Shiraz bottle image
Shiraz bottle image

Shiraz 2005

Tasting Notes

A nose with spice, dark fruit and mulberry leads on to a soft, full, even palate with excellent weight. The wine has great length, and without being a big blockbuster style, exhibits hallmark McLaren Vale Shiraz characteristics, while maintaining a svelte, shapely exterior; there are no bulging muscles here. The 2005 Shiraz has wonderful balance, length, and class.

An ideal lead up to vintage 2005 was had at Edgehill Vineyard: good winter rains with cool temperatures preceded a perfectly timed spring rain prior to flowering. Budburst occurred at its usual time (mid – late August), followed by a slightly earlier flowering than normally experienced. In the lead up to vintage there was a very even ripening period with few temperature extremes which resulted in the vines photosynthesising longer each day, bringing vintage forward by at least a couple of weeks. 2005 was almost a textbook vintage with excellent quality grapes resulting from what in hindsight was a very cool summer (reminiscent of 2002) with minimal temperature extremes.

As a single vineyard wine, the Shiraz is made in a myriad of ways to provide a range of components from which to make the final wine. Traditional vinification saw the Shiraz undergoing a gentle fermentation in open fermenters with daily pump-overs. Approximately a third of the Shiraz was pressed off into barrel to finish ferment. A very small percentage of cordon cut, vine-dried Shiraz was blended back to the wine prior to bottling. The Shiraz matured in a mix of new and older French and American oak barriques prior to bottling.

Technical Details

Picking Date: 11th, 15th, 19th and 24th March 2005

pH Level: 3.56

Total Acidity: 6.47g/L

Alc/Vol: 14.5%

Bottling Date: 16th August 2006