TN: Primo Estate vs Tin Shed

[n4sir]

2004 Primo Estate La Biodina (Stelvin): Pale green/straw colour. The nose and palate are very clean in comparison to the 2003 vintage, with those crisp passionfruit and tropical fruits without the sweaty/pungent characters. There’s a bit of Riesling and Sauvignon Blanc with the Colombard this time, and I think it softens the wine out nicely without losing flavour or crispness.

2004 Primo Estate Pinot Gris: Olive/straw yellow colour. Sweet white peaches mark the nose, but the palate is much spicier and grittier in texture in comparison. I think this would be a good match for pasta with shellfish.

2002 Primo Estate Il Briccone (Stelvin): Dark red/purple colour. The nose is a rich mixture of sweet cherry/blackberry with a hint of barnyard. The palate is fruity and spicy and slightly hot, crying out for food to match – Tapas maybe?

2001 Primo Estate Joseph Angel Gully Shiraz: Dark to inky red colour. What’s there of the slender nose is marked by spicy/coffee oak, and a hint of blackberry. That oak is on the palate too, with the blackberry fruit not big enough to match the oak or justify the price tag; the vineyard at Clarendon is only a few years old and it certainly shows.

2001 Primo Estate Joseph Moda Cabernet Merlot: Dark to inky red/purple colour. The coffee/mocha oak is much more opulent in this wine, but it has the fruit to back it up; blackcurrant, iodine and earth on the nose and palate surface to challenge the oak. The palate has a massive tannic structure that makes the Angel Gully pale in comparison, and earthy/blackcurrant fruit to match, finishing with nutty/coffee oak. This had a lot of similarities to the 1998 I tried last week, but the youthful fruit seems to be hiding that 14.5% alcohol better at this stage.

2004 Tin Shed Wild Bunch Eden Valley Riesling (Stelvin): Pale green colour. Sweet but closed nose of lime blossom; the palate again features that sweet and dry limes at first, but those wild yeasts kick in on the finish, leaving a very bitter aftertaste.

2003 Tin Shed Melting Pot Shiraz (Stelvin): Inky purple/red colour. Huge nose of liquorice allsorts, blackberry and prune, which are all on the palate with a big spike of alcohol to match. I think this could meet the classic definition of a fruit bomb, but it’s young and could tone down a bit yet.

2002 Tin Shed Single Wire Shiraz: Inky red/purple colour. The nose is reserved in comparison to the melting pot, with blackberry, liquorice, earth, at times some coconut and slightly green tea characters. The palate has a slow build-up of rich, opulent blackberry fruit and fine tannins that match the power and persistence of the Joseph Moda, but the fruit has swallowed the oak and softened the impact. This was back to the form the wine showed 6 months ago at the last Norwood Small Winemakers show, and a lot less like the last bottle blind in the Blacktongues Super Shiraz II. Priced the same as the Angel Gully and Moda on the day, and frankly made the Primo Estate Shiraz look like a bad joke.

Cheers
Ian

[707]

Ian, I'm with you on the 2002 Tin Shed Single Wire Shiraz.

Every time I've tried it, including at the Small Makers Exhibition where I thought it was the "Wine of the Day", it has been very impressive, a worthy follow up to the 2001. This is a label to watch.

The only time it has failed to show that well was at Super Shiraz II leading me to think that may have been a poor bottle. Roll on screw caps!

On that matter, it would be an interesting exercise to get a case of something current under cork around the $20 mark, open them all up and present as a blind tasting of just twelve glasses in front of you to see what variation there was. I think you'd be surprised.

I'm currently regularly drinking a 2002 wine I had a winemaking friend make for me which I had bottled under screw cap. I've already drunk my way through a case in the last two weeks (been showing alot of people!)and not a single bottle has varied in the slightest from another.

[n4sir]

On that matter, it would be an interesting exercise to get a case of something current under cork around the $20 mark, open them all up and present as a blind tasting of just twelve glasses in front of you to see what variation there was. I think you'd be surprised.

A couple of weeks ago at the Rosemount tastings we struck a lot of bottle variation with the 1997 Balmoral. Chris ended up opening five bottles of which one was corked, and one reeked of VA and eventually was thought to be randomly oxidised. The remaining three were remarkable different:

The first was very savoury with fish sauce, leather, earth, and a hint of barnyard on the nose, and very powdery tannins on the palate.

The second was closed initially, then opened up a lot fresher with some blackberry and nutty oak on the nose, and tighter grained tannins on the palate with a hint of VA.

The third was remarkably oaky on the nose and palate, and pulled up rather short compared to the first two.

It was one of those lucky occasions not many people were around, and I was able to sample from the three bottles and get an idea of the variation you're talking about.

Cheers
Ian

[MB]

I also have experienced bottle variation with cork but haven't had enough stelvin reds to appreciate whether there is significant reduction under this closure. Regarding the masked tasting of stelvin closures it would be interesting to compare the same wine under both stelvin and cork (I think Stephen Henschke does one of his wines this way).

[707 guest]

I've done a session with Stephen Henschke looking at 96s from memory. The screwed wines looked aged although not much as the cork versions and the screwed versions had an appealing freshness to them.

I won't ever buy corks if I can get screws, had far to much TCA and botlle variation after years of careful and patient cellaring. TCA stinks!

Cheers - Steve