Zema Shiraz 2021
- 93
- $28
- Drink by: 2025-2037
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The latest collection from the Zema winery in Coonawarra is from the exceptional 2021 vintage. That alone should have people racing to the store. If your cellar is not overflowing with wines from this stunning vintage, then you are doing yourself a disservice. You won’t get many more opportunities. The wine spent fifteen months maturing in a mix of French and American oak. The colour is an opaque maroon. The wine exhibits deftly handled oak with notes of chocolate, blackberries, mint, mulberries, tobacco leaves and coffee beans. There are some sappy and briary notes along with vibrant acidity, good focus and excellent length. Showing a lingering finish with sleek tannins, this is an excellent Coonawarra Shiraz, which should be terrific drinking over the next ten to twelve years. 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.
