Tyrrell's Vat 9 Shiraz 2005

I could smell this wine as soon as I started pouring it, which always makes me smile.

Hunter Shiraz often smells to me like dried brown dusty earth, and this is really typical. It's got that lovely dusty, dirty, meaty smell that leads into some toasty vanillan oak, all of which frames a core of sweet/savoury red fruit of exceptional quality. This wine has great "line" and one's experience of it flows smoothly from nose to palate and finish. Intensity of flavour is high, although the wine is only just medium bodied. This wine's structure seems acid-driven. I just can't get over the quality and complex flavour delivered by the fruit in this wine. It's clean and ripe and, although it has a sweet dimension, the wine as a whole remains savoury in its flavour profile.

Drinking well now but I'm certainly going to leave some bottles in the cellar and see how they develop.

I was a bit worried when I first opened the wine as there was some sulphur hanging about, but this blew off quickly, leaving a very clean wine behind.

Update: this wine has opened up further over the course of our meal, with some additional aniseed/medicinal notes emerging. The wine has also developed some weight and intensity in the glass. A really beautiful wine.