Heady, rich cedary blackberries and dusty book leather hit you the moment you pull the cork from the bottle. It’s obvious that this is not a young wine: there’s a bit of wateriness at the rim, and the color is a bit faded there as well, although the drink itself still looks fairly youthful.
In the mouth, this wine doesn’t really taste at all like it did five years ago: it’s calmed down into something entirely different. There’s a little bit of spiciness, and (thankfully) the fruit is still holding in there, but secondary flavors of peat and wood are beginning to dominate. It all still works fairly well, but it’s clear that the wine is probably on its way out – if you have any of this, you’d do well to drink up now while it’s still fairly good. I imagine that another year or two is all that’s left in this, and to be frank I’m sad that I didn’t drink it while it was young (I tasted this wine at the tasting room in the winter of 2002 and it was at that point one of the most stunning wines I’ve ever tasted). Still, it’s a beautiful example of an aged Australian shiraz at this point, and if you prefer your wines aged, this is as a good ‘un.
Plantagenet
Price: US $20
Closure: Cork
Date tasted: November 2007
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If you’re ever in Mount Barker, Western Australia, you owe it to yourselves to see these guys. As an added bonus, the Valley Views Motel is the best motel I’ve ever stayed at in Australia: well priced, comfortable beds, friendly proprietors, and a lovely, quiet location in a beautiful WA country town.
This wine struck me as “on the way out”, and unbalanced, but in an atypical sense.
Everything was backend: there was no fruit up front at all–it was all the mouth feel of a medium bodied wine, and you can tell it was something new worldly… but not much else.
The action was at the end: an intriguing sweetness, like Cadbury cherry milk chocolate, and really refined and decently moderated tannins over some smoky oak.
I finished the bottle.
Hmm, I remember you guys going nuts for this wine at the time – a shame that it’s not aged as well as hoped. Even if it’s a bit far gone, there’s still something interesting about a red wine in decay, isn’t there? Especially that ethereal sweetness.