Winemaker Notes
This is a full-bodied wine in the definitive Barossa Shiraz style. The beautiful deep red color and great complexity on the nose reveal a serious and superior wine. It has aromas of berry and black fruits with savory spice and cedar oak. The palate is savory with pure dark fruits and hints of chocolate wrapped in vanilla and cedar oak.
This is a powerful wine that will cellar for some years. It will complement robust meat dishes – barbecued lamb backstrap or beef fillet, a flavorsome Osso Bucco or venison.
Professional Ratings
-
Wine Enthusiast
Six years in the bottle sees this fullbodied wine easing into calmer waters, the waves of plum fruit washing over the nose and tongue in dried rather than fresh form, and herbal, floral characters that feel like they belong less in a meadow and more in a potpourri dish. The vanillin oak is still present, too. There’s still a firm grip of fine-grained tannins and some silky textured fruit weight but there’s plenty of freshness still buoying things into brightness.
Marked by an unmistakable deep purple hue and savory aromatics, Syrah makes an intense, powerful and often age-worthy red. Native to the Northern Rhône, Syrah achieves its maximum potential in the steep village of Hermitage and plays an important component in the Red Rhône Blends of the south, adding color and structure to Grenache and Mourvèdre. Syrah is the most widely planted grape of Australia and is important in California and Washington. Sommelier Secret—Such a synergy these three create together, the Grenache, Syrah, Mourvedre trio often takes on the shorthand term, “GSM.”
Historically and presently the most important wine-producing region of Australia, the Barossa Valley is set in the Barossa zone of South Australia, where more than half of the country’s wine is made. Because the climate is very hot and dry, vineyard managers work diligently to ensure grapes reach the perfect levels of phenolic ripeness.
The intense heat is ideal for plush, bold reds, particularly Shiraz on its own or Rhône Blends. Often Shiraz and Cabernet partner up for plump and powerful reds.
While much less prevalent, light-skinned varieties such as Riesling, Viognier or Semillon produce vibrant Barossa Valley whites.
Most of Australia’s largest wine producers are based here and Shiraz plantings date back as far as the 1850s or before. Many of them are dry farmed and bush trained, still offering less than one ton per acre of inky, intense, purple juice.