If given the choice, I'll usually gravitate towards a more elegant, medium bodied red wine over the more monstrous examples. But sometimes, the food you're eating (in this case a hearty beef stew) calls for something more. So, out came a Baileys of Glenrowan Shiraz.
I opened this wine expecting not to like it, as I've reacted negatively to the flavour profile of North-Eastern Victorian reds in the past. So it was with a good deal of surprise that I found myself latching onto this wine in a most positive fashion.
Perhaps the bottle age helps things along, but I found the wine to be big, but in balance, and surprisingly complex for its price point. It has that distinctive "stewed red fruit" flavour that I often get with warm climate shiraz, and the wine's flavour shows a good deal of spicy oak influence. This translates, especially on the palate, to a lovely mix of hot fruit and spice that, whilst not overly structured, is very generous and quite delicious. I wouldn't call the mouthfeel refined, but nothing poked out unduly, with acid and tannin, as well as alcohol, sitting alongside each other nicely.
This wine has me reassessing my aversion to red wines from this region. I like that about wine. It's constantly surprising and forcing me to question my prejudices.
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