Savitas Wines Incygnes Reserve Shiraz 2015
- 93
- $90
- Drink by: 2022 - 2028
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The Reserve Shiraz is the pinnacle of the range offered under this label. For me, the bottom line was that this is undoubtedly a very fine wine with much to admire and enjoy. So why did I opt to score the ‘standard’ Shiraz a whisker higher? I suspect vintage conditions might have been even kinder to the wines in 2016, but that should not, in any way, dissuade anyone from not putting a few of these in their cellar. You’d be missing out if you didn’t. My thoughts would be to drink this while waiting for the 2016 to come around.
The aim of the Reserve Shiraz is to provide the “ultimate expression of the quality of the Shiraz grapes grown on our Green’s Vineyard”. Again, open top fermenters are used before extended time on skins. The final wine is made by way of barrel selection, again with 18 months in French oak. Lovely magenta/deep red in colour. This offers notes of leather, blackberries, animal skins, campfire notes and an intriguing mix of red and black fruits. Some oak but well integrated; this is soft and generous on the palate. Fine tannins and it is certainly the more attractive wine out of the pair of Shiraz at the moment but perhaps offers not quite the same extreme future and is more likely to drink at its best over the next 3 to 6 years. Preference? Toss a coin.
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.
