Hewitson Falkenberg Barossa Valley Shiraz 2021
- 95
- $88
- Drink by: 2023-2043
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The Falkenberg name is a famous one in the Barossa – growers, winemakers, local identities. For the team at Hewitson, it symbolises ‘the heritage of the Barossa Valley’. This is the first release under this name since the 2018. The vines here are 25 years old and the wine was open vat fermented for three weeks, destemmed, and made with “maximum whole bunches”. It was then matured for 18 months in French oak barriques, 25% new. Bottled under cork, a deep gleaming purple, this is a cracking Barossa Valley Shiraz. Rich, complex and full of flavour, we have notes of dark chocolate, blueberries, mocha, plums, cloves and leather – gorgeous stuff. This is seamless with very fine, silky tannins, excellent length and intensity which never drops. A wine which will sail through the next fifteen to twenty years.
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.
