Next week brings the annual Taste Orange event into Sydney’s CBD. A large scale installation that transplants a little bit of the Central West New South Wales town to celebrate the abundant food and wine and idyllic lifestyle of Orange.

So I thought it best to have a look at one of the wineries that sometimes flies under the radar, Patina. Gerald Naef, an immigrant from California many moons ago, came to wine making late in life, but that sometimes brings a wonderful array of life experience and a potential to not follow the well trodden steps of the traditional. The label is incredibly striking, one of my personal favourites. An artistic industrial contrast of rust and steel? Or is it a rural scene, a slice of just turned field weighted down with a loaded firmament?

The Patina vineyard sits at 930 metres above sea level and further cooled by airflow from the region’s sentinel Mount Canobolas. The cellar door is only open on the weekends, but the best time to visit is during one of the food and wine festivals that Orange does so well and see Patina as stage for concerts and picnics.

Patina Wines Riesling 2013

Pale blonde hue. Crisp talc, floral bloom, soft lime and an almost cinnamon spice note. Restrained and delicate at the start of the journey. Lime juice citrus overlaid with crunchy acid. There’s an espy of fullness and an attempt to promote palate generosity with some residual sugar.

Tight, linear and for the moment, closed…it’s all about structure, rather than the fruit.

RRP: $25

Alc : 11.2%

Patina Wines Reserve Chardonnay 2008

Yep, 2008. If Gerald Naef was looking for an alternate moniker for the wine, you could probably go with “Accountant’s Nightmare.”

Light gold with hardly a hint of being 6 years old. Nutty, sesame oil, lemon curd and peach. Rich, full and somewhat still overt. Oak and lees maturation characters promote nutty, creamy complexity. Ripe peach stone fruit, almost headed to rock melon (without being tropical). Regional acidity providing the struts around which the fleshiness is wrapped. Finishes medium-long with lingering bitter sweet grapefruit.

This is still a wine of parts, so buy a dozen and forget about it for a while, or pair it now with a good quality free range chicken schnitzel.

RRP: $35

Alc: 11.9%

Both wines samples courtesy of Define Wine and Patina Wines