Thursday, November 12, 2009

Torbreck 2004 Old Vines Granache-Shiraz-Mourvedre (Australia)

Night 2 of my Gewurztraminer Challenge and I pulled out another special bottle for the "staff". Torbreck is one of my favourite Aussie producers (others that come to mind off-hand include Gemtree and Thorn-Clarke, but that's not what we're here to talk about right now). This was a bottle of Grenache, Shiraz and Mourvedre, otherwise known as GSM. The wine was under screwcap so I was not worried about corked or oxidized wine, but what poured out of the bottle was lighter in colour than I remember; of course that's what 5 years (from vintage date) will do to a red wine. The nose was fabulous, with plenty of red fruit and berry smells that grabbed the nose and lured you into the glass. Unfortunately, the palate did not deliver on all those wonderful red berries, it fell just a tad short, instead there were dried raspberries with licorice notes through the mouth and the finish was loaded with minerality and dried herbs ... hmm, interesting. The palate was very smooth and it did open a little the longer it sat in the glass, but it never did develop the fruit that the nose alluded it would have.

No comments: