Reviews of Shiraz Mourvedre
2014 Darkside Shiraz Mourvedre
James Halliday's wine tasting note
Rating: 95; Drink By: 2029; Price: $29.00; Date tasted: 16 January 2018; Alcohol: 14%
70% shiraz, 25% mourvedre, 5% grenache, fermented and matured separately, matured in used French hogsheads for 24 months, 100 dozen made.
Good colour; tells a tale of savoury dark fruits, blackberry and blood plum ex the shiraz, and moody/earthy/briary notes ex the mourvedre, cacao bitter dark chocolate the glue binding the flavours. This is an intriguing wine that may turn out to be something quite special down the track.
100 dozen made
2012 Darkside Shiraz Mourvedre
James Halliday's wine tasting note
Rating: 94; Drink By: 2032; Price: $29.00; Date tasted: 17 February 2015; Alcohol: 14.5%
70% shiraz, 25% mourvedre, 5% grenache picked separately, hand-sorted, hand-plunged, 2 weeks post-fermentation maceration, basket-pressed to used puncheons, on lees for 12 months, racked, then a further 18 months in oak.
The result is an almost creamy texture, but with such deep fruit that the wine has overall balance. Whether 6 months less in oak would have been better is a question without answer.
200 dozen made
2011 Darkside Shiraz Mourvedre
Philip White - Drinkster / INDAILY NEWS
$27; 14.5% alcohol; screw cap; 93++ points
Here's some snakearse red from my favourite McLaren Vale geological group, the Kurrajong Formation. These vines are in it just down the slope north-east of The Victory, on the Smith Cru vineyard. It's a messy rubble from a real fruit salad of geologies which has washed down across the Willunga Fault from the ancient ranges which were there, all the way along from Sellicks to Kangarilla. Kurrajong Shiraz and Grenache are often full of bittersweet morello and pigeon's heart cherries; its Mourvèdre similar, but more rustically leathery and rooty, like the radix family: beet; parsnip; turnip, with all their greens, and with the pickling water of the black olive.
This wine is rude in the way it thrusts all those assets forward. But it has a weight of 6B carbon in its base, which gives it a grand authority. It's almost, but not quite silky. It gets as close as satin, which any old kisser of the grosgrain tux collar or opera shoe bow will tell you is more abrasive than silk. But while it obviously wants to be silky in the middle – it will be in five or six years – it does have a lovely velvety finish, which is a different texture again. Which is not to say the Smiths are drapers. No. They are exemplary grape-growers and winemakers, if quality and pleasure are any measure. So let's just settle for snakearse. Order a pekin duck at Park Lok, and accubate.
By Philip White
INDAILY NEWS
2010 Shiraz Mourvedre - Gold Medal at Cowra 2013
James Halliday's wine tasting note
Rating: 94; Drink By: 2020; Price: $25.00; Alcohol: 14.5%
A 68/25/7% blend of shiraz, mourvedre and grenache, the shiraz estate-grown. Each parcel was separately picked, hand-sorted, crushed into small open fermenters, hand-plunged, basket-pressed and 30 months maturation in used French hogsheads, not fined or filtered.
Good red-purple; the bouquet and medium-bodied palate focus on blackberry, plum and licorice, with a dash of dark chocolate; the tannins are fine-grained and very good, combining well with the oak.
2009 Shiraz Mourvedre
Philip White - Drinkster / INDAILY NEWS
$25; 14.5% alc/vol; screw cap; 45 cases made; 94++ points
Here's another bottle of solid evidence supporting my long-held theory that the geology of the Kurrajong Formation produces pretty much the best flavours McLaren Vale has to offer.
This is both riverine-rounded and sharp glacial rubble from the mountains which towered there above the Willunga Fault a helluva long time ago. It appears on and off along the escarpment from the Victory to Kangarilla, lying where it was dumped by some dumbfounding epoch of extreme consistent rainfall, not to mention your basic violent landslide. I'm very happy that I wasn't here while that was going down!
Licorice, coffee, leather, black Iberian ham, nightshades and juniper well about the glass, menacing and gloomy. There's also that acrid quarry-after-a-blast nose-tickling topnote. The palate reflects all this to the T, with the odd shot of marello cherry, kalamata, blackberry and Satsuma. The stones reappear in the finish.
It's too young now, but by Bacchus, I've been into it something shocking. It'll be fair dinkum ravishing in five years; now, it wants six hours in the decanter, then venison, boar, or pigeons in red wine with juniper, speck, and baby beetroot.
By Philip White
INDAILY NEWS
Wine Will Eat Itself - August 16, 2012
Mourvèdre/Mataró is such a great blending partner for Shiraz. It adds structure and interest, two things that are sometimes absent from straight varietal gear. This one's got 20% Mourvèdre in it, along with a dash of Grenache (5%). It's entirely sourced from the Sellicks foothills - the farthest point South in the Vale and one of my favourite subregions - with the Shiraz component coming from the Estate vineyard.
It's earthy and spicy with blackberries and blood plums, iron and animale characters. Mocha oak is soaked up by the intense fruit and there's a lick of regional salted licorice in there as well. Plenty of chewy tannin to sink your teeth into. Will hold the wine in good stead over the next five years at least.
Very Good
And from our fans... some email excerpts
Just thought would let you know, I tried the 2009 SM last night.
Enjoyed it so much I nearly finished the whole bottle by myself. Velvet texture, lithe with power, concentration and great length. Tannin and acid structure are just beautiful.
A really outstanding wine. Very glad I have 11 left, I will be looking forward to each of them over the next few years.
Keep up the great work. – 1/08/12 MW
Subject: Holy Cow Batman
Just opened the last of our original dozen it was a cab reserved for a special meal. Holy cow, shizzam, #$@k me roan what a wine - wat a change in the bottle over 4 months. This wine was very good and wasted in opening under three months. Please make up 12 cab 8 gms and 4 shiraz for us!
Regards Moorooka QLD
Subject: Thanks
Paul and Tracy,
Thanks again for your generosity of time and hospitality when we visited you on Saturday. We all had a great time and have left you all the richer for the experience and I'm confident in saying that you have a couple of new interstate proponents for your sensational wines. ADELAIDE
