees C.

The Shannonvale Tropical Fruit Winery is a family business. Tony and Trudie Woodall and eldest son Laza. We have lived on the farm since 1992 and we have produced commercial fruit wine for the past 5 years. What started with a hobby of growing tropical fruit became a winery after we started producing surplus fruit and what better to do with fruit but make it into wine. You can only eat so much jam!!! This was 12 years ago and then 5 years ago we decided to convert our amateur wine making into commercial quality wines. We contract a Wine Consultant, Brian Wilson from Victoria who has provided us with the best of wine making expertise and 10 medals from 13 wines at recent wine shows demonstrates this.

Cheers,

Tony, Trudie and Laza Woodall

Please Phone, Fax , Email or send us a Postcard for our Wine Order Form and Wine Tasting Notes.

Tasting notes for 7-3-2008.

All wines $20 each except for the Black Sapote Port and the LemonCello $25. Medals refer to the Australian Fruit Wine Awards November 2006 held in Cairns

Dry Wines.

Mango - Dry

Clean, fresh and dry. Low acid level which makes it the most popular style of dry wine. It has a light to medium flavour of Mango and is ideal with any light flavoured food. A long way from a dessert wine.

A wine to match fish and chicken.

PINEAPPLE - Dry

We have the tastiest Pineapples (Mareeba Sweet) in Australia available to us in Mossman and we have made this wine into a dry style using the natural acid of the Pineapple. The wine has the aroma of Pineapple, is full bodied and has the full flavour of the fruit. It is very well balanced at this time of its development and has the potential to score well in its class at the next Australian Fruit Wine Awards. Will cellar for 2-3 years.

We are finding this goes really well with thick savoury foods like Indian curries.

Paw Paw - Dry

New 20-11-2007. Our previous Paw Paw wine was very popular and went very quickly. This wine is very similar in flavour and style. Technically quite dry but presents as a medium style and is a light to medium flavour. The flavours are quite delicate for a Paw Paw and matches with most food types including Thai curries, stronger fish and chicken dishes but especially good with smoky foods.

Tropical Red for red meats or strong flavoured food

JABOTICABA - “Beaujelais” style

A new wine on the table 15-2-2008  The most popular style of red in the Tropics. A real summer wine.  Beaujelais styles are light on tannin, light on acids, pleasant flavour and not heavy. Like all red wines this Jaboticaba Tropical Dry Red is perfect for any red-meat dishes which includes Steaks, Bar-B-Qs, Spaghetti Bolognaise, Pizzas, Lasagne, Pork and Lamb.

Jaboticaba - Full flavour - Bronze Medal.

A new wine on the table but is 1 year old already. It can be described as a Shiraz style but in fact has a higher tannin level than a shiraz but we have polymerised the tannins so they don't have the coarseness of the tannin “grip“, but retain the heaviness. The first sip is a shock to the palate. This type of red hasn't been on the market for many years (but the winemakers are making for themselves). It has developed excellent balance between the acids, the tannins and the fruit flavours and will cellar well for many years to come. The experts are saying this is already close to a gold medal.

Red meats and game meats of course with many other similar full flavoured foods.

For spicy foods

Ginger - Silver Medal in 2005

This Ginger wine has the rich aroma of the Ginger root. This table wine is designed as a wine for spicy food. Like the Lime neither sweet or dry. For Ginger lovers it is delightful as casual drinking wine. The flavour is medium so that it won't dominate the spicy food. But it still has a bit of a zing at the back palate.

Serve with Curries, Mexican and all Asian foods.

Jakfruit

New on the table this month. The Jakfruit is a bit bigger than a Water Melon, it is the biggest fruit in the world. It is an Indian fruit and is used in the making of thick savoury Indian Curries. The flavour of the fruit is strong, heavy and pungent. The aroma to most people is Honey-like, a bit Muscaty but slightly more pungent. We thought this would be too much of an “acquired“ taste for most people but it has become one of our best sellers. The wine is relatively light in flavour but strong enough to indicate the flavour of the fruit. Quite dry with a low acid.

