This wine’s packaging, with which I was so taken when I tasted last year’s release, still made me grin when I unpacked the sample box this evening. It’s just so bold and fun, without resorting to the sort of immediately dated look that so many other producers seem to arrive at when trying to make their wines stand out on the liquor store shelf.

I was also impressed with the wine in the bottle last year; for my taste, though, the 2010 is a marked step up in sophistication and style. If I were to level a criticism at the 2009, it would be at its fruit character, which was quite sweet, perhaps too much so for some, and overpowering the positive, dirty influence that Tempranillo can bring. This is still a lusciously generous wine that wears its Grenache on its sleeve, but there’s a savoury dimension that seems more prominent this time around, taking the aroma profile to a darker place and helping the whole seem more complex.

The palate is perhaps a tad more gushy than the aroma suggests. Viscosity and intensely gorgeous red fruits on entry, this moves to the middle palate with a whoosh of acid and several licks of sweet/savoury character. I’m sure if I had a very savoury red wine alongside, this would seem hopelessly naive, but on its own terms it is positively delicious and, given the style sought, it seems quite perfectly judged.

Bloody good quaffing wine for the drinker with attitude.

Dowie Doole
Price: $A25
Closure: Stelvin
Source: Sample