97 Points – Ken Gargett, Wine Pilot
96 Points – Andrew Calliard MW
2019 ARILA GARDENS
QUARTZ & SAND GARDENS
SHIRAZ
$90.00
This parcel of Shiraz was a selection of vines showcasing the absolute best of Shiraz from our Arila Gardens single vineyard site. The Quartz Garden fruit was selected for its enticing dark chocolate, black fruits, and its rich opulent palate. To complement this, a parcel from the Sand Gardens heightened the aromatics, lengthened and tightened the palate to create a truly balanced and complete wine.
Our Garden Selection Shiraz is a culmination of decades of experience, working in the Barossa Valley focussing on top end, age worthy wines. The intent with this wine is to showcase our vineyard in the Moppa sub-region of the Barossa Valley. The Moppa region is highly acclaimed and often blended in to the most sought after wines In the Barossa Valley, but rarely seen as a single vineyard offering. Arila Gardens embodies the power and complexity the region has built a reputation for but with an elegance and finesse to the structure that we love to drink.
Out of stock
Tasting Note
Grape Variety: Shiraz
Vineyard: Quartz & Sand Gardens from the Arila Gardens single vineyard, Moppa, Barossa Valley.
Colour: Deep crimson with magenta hue.
Nose: Black and brooding, this wine speaks of Moppa at the fore. Blackberry and blood plum fruits with notes of dark chocolate, sarsaparilla and subtle malt. Complex and enticing.
Palate: Dense and rich, this wine has a powerful core of black fruits with a long finely textured palate. The wine is undoubtedly generous but with an elegance and finesse of texture and complex fruit and savoury elements. Tannins are powdery and layered with a plushness to them which runs the length of the palate. Fruit lingers on the finish – mulberry, blackberry, black pastille with nuances of aniseed and finely woven supportive oak.
Cellaring potential: 20+ years
Vintage Conditions
The 2019 vintage was characterised by hot, dry summer conditions and low yields. As a result, fruit was small berried and intense in both flavour, colour, and tannin. The harvest decision was vital more than ever for this vintage to retain freshness and brightness of fruit flavour.
Tasting the grapes daily was a necessity as flavour and tannin ripening occurred quickly and with hot weather forecast for the next week it was decided to pick the Shiraz starting February 27th, the earliest harvest date in recent history.
Winemaking
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- Harvest date – 27th & 28th February 2019
- Cold soak 36 hours at 12 °C
- 100% whole berry
- Fermentation in small open top fermenter for 7 days with gentle pump over and hand plunging
- Gentle pressing to barrel for completion of fermentation
- Maturation – 18 months in 100% French oak, 35% new.
- Racked from barrel and filtered without any fining prior to bottling.
- Wine analysis
pH – 3.58
Acidity – 6.2g/L
Alcohol – 14.5 %
Residual Sugar – Dry : 1.0 g/L
Reviews
I will confess that these wines were new to me, but what a debut! Quintessential Barossa beauties of the highest quality. The team believe that the Quartz Garden provides opulence, chocolate and black fruits. The Sand Gardens site gives aromatics and structure. These vineyards are in the Moppa sub-region. The grapes received a cold-soak for 36 hours, at 12°C. The wine is 100% whole berries. Fermentation was in small open top fermenters for seven days, with gentle pumping over and hand plunging. 18 months maturation follows, in French oak, 35% of which is new. Both this wine and the grenache show just what a stunning vintage 2018 was.
This wine was almost black in appearance, so opaque. There are notes of plums immediately apparent, with dark chocolate, soy and black fruits. Ripe, dense and yet finely balanced. The oak is so well integrated that it appears invisible. The texture is supple, the tannins silky and the wine has amazing length. Black cherries start to emerge near the finish. Stunning stuff. Love it. – Ken Gargett, Wine Pilot (97 points)
A new label, but the pedigree of both vineyard and winemaker has enabled the delivery of a truly stunning first release that is a floral, pretty and an undeniably beautiful expression of Barossa Shiraz. A glossy, youthful deep red with purple hues in the glass and a nose that has plum and black cherry lifted by violets and warm spice. The palate shows a wine of contrasts with a textured baseline of dark berry fruits that take on a touch of fennel and spice before brighter red berry fruits and finely etched acidity give elegance and lift. The finish is layered and keeps building with fruit and savoury impact taking it in turns to shine. I might go out on a limb and say this is an icon in the making. Optimal drinking 2021 – 2041 – Patrick Eckel, Wine Reviewer (98 Points)
Deep crimson. Lovely concentrated dark cherry, black berry mint-chocolate aromas with herb garden, liquorice notes. Ample bodied wine with plush dark berry fruits, paneforte flavours, plentiful velveteen tannins and mocha/ spicy complexity. Finishes chocolaty firm with Bendincks bitter-mint like notes. An impressive Moppa District Shiraz with the volume and richness to carry those light minty notes. 14.5% alc. Drink 2024 – 2032. – Andrew Calliard MW (96 Points)
