We know Justin Westhoff could play great footy but can he make great wine?

When Justin Westhoff’s football career ended he went home to the Barossa, and staked his reputation on a second career creating wine with his best mate.

Port Adelaide favourite Justin Westhoff has partnered with boyhood friend Scotty Rogasch to create wine under The Forage Supply Co label.

For all their commonalities, Scotty ­Rogasch and Justin Westhoff are more easily defined by their striking differences. Both are Barossan to their bootstraps, and those boots kicked a lot of footballs. They played as kids for Tanunda and as teenagers for Central Districts in the SANFL. Then their paths diverged. Justin was picked up by Port Adelaide in the 2006 AFL draft, playing 280 games in a career that made him a cult hero among the notoriously fervent Port Adelaide faithful. Scotty blew out a knee and went wandering the globe. But they always knew, once the football went flat, they’d end up doing something together back at home. That something is The Forage Supply Co.

It appears, on the surface, to be a wine brand, but like the two men behind it, dig deeper and you find more. The two couldn’t be any more different. Westhoff is toweringly tall and so sparing with his words that statues appear verbose beside him. Rogasch is potentially part terrier, humming with so much chatty energy that if you could attach jumper leads to him, he’d start your car. But they are committed to the mantra, “smallest impact on the environment, biggest impact on the community”

With the wine business at its core, The Forage Supply Co also operates a small catering operation helping to feed the homeless, community kitchen gardens, and funnels a percentage of revenue to Forage Built, a program building partnerships to provide housing pods for the homeless. That community mindedness is reflected in the wines, too. Using Rogasch’s parents’ Tanunda vineyard at its core, and the vineyards of friends and neighbours, the pair have crafted a collection of wines that not only tie neatly into the old Barossa traditions, but reimagine what a wine business can achieve. Great wines speak of place; the Forage Supply Co wines speak of a better place.

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2023 FORAGE SUPPLY CO CHARDY PARTY $30

Bias would have me say the only way to make unoaked chardonnay any worse would be to make it in the Barossa. But tasting this without preconception delivers surprise. I want to hate it but I can’t. Slated melon rind, some peach, a bit of lemon pith. Punchy acidity, ­refined fruit richness, energy and drive. Who would’ve thought? 11% alcohol, 90 points

2024 FORAGE SUPPLY CO BABY FACE FIELD BLEND NO.6, $32

When the boys started, they replanted an old vineyard to grenache, carignan and montepulciano. This is all about fragrance and energetic juiciness, a wine of youthful energy. Ripe raspberries, musk sticks, a little spice. Happiest with a slight chill. 13.5% alcohol, 93 points

2021 FORAGE SUPPLY CO COTTAGE ­RESERVE SHIRAZ, $150

Classic Barossa. Dark chocolate and rich earth, roast meat and preserved plums. Fullness without fat, a choc-coated fruit sweetness deep and sustained. Generous through the middle, tapered by fine-grain tannins through the finish. This proves these boys ­really do have Barossa blood.

14.5% alcohol, 95 points