Agricola 'Flaxman Valley' Shiraz 2022

Winemaker... Callum Powell

"Flaxman Valley had an unfortunate hail episode that rendered yields minute in 2022. The wine on hand is “a very neighbourly wine of small picks from Chris Ringland’s ‘Three Rivers’ vineyard to the left of us, Nathan Burley’s ‘Hill’ vineyard to our right and ‘Naimanya’ a little further up the hill”, offers winemaker Callum Powell. It’s the lift and vitality in this wine. Beautiful, pure yet dark fruited, while concentration of dark cherry, red berries, blueberry and plum is a thing, there’s a gentle refrain of fennel, eucalyptus, white pepper and game meat that answers their call. It feels lithe and shapely in the palate, threaded with graphite-tinged tannins and miscellaneous minerality that draws out the length and stretches luxuriously with pecks of succulent chew. It’s spicy, it’s heady in perfume, it’s magnificent in the way it lays out all that is possible from shiraz and the cooler year lends tension. Boldness wrapped in gossamer. A wine hitting all the high notes, from up high. 97pts."
Mike Bennie, The Wine Front