Grape
Shiraz
Ratings
*Penfolds – Icon & Luxury Range
Exceptional – by Langton’s Classification Australian Wine
Robert Parker 94
Jeremy Oliver 95
James Halliday 94
Wine Spectator 92
Tasting Notes
Colour : A deep, crimson red with a dense ruby core.
Nose : Immediately engaging, with wafts of nutmeg and
ginger amongst notes of blueberry and
blackcurrant and a background of well-seasoned
savoury oak. The fruit gains in the glass with
aeration, when more subtle perfume and chestnut
complexities emerge.
Palate : Already showing excellent balance within the
frame of a beautifully interwoven mesh of dark
plum and blackberry fruits with fig and liquorice.
Complex fruit and spice flavours sit against a
finely focused backdrop of firm but rounded
tannins.
-by Official Website
The 1997 Grange (a blend of 96% Shiraz and 4% Cabernet Sauvignon) looks
to be a classic Grange, although slightly softer and more forward than
the backward 1996. The saturated purple-colored 1997 offers a gorgeously
sweet nose of blackberry liqueur, cherries, camphor, chocolate, plums,
and mocha. The wine is opulently-textured, extremely soft, layered, and
seductive, with Grange’s tell-tale personality well-displayed, but in a
seamless, seductive style. This is a superb Grange that can hold its own
against the more heralded 1996. Anticipated maturity: 2005-2022.
-by Robert Parker
A big, typical Grange and a very good wine from this vintage. Deep red
with ruby edges, its slightly cooked aromas of blackberries, dark plums
and prunes, licorice and currants are distinctly spicy. Smooth,
sumptuous and firmly structured, its deep, long palate of dark red and
black berry flavours is wound around firm, but powder-fine tannins,
finishing spicy and savoury. Drink 2017-2027+.
-by Jeremy Oliver
Medium to full red-purple, still bright after five years, vibrant cherry
and plum fruit aromas more than handle the oak on the bouquet; the
palate is sumptuous, but not heavy, the cherry and plum flavours
tracking the bouquet. The wine has a very long finish, with fine,
integrated tannins. Destined to become one of the great Granges.
-by James Halliday
Not huge, more of a human-scale Grange, with beautiful plum and
blueberry fruit that shines right through the long, crisp, fine-grained
finish. A lovely wine, though it doesn’t quite show the grandeur of
great Grange vintages. 10,000 cases made.
-by Wine Spectator