Wine Composition

100% Shiraz

Winemakers Comments

The deep rich color of this wine indicates its intensity. The nose is full of ripe plum and dark cherries with a hint of white pepper and sweet vanilla. The flavors carry onto the palate which is full of big soft fruit, but balanced by an elegant oak structure and natural acid, resulting in a rich wine with a complex and fresh structure.

Technical Analysis

TA

pH

Cellar Techniques 

Perfect fruit arrived at the winery at 13 degrees celsius allowing a long controlled start to fermentation in opened topped vessels. 20 days on skins with a high percentage of whole berries, before maturation in French oak Barriques 20% new to add roundness lift and structure.

Winemaker(s)

Name -  Andrew Spinaze, Mark Richardson and Chris Tyrrell

Winery

Rich in gold mining history, Heathcote developed into a wine production area in the 1950s with expansion taking place in the 1980s. The Heathcote region is nestled between Bendigo, the Macedon Ranges and Goulburn Valley and is 120km north-west of Melbourne.

The landscape comprises undulating rises and narrow alluvial floodplains providing the climate and soil for shiraz vines to thrive. The climate is temperate, ideally suited to full-bodied, rich and textured shiraz and cabernet sauvignon. Full ripeness is always achieved, but the climate is not so warm as to diminish varietal character.

The Heathcote region has established a reputation for high quality red table wines. Shiraz wines of unimaginable depth of colour and extreme weight of fruit are now the hallmarks of this relatively new region. Harvest commences in mid March.

The Tyrrell’s Heathcote vineyard was put to vine in 1994 and was fully planted out in 1997 with its first release in the same year. Our Heathcote vineyard sits in the deep Cambrian soil giving it a unique ability to produce extraordinary wines. The vineyard is high enough on the eastern slope of the Mt Camel range to be out of the frost zone and is protected from the hot sun in the late afternoon