Jack Estate Wrattonbully/Coonawarra Shiraz 2018
- 94
- $25
- Drink by: 2025-2040
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2018 has proved itself to be a legendary vintage across the Wrattonbully and Coonawarra regions. The blend is 90.3% Wrattonbully and the remaining 9.7% from Coonawarra. This wine spent time in American oak for maturation. It is quite astonishing value. Part of that must be attributed to the quality of the vintage perhaps, but it is a wine that is still offering so much and should do so for at least the next ten to fifteen years. At that time, this will look like one of the great bargains imaginable. The colour is an inky dark maroon. There is still some toasty oak evident but overall the integration has been exemplary. We do have some maturity but the wine is still fresh and alive. Early complexity is present and we have flavours of chocolate, mocha, licorice, blackberries, vanilla and bay leaves. The wine is of medium weight with decent length, finishing with fine tannins and a gentle flick of acidity. Really good buying.
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.
