Hewitson The Mad Hatter Shiraz 2019

This single vineyard Shiraz is taking us into the realms of special occasion wines. It is for enjoying today or take advantage of the structure to look at it any time over the next few decades. After harvest, the grapes were crushed and de-stemmed, before cold soaking for a week and then a further three weeks on skins. After that, it spends 16 months in ‘freshly seasoned’ French oak barriques.

The colour is deep dark red with flecks of purple throughout. Deep and intense, the nose offers rose petal notes, graphite, dark berries, mulberries, florals and a hint of that sweet, earthy character found in a tin of sliced beetroot. There is serious grip here, by way of fine yet firm tannins. The wine has serious length. This is a cracking young Shiraz, which will be even better in ten to fifteen years.