Another clean, svelte and tasty red from the Loire. Cabernet Franc in all its raspberry leaf and bright red fruit. Tangy berries and some sweet green herbals show just over the line ripeness. There’s no sourness to the green flavours and the well mingled tannin and acid are mouth-wateringly ripe. A lovely compact palate, fruit and texture held tight and more interesting after three days of oxygen exposure. Great pedigree.
13% alcohol. Cork. $48.
93 points
100% Malbec or Côt as they say in the Loire Valley. Pungently clean perfume of Turkish delight, woody spices veering into star anise, startlingly so. Below are some bright cherries and berries. Terrific flow of spiced fruit with silky tannin and acidity. Floats in the mouth, leaving a gentle waft to linger. Fine and whistle clean. Those lovely obsessives at the City Wine Store certainly know how to tickle my fancy.
12.50% alcohol. Cork. $41.
93 points.
Having really enjoyed Clonakilla’s great Shiraz during the nineties, it was nice to find a cheaper version with such a close connection. Almost ten years on this is developing just deliciously. Dark red fruit, tarry, earthen and leathery but still a freshness and lightness of being as good acid and tannin sweep up. The once noticeable oak has melded and there’s a sweet wealth of fruit right through the mouth. This wasn’t fashionably labelled a few years ago and Dan’s couldn’t sell it. Very happy to have scored a six pack for under $20 a bottle when they cleared it. Dare say it’s on allocation now?
14% alcohol. Screwcap. $20 then, mid thirties now.
93 points.
A year on and it’s even more of a whole. Quintessentially warm and spicy but still calmly firm Aussie Shiraz. Initially too many bottles stashed, now probably not enough left!
94 points now.
Smells of rich exotic honey, cut apple and old Catholic Church candles. Chenin can be unbearably large and hefty but this just stays on the side of polite and charming due to some ripe acidity that cuts against the richness. Almost so much that the whole may seem a bit attenuated. Not so, that fruit keeps nagging its presence and builds so well as it slides through. It says sec but there’s a cushion. A terrific tension that seems so typical of the Loire’s douceur…the luxury Stelvin screwcap may help…
12.50%. Screwcap! Was about $30.
92 points but more for sense of place and clean poise.
Lovely fresh red colour and smells. There’s some genuine tart berry perfume of good flavour ripeness without heaviness or green shrubbery. Only the acidity seems a bit too firm at the finish. Rather that than the higher PH and duller colour of warmer sites. The mid mouth flavour of ripe strawberries and raspberries with real freshness is just so delicious and bright. Cool for sure. Ripe fruit, just, at low alcohol, woohoo…
12% alcohol! Screwcap. $30.
92 points
Cognitive Bottle Therapy 