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Subject: 2004 Mitolo Shiraz G.A.M.

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ChillyWino User is Offline

Barrel Racker
Posts:1689

12/27/2005 5:28 PM
Popped and poured on Christmas Eve. Had with Grilled Steaks. Deep purple. Restrained nose of dark fruit, chocolate, and coffee. Very smooth, but short finish. Definately not 97 pts. I'm guessing that some air or bottle time will help.

Seek

Upstate NY

Wine Thief
Posts:2772

12/28/2005 8:16 PM
I had this wine December 17th. Splash decanted and began consumption after 45 minutes. My friend and I drinking this found the wine very UNinspiring. There was flat fruit, soft tannin, tar, no depth, and a flabby finish of 15-20 seconds. We drank it over another 2 hours and no real change occured except for a little bit of further softening. I would like to revisit this in another 3-5 years, but I own no other bottles so it will have to be someone elses.

kramer

Grape Stomper
Posts:109

12/31/2005 12:39 AM
IMO This bottling has never lived up to the points bestowed by Parker in vintages 02, 03, 04. I think all were rated somewhere in the 96-100 range. Seeks descriptors seem to be right on for this bottling flat, no depth.

pizinah

Barrel Filler
Posts:1313

02/20/2006 1:58 AM
Drank last night alongside the '04 Godolphin; the GAM was pretty uninspiring (Godolphin wasn't great either). Huge hole in the GAM's mid-palate, and the fruit was very unfocused and a bit flat. High 80s point-wise, not remotely close to Parker's 97 points. The Godolphin was also disappointing but clearly better than the GAM. Parker's on crack with these Aussie reviews!

dridge11

Grape Destemmer
Posts:53

03/10/2006 2:56 PM
I picked up a couple of 04's, but haven't tried it yet. Hopefully it will evolve like the 03 did. I tried an 03 sometime last year and thought it was a real let-down. But, since I had 5 more I decided to pull one out and give it another go about 2 weeks ago and it was a rockstar...it had totally changed. Hopefully the 04 will go down that same path with a little time.

GreenDrazi User is Offline

Atlanta, GA

Grape Puncher
Posts:933

03/19/2006 5:22 AM
2004 Mitolo G.A.M. Shiraz - McLaren Vale, Australia Bottle decanted 6 hr’s before my first taste. Thick, violet nose. This has huge flavors of black and blue fruits with some raspberry and chocolate mixed in with just a touch of pepper picking up on the finish. Nice complexity with excellent depth and a plush, textured, mid-palate that expands further on the lengthy, heady finish. Fine to chalky tannins with some minerality and acidity, this can drink wonderfully now if given adequate decant time, but should do well for several years to come. My WOTN S97 from Napa off-line at Pyang’s. 2/3/2006 Second tasting: Decanted 3.5 hr’s. Consistent with previous notes. This has incredible mouthfeel. 2/11/2006

love_cab_chard User is Offline

Master of Wine
Posts:12386

03/19/2006 1:47 PM
pizinah: high 80s GreenDrazi: 97 That's a big difference: bottle variation eh?!? Or, is it just too early/young to open (as the wine is still going through "stages") I will be holding all my 4 bottles (for now then). No rush from me to open/try these... Thanks for the updates on these.

GreenDrazi User is Offline

Atlanta, GA

Grape Puncher
Posts:933

03/19/2006 4:52 PM
I may be a few points high for some people’s palate, but the avg score on Cellartracker is around 94 (with or without my score) with quite a few notes/scores posted and only one score is below a 91. This giant is excellent juice but currently needs a lot of decant time. Although they are very different wines, I’ve had the ‘04 Savitar which is more polished and yet I scored it the same. I’ll get my tasting note posted here. I also think that it’s currently an incredible bargain still available for $42-$50 in a few places.

wineismylife User is Offline

Arlington, TX

Master of Wine
Posts:12044

03/19/2006 6:36 PM
This might be an interesting case study. GD and Piz, a question to each of you. When you evaluate a wine such as this do you evaluate it solely from a technical standpoint or do you award/deduct points for stylistic preferences? Here is the reason I ask. Typically when I'm assigning a score to a wine I do my best to do it solely on a technical basis. However, I know of some posters, one I have in mind in particular, that definitely awards and frequently deducts points for stylistic preference. Thoughts?

