Winemaker Notes
Nose: Lifted sweet plum and berry fruits. Hints of coffee, chocolate and menthol integrate and complex well with the spicy French oak.
Palate: Palate is richly textured and flavored, initial sweet plum and berry fruits integrated with the firm tannins and a smooth, alcohol finish. The palates natural acidity and subtle oak characters provide length, complexity and persistence. Cellaring potential of at least 12–15 years.
Professional Ratings
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Robert Parker's Wine Advocate
The 2006 Oracle Shiraz spent 22 months in French oak, 50% new. Opaque purple-colored, it exhibits a captivating nose of toasty oak, truffle, mineral, violets, black pepper, blueberry compote, and blackberry. Glossy on the palate with superb depth, it exhibits gobs of savory blue and black fruits, hints of chocolate, and enough ripe tannin to evolve for 4-6 years. Drink this explosive effort from 2013 to 2026.
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Wine Enthusiast
Dark and chocolaty in style, with hints of earth and espresso oozing in. This is a big, heavy, fudge-like Shiraz that comes across as impressive for its concentration if not for any sense of elegance or finesse. Might improve with aging, but might not; a gamble, so drink it over the next couple of years.
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.”
The Clare Valley is actually a series of narrow north to south valleys, each with a different soil type and slightly different weather patterns along their stretch. In the southern heartland between Watervale and Auburn, there is mainly a crumbled, red clay loam soil called terra rossa and cool breezes come in from Gulf St. Vincent. A few miles north, in Polish Hill, is soft, red loam over clay; westerlies blowing in from the Spencer Gulf influece this area's climate.
The differences in soil, elevation, degree of slope and weather enable the region to produce some of Australia’s finest, aromatic, spicy and lime-pithy Rieslings, as well as excellent Shiraz, Cabernet Sauvignon and Malbec with ripe plummy fruit, good acid and big structure.
Clare Valley is an isolated farming country with a continental climate known for its warm and sunny days, followed by cool nights—perfect for wine grapes’ development of sugar and phenolic ripeness in conjunction with notable acidity levels.