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Reviews of ROW 23 Shiraz

2015 ROW 23 Shiraz

James Halliday Wine Companion 2020 Review Gold

Rating: 95; Drink By: 2030; Price: $45.00; Alcohol: 14%

Only 65 dozen made, grown on the Sellicks Hill Vineyard. 5% cabernet included, 18 months in oak. Terrific concentration of fruit here, and I'm sure it's going to be a better wine as it unwinds and matures. Ripe blackberry and plum, smoky oak and spice, and tannin that takes a grip very quickly and continues to make its presence felt. It needs time.

Wine Orbit

Rating: 95; Drink By: 2030; Price: $45.00; Alcohol: 14%

This sumptuous offering shows impressive dark fruit intensity with seductive notes of chocolate tart, vanilla pod and warm spice notes on the nose. The palate is equally gratifying, displaying outstanding concentration and depth, backed by silky texture and multi-layered mouthfeel. Mouthfilling and hugely appealing. At its best: now to 2030.

2014 ROW 23 Shiraz

James Halliday Wine Companion 2017

Rating: 95; Drink By: 2030; Price: $45.00; Alcohol: 14.5%

Splendid wine. Oak melted into fruit, spice splashed upon earth. Sparks, fires, a dry bed; it’s all here, in the form of gun smoke and toast and a spice-shot stream of tannin.

If it sounds overly intellectual it’s not; there’s plump fruit here but it comes with all the trimmings.

100 dozen made

Questions by James Halliday (JH), answered by the winemaker, Paul Smith (PS). May, 2016.

JH - What can we expect from this wine with age?

The intense black fruit and spicy opulence of this wine will develop greater complexity with cellaring. Early to mid-season harvested shiraz provides excellent balance and silky tannins, which will age beautifully for 15-plus years.

JH - What’s the biggest cellaring mistake people should avoid and why?

Avoid drinking wines past their prime! I choose wines of intensity and balance, buy a few, then enjoy them over 10 to 15 years unless they have a proven pedigree for greater age.

2013 ROW 23 McLaren Vale Scarce Earth Shiraz

James Halliday's wine tasting note

Rating: 95; Drink By: 2038; Price: $45.00; Date tasted: 16 February 2015; Alcohol: 14.5%

Micro-parcels of estate fruit picked during early-mid March for red and black fruit flavours, 13.5 to 15 baume; open-fermented, matured for 18 months in new and used French hogheads.

This is a joyously full-bodied shiraz, with the promised fruit complexity and more; the tannins and oak contributions play second fiddle to the fruit.

65 dozen made

Philip White - InDaily

Rating: 94++; Price: $45.00; 100% Estate-grown ultra-premium Shiraz; Cellar to 2027+

Below its acrid flinty topnote, and maybe a hint of bruised mint, this is pure bitter cherries, as in Morello juice. It's one of the most elegant wines in the entire line-up, which is not to say it's in any way weak: uh-huh.

This is incredibly tight, intense, focussed wine which will last a good decade, probably more. Geology: Kurrajong Formation

2011 ROW 23 McLaren Vale Scarce Earth Shiraz

James Halliday's wine tasting note

Rating: 93; Drink By: 2025; Price: $45.00; Alcohol: 14.5%

Estate-grown, open-fermented and basket-pressed, then matured for two years in used French (70%) and American (30%) oak, neither fined nor filtered.

Good colour; the bouquet is fragrant and spiced, the medium-bodied palate with spicy/savoury black fruits and a long finish.

Excellent outcome for the vintage.

2010 ROW 23 McLaren Vale Scarce Earth Shiraz

James Halliday's wine tasting note

Rating: 92; Drink By: 2018; Price: $45.00; Alcohol: 14.5%

An alluring fruit focus sings of the purity of McLaren Vale's 'Scarce Earth' single block imperative. Impressive flavour concentration of blackberry compote and mixed spice is uninterrupted by used oak, which lends its support to soft, fine tannins, confirming an easy and early drinking style.

Scarce Earth: McLaren Vale gets dirtier, Australian Wine Review – July 11, 2012

Open plum purple fruit. Quite floral plum essence. Chocolatey palate has fine grained tannins. Quite a fine open style with good balance. Graceful for the Vale. Licoricey. Showing its oak on the second taste but good.

18/20, 93/100. $55. 396 bottles produced

Tyson Stelzer Wine Taste Special Edition 75 - 29 June 2012

There's an alluring fruit focus to this tiny volume newcomer to Scarce Earth. Blackberry compote and mixed spice carry impressive fruit concentration through a long and finely structured palate. Seasoned oak lends structural support without interrupting fruit expression, which lingers supple and primary amid soft, fine tannins, making for an easy and early drinking style.

92 Points. Drink: 2014 – 2018. $55.

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