TN: Penfolds Grange Hermitage 1985

[Waiters Friend]

Decanted for about an hour before service. Possibly should have left it longer.

Purple red in colour and dense. Developed nose of stewed black plums, blackberries, vanilla,furniture polish / leather, coffee, toffee and some savoury tertiary characters. Dense and full palate with integrated tannins, developed dark fruits, supporting acid and mocha. Not surprisingly, a full bodied wine, quite mouth-filling without being overly drying, and an extremely long finish.

At 32 years of age, I suspect it's not going to get any better, but should hold for a little longer (if you must).

Cheers
Allan

[Waiters Friend]

I've been fortunate enough to open another bottle of this - two in six months. One remains in the cellar.

This bottle was decanted 4-5 hours before service, and the extra breathing time may have made a difference. Most of the notes below remain accurate, but this bottle seemed amplified somewhat in comparison to the previous one. The choc / mocha was more to the fore, the fruit seemed a little more lively, and there was almost none of the furniture polish.

The wine was just starting to fall apart slightly after an hour or more in the glass.

General opinion was that this was the better bottle of the two. It's interesting to note that the last bottle went through the Penfolds clinic in 2014, while this bottle has not been through at all.


It will be interesting to look at the final bottle - may another 6 months?

Cheers
Allan

[Hunter]

Had a bottle of this start of the year. was decanted and after 30 minutes fell apart and was undrinkable. The bin 90a 1990 was the star of the night.

[Mike Hawkins]

Mine in late April was pretty good given the vintage. We drank after 3 hours of air and the last glass was definitely the best