It is certainly different and terrific with thick Indian Curries.

Dessert Wines

LYCHEE - full flavour - slightly dry of medium

The return of the very popular Lychee wine (20-2-2008).  We sold out back in November last year but we now have the new crop of fruit so its on again.  Full flavour but medium style, not sweet.  Lychee is one of the very few fruits that retains most of its fruit flavour when fermented, which is great because the Lychee fruit is the most popular tropical fruit.  Terrific as a social drink (like our Mango Dessert) but goes with any Chinese-type spicy foods and great with most Cheeses.

Yellow Mangosteen.

Also new this month. The fruit is almost too acidic to eat but has a very interesting and pleasant flavour, almost “French“. The wine is technically a dessert wine but has a high level of natural acid making it almost like a medium flavour dry wine. We have balanced the acidity to produce a very distinctive wine and is proving to be very popular to those people who think beyond the traditional dessert style.

Great as a balancer for Sticky Date Pudding type desserts, great as a palate clenser between courses and many people are now enjoying this as a social drink.

Mango.

Full flavoured and about half the sweetness of most grape dessert wines. Really popular with those who love the Mango flavour without the stickiness. Full of flavour as you would expect from a Mango dessert.

Ideal with Prawns and any other Shellfish. All the cheeses and dessert style foods. For many people it is very popular as a social drink.

Ports

Orange Liquour Port - Bronze Medal

At 18% alcohol this is the port equivalent to a Cointreau or Grand Marnier. Rich flavours of peak ripeness oranges. It is loved by most men but 99.999% of women. This is one of our most popular wines.

Perfect as a Port, with Dark Chocolates, Strawberries, Rasberries, on IceCream or with crushed ice or in a Trifle. Try it as the base for sauce to go on fish.

Grapefruit Port

We have blended the intense spiciness and complexity of the zest of the skins with the flavours of the sweet tropical Grapefruit (March) resulting in a rich luscious complex spicy flavour with a firm back-palate and a suggestion of liquid Marmalade. Made in the style of one of the many traditional aged Portugese Ports. It is made for those who like complex traditional styles of ports. Our previous Grapefruit Port won a gold medal and this is heading in the same direction.

Black Sapote Port - Gold Medal in 2005 - Champion wine of the show and even better now.

Made from the Mexican fruit Black Sapote (Sapote is South American for fruit). It is known in Australia as the Chocolate Pudding Fruit. Once fermented the Port develops flavours of Chocolate, Liquorice, Dates, Prunes, Malt, Sarsaparilla, Treacle, Aniseed, Raisins, Vanilla, Caramel, Christmas Pudding and others as you swish it around the palate. We challenge anyone to make a more complex single-fruit port.

We are very proud of this Gold Medal port and it is our best selling wine with good reason. A Port lovers Port !!!

Kaffir Lime Port - Bronze Medal

The rich flavour of the fruit makes this port one for those with a well developed palate. Very smooth and with honey flavours. It makes a wonderful “nip” and has a remarkably long palate. Many uses outside of the glass, great in the kitchen to add to your stir-fry's to give the Thai factor and numerous uses in food preparation.

Chefs love it for adding it to their Thai foods. Makes a lovely sauce to go on fish. Cocktail Bars love it for their cocktail making. Hostesses love it for their Party Punches.

LemonCello

New on the table September 2007. LemonCello is a traditional Italian fortified wine usually around 35% alcohol. The LemonCellos made in Southern Italy are sweeter styles and these are the Cellos usually exported to Australia. Those made in central and northern Italy are drier. The Shannonvale LemonCello is the drier style. We see many Italian people at the Cellar Door and they say that this LemonCello is the one they would buy in Italy. The flavour is rich and zingy. The 20% alcohol balances beautifully with the sugars, the acids and the flavour. We are very happy with this LemonCello and this will be the first of many Cello-style wines. We look forward to a Kaffir LimeCello, a GrapefruitCello, an OrangeCello and perhaps a GrapeloCello.