Joe ----- Wine is like potato chips around me...if it's open, it's gone.

GreenDrazi User is Offline

Atlanta, GA

Grape Puncher
Posts:933

03/19/2006 8:55 PM
Joe, That’s a great question and should probably have it’s own thread, if someone has done so already. I would like to say that my stylistic preferences don’t come into play, but that in the end, that would be false statement, because, ultimately scoring/reviewing wine is a subjective thing. But to answer your question more directly, I try to leave my preferences out of the equation. An example for me would be RP ‘03 vs ‘04 Aussie scores/reviews. Most of the ‘03 Shiraz’s coming out of McLaren & Barossa are a little over ripe, intense or too toasted for my palate and please note that I generally don’t have any issues with big, ripe wines. Yet Parker was all over these. A specific example would be ‘03 Branson Coach House Shiraz which scored RP98, WS96 & ST93. I had it and scored it a S95 and probably really feel it’s more like a 93. It wasn’t as roasted as other ‘03's that I’ve had, but I still can’t see his S98. Other’s have thought highly of it as well and of course, I can’t claim to have his great ability to project how well a wine can age. On the other hand, the few ‘04's that I’ve had have been more elegant, balanced wines and I’ve generally agreed with many of RP scores (minus 2 - 3 points in many cases). If enough people post reviews/scores on a wine, Cellartracker is a great tool to judge and learn about your own palate/scores against others.

pizinah

Barrel Filler
Posts:1313

03/20/2006 4:30 AM
Quote: This might be an interesting case study. GD and Piz, a question to each of you. When you evaluate a wine such as this do you evaluate it solely from a technical standpoint or do you award/deduct points for stylistic preferences? Here is the reason I ask. Typically when I'm assigning a score to a wine I do my best to do it solely on a technical basis. However, I know of some posters, one I have in mind in particular, that definitely awards and frequently deducts points for stylistic preference. Thoughts? I try to score neutrally and objectively without bias for my own stylistic preferences, but of course it's difficult to completely filter out one's own taste. Personally I like big, fruit-forward wines but not when a wine is overblown, flabby, blowsy or unfocused. It's certainly possible that bottle variation is partly to blame in this case. The bottle I drank wasn't "bad" in any obvious sense, but GD's could have simply been showing better. It's hard to understand how our point difference would be this extreme based solely on bottle variation though. As noted in my post, I opened this and the '04 Godolphin on the same night, preferred the latter and felt the GAM had a big hole in the mid-palate and its fruit was a bit unfocused. It certainly wasn't unpleasant to drink and isn't a terrible wine. FWIW, my retailer who has a pretty good palate (different from mine) separately tried both the '04 GAM and Godolphin and didn't flip out over either either. His scores were flip-flopped from mine -- he told me he felt the Godolphin was high 80s and the GAM low 90s. For me, the GAM was nowhere near Parker's 97 points, and a lesser wine than a number of other Aussies Parker likes that I've recently consumed ('02 Noon Eclipse, '01 Kay Bros Block 6, '01 Greenock Creek Apricot Block, '01 Run Rig, etc.).

love_cab_chard User is Offline

Master of Wine
Posts:12386

04/20/2008 11:40 AM
$45, Retail. Parker did rate is 97 points. And, it seems that some above also go that high, while others are way under that rating. I am in the middle of it all. For me it will never be a 97 pointer & I don't come close to that rating. But, that takes nothing away from this nice bottle of wine. I have 3 more that I will actually hold for another 1-3 years. Last night 92 points, a lovely bottle that went fast. Drink or hold, or decant some if drinking now.

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