A glass-staining clear dark purple in color, the bold nose on this wine couldn’t be mistaken for anything but an Aussie Shiraz. Aromas of sweet black cherries, vanilla, and a touch of mint lead into a rich mouth-filling palate. Somewhat grainy tannins and good acidity frame plenty of sweet fruit, and the finish is pleasing and medium in length. I’m inclined to suggest short term cellaring to see if those grainy tannins don’t resolve a bit with a couple years in the bottle. 89+, with strong upside. Drink 2006-2008.

Eric,

I take it the wine was the straight "Shiraz" (the Reserve) with the white label and not the Stocks Hill.

I tried the Reserve at the winery last year, here is my TN.

Pirramimma 2001 Shiraz SA2003 has been blended but is still in oak. The abundant tannins are approaching creamy and provide an attractive mouth feel. This has sophisticated complexity and great blackcurrant, blackberry, coffee and chocolate fruit flavours and will be one worth watching out for in about 18 months. No hesitation in a Highly Recommended rating even though its not in the bottle yet.

By the sound of it, the wine has recently been bottled and is showing the effects of that movement. Last May it was planned to release late in 2003, why its already out I don't know. Based on my experience with this winery the tannins are normally abundant and the wine seems "old fashioned McLaren Vale" but given time the tannins normally resolve leaving a lovely wine. I haven't even started on my 98's yet so 2 years is conservative.

Correct Torb, simple white label with black writing. Text on the back indicates that the wine comes from vines planted on Stocks Hill, but there is no designation other than "Shiraz".

I emailed the winery about this one and recied the follwoing response.

Hi Ric,

I think the wine was our 'Reserve'. If it had a USA label, it was definately our Reserve Shiraz as we do not export Stock's Hill Shiraz to USA. Our oldest shiraz vines are on Stock's Hill which is why the back label of the USA exported wine refers to Stock's Hill. Only the very best parcels of grapes go into our 'Reserve' wine with the remainder of our Shiraz grapes going to the Stock's Hill label.

Apologies for the confusion .... we have had a lot of problems with using the word reserve on the label of our premium range as most of this wine is exported, so we dropped it's use .... unfortunately this has caused problems in our domestic market with people being unsure about the plain white label being our 'reserve' wine. Another way to tell is that the reserve wines have a black tin capsule and the Stock's Hill range has red capsule.

The 2001 premium wines were released December 2003.

Annabel Johnson

Had this last night, did not take detailed TNs but about an 87 & drink now. A descent shiraz. Interesting that my experience is not @ all like Eric's experience. I saw no room for improvement.

WOW, what a rich and lush wine. Loads of coffee, leather, cherries on the nose with a hint of alochol. The wine is deep purple and the finish is incredibly long. This is a very impressive wine. Great balance and depth.

3 hours into it, it’s smoothing out. All the parts and pieces are integrating nicely and the alcohol is uncoticable now. A lush and sexy wine. 93pts.