Geoff Merrill Reserve Shiraz 2015
- 95
- $65
- Drink by: 2023-2033
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So much to like here. The team select their suitable barrels from McLaren Vale for this wine, then blend them together in a mix of new and used American and French oak for a further stint of maturation. Overall, the wine sees 29 months in oak, but the quality fruit has swallowed that. An opaque maroon, this is a compelling McLaren Vale Shiraz. Some development, as is to be expected from a wine now eight years old, but it is still fresh and richly flavoured and undoubtedly has a long future ahead of it. Mouthfilling flavours with chocolate, cassis, orange rind notes, florals and herbs. Very long, but the wine is balanced throughout with plenty of grip. Drink over the next decade.
Ken was born and bred in Brisbane, Queensland. He had a non-trendy, perfectly happy childhood, in a family convinced alcohol meant instant condemnation to Hades. But a break fishing on the Great Barrier Reef, and some good wine, started a serious obsession that eventually took over. It did not stop Ken being chastised later for drinking Pol champagne, disgusted he’d drink anything made by a Cambodian dictator. Now, Ken mostly writes on wine, champagne and spirits for various newspapers, magazines and books, but is perhaps best known for his work in The Courier Mail. He also has a little sideline writing on cigars, fishing, travel and food. When not writing, fly-fishing for trout in NZ or bonefish on the flats of Cuba, travelling or smoking cigars, he is no doubt following a variety of sporting teams – the occasionally glorious Queensland Reds rugby, the dysfunctional Washington Redskins, the dodgy Arsenal and especially revels in the world restored to its proper axis with the return of the Ashes to their rightful home.
