Beautiful glowing colours in the glass, youth and freshness combine with knowledge and experience, a shining blackness in the depths and dancing red and purple lights as you approach the shallows.
Wow what a rapid redolent invasion. This is such an immediately inviting Petit Verdot, just one small whiff and you know you’re about to be consumed by a highly perfumed long luscious liquid berry language – the sheer unmitigated enthusiasm just sweeps up your senses and carries them along in an excitable stream.
Mulberries, dark cherries, plums, blueberries a little vanilla, clove and black pepper spice welcome you in party mode the fruit fragrances are propelled in a bouquet of violets and lilacs, sage and bayleaf.
A full palate is smooth and caressing with black cherries, mulberries and dark plums, those violets are unmistakably vying for your attention, cloves and black pepper add spicy interest, and, for those familiar the wine is like a mazamorra morada dish featuring purple corn juice, quinces and a little prune presence. Petit Verdot thrives in warm climates and I can only imagine that this 2019 enjoyed the warm, drier version of the 2019 drought vintage as it displays a fruit weight I’ve not yet encountered in Granite Belt PV and not even from Duncan Ferrier’s Rosemary Hill fruit. The tannins have the expected power of PV but they are also rather silky and the acidity is pitched at a balanced enlivenment as indeed are all the components of this wine.
If you are interested in experiencing all the personality variants of Granite Belt wine then the powerful fruit weight of this PV is something to seek out, enjoy now and also cellar more as there is considerable development to come.
Many of us are familiar with the excellent wine making skills of John Handy and I’m sure we will recognise his contribution to this wine. Stephen Oliver is the new wine maker at Heritage Estate, I’m certainly enjoying how he has finished this beautiful Petit Verdot!
Tasted: Saturday 30th July, 2022 without food and then with over several hours.
Alcohol: 12.3%
Closure: Screwcap
Price: $59
Suggested Drinking Window: 2022 to 2035
Winemakers: John Handy and Stephen Oliver
Fruit Source: Summit Estate
Oak: French
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