1997 Seven Acre Shiraz

The 1997 Shiraz Seven Acres is another big baby that goes on and on in the mouth. Soaring aromas of creme de cassis, smoke, blackberries, new saddle leather, and earth are followed by a layered, multidimensional wine of great purity, richness, and length. At age 12, this seems like a 2- to 3-year-old wine, and while critics might ask “where’s the complexity?”, everything remains intact, and my instincts suggest this, like its siblings, is a 30+ year wine. These wines tend to be drunk entirely too soon, and are often written off before they have ever had a chance to develop fully. This has always been one of my favorite Barossa wineries - great proprietors, tiny yields, old vines, and a hands-off style of winemaking. Of all the flights we tasted, these stood out as the most riveting wines of the entire tasting. The Shiraz cuvees were off the charts - every one still young and not close to full maturity. These are all high octane wines (14.5-16% alcohol), but any evidence of wood (little new oak is used here except for the limited production Roennfeldt Road cuvee) is completely buried under the aromatic complexity and richness.