Top 100 Wines: Shiraz (part 2)
Top 100 Wines: Shiraz (part 2)
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Step up the power in the wines, pay a little more, and you'll find a range of wonderful regional expressions from the Barossa, McLaren Vale, Adelaide Hills and Langhorne Creek.
Dowie Doole 2012 Shiraz
Evidence 2012 vintage played out very well in McLaren Vale as well as other SA regions, this is old-school shiraz in all its layers - plenty of oak character lines in its spice and mint chocolate aromas, rich, ripe and bold plum fruit flavours following, warm, soft and comforting as you sip with desirable tannins and texture filling out the finish.
★★★★
McLaren Vale
Food: Herb crusted rump steak
$25
Three Dark Horses 2013 Shiraz
Wow. Youthful, vibrant yet moodily dark colours lead you right into this fascinating wine – single vineyard fruit, some vines up to 70 years old, wild yeast fermentation for a beautifully textural, fine-grained earthy shiraz that is settled in its rich flavours of dark chocolate and black fruits. Spot-on balance. Great drinking.
★★★★1/2
McLaren Vale
Food: Chinese style braised duck
$25
Kalleske Moppa 2012 Shiraz
From the Kalleske family’s biodynamic vineyard, this takes in small additions of viognier and petit verdot to add a little aromatic lift, resulting in just about everything you would desire in a big yet modern Barossa shiraz: deep, dark-berry flavours, fine textures, a distinctive stone fruit kernel note, bright and vibrant to the end.
★★★★1/2
Barossa Valley
Food: Steak and kidney pie
$28
Murray Street Vineyards Black Label 2012 Shiraz
Eye-catching vibrant purples in the glass offer immediate attraction and, while the oak is prominent at the moment, previous vintages show it gradually integrates, allowing its pepper and exotic dark spice notes to lift further into the deep and rich plum fruit profile. It’s mouth-filling and utterly satisfying in that big Barossa way.
★★★★
Barossa Valley
Food: Rustic Lasagna
$28
Heartland 2012 Directors’ Cut Shiraz
From older vineyards in a crackingly good regional vintage, this shows a bit of oak, but it’s very good French wood, adding pepper, anise and nutmeg-like spices to accentuate the shiraz aromatics with earthy and mineral layers also in play. Flavour, flavour, flavour - delicious, intense and sophisticated.
★★★★1/2
Langhorne Creek
Food: Roast beef, Newman’s horseradish
$33
Bishop by Ben Glaetzer 2012 Shiraz
All-round, full-bodied Barossa shiraz in all its glory with black fruits, dark sweet, exotic anise spice and a finely crafted balance between all its fruits and underlying foundation elements of oak, sticky texture, tannin richness and acidity, coming to a satisfying mouth-watering conclusion. Bold and beautiful.
★★★★1/2
Barossa
Food: Braised beef short ribs
$33
Torzi Matthews Frost Dodger 2012 Shiraz
Wow. Perhaps the most distinctive Barossa zone shiraz you’ll encounter in a brilliant vintage, the fruit rack-dried (in a north-eastern Italian tradition) before going into the winery, ramping up intensity, the fruit flavours vibrant and energetic with a faint dash of delicious top-note mint and fine-grained texture. A thing of beauty.
★★★★1/2
Eden Valley
Food: Bistecca alla Fiorentina
$35
Tim Smith Wines 2012 Shiraz
More of the good stuff from 2012, this celebrates vintage signatures of squashed plum and berry - wow aromas bursting out of the glass, swirling around again in the mouth with lovely garden-picked lavender and thyme notes adding to a delightfully satisfying, richly rewarding red with bright, tangy blackberry zing to finish.
★★★★1/2
Eden Valley
Food: Butterflied leg of lamb
$36
Shaw & Smith 2012 Shiraz
Total commitment to medium-bodied, cool-climate shiraz styling has reaped a triple trophy haul at the recent London International Wine Challenge. Here’s why: delightful cherry fragrance, shapely support in the mouth via deeply integrated savoury tannins, chewy enough to hold in the flavour, delicate enough to encourage a more-ish finish.
★★★★1/2
Adelaide Hills
Food: Braised duck tagliatelle
$45
Yangarra Small Pot Sand Block 2012 Shiraz
Yangarra’s regular 2012 shiraz is already a great drink, and this (one of two) smaller selections from Kangarilla’s sandy grounds is simply fabulous in its dark fruits that just can’t stop delivering mulberry, blackberry and subtle oak sweetness with enlivening, refreshing acidity in the finish. Elite shiraz that presses all the buttons.
★★★★1/2
McLaren Vale
Food: Japanese beef rolls
$45
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