2000 Duck Muck

[Mahmoud Ali]

1999/2000 Wild Duck Creek 'Duck Muck', Heathcote (~16% alc as I remember being told)

We finally opened the half bottle of Duck Muck that we were given by David Anderson back in autumn 2001 when we helped bottle his magnums (exactly 71 bottles) and some half bottles destined for samples to the trade. A front label was attached to this half bottle as well as a couple of regular bottles that were opened for some of his visiting growers. Yes, the freshly bottled wines had to be taken to the side office, a label attached, the returned to be opened for the visiting grape growers. Nice touch there.

So here it is, some 17 years later, after a trip across the Pacific and time in my passive cellar. I could see through the bottle that the colour seemed light and there was chunky sediment at the bottom of the bottle. I half feared that I might have left it too long so I didn't give it a long decant, about an hour in a small decanter and cooled in the refridgerator. A feral funk from the decanter made me worry. When poured in the glass it was still there and I despaired for it. However I did notice that the still glass brought to the nose was different, fresher and without the hint of rotting underbrush. I thought that perhaps the wine needed more time to aerate. Sure enough the wine smoothed out. It still had a feral quality but it was more animale and rustic, with a leather, black cherry, and a long, broad, warming finish.

This was not an elegant wine in the traditional sense, rather a rustic, broad-shouldered, and characterful expression of shiraz, a jackaroo in shorts rather than urban tuxedo. We both enjoyed it, and it brought back fond memories of our time at Duck Creek.

Thank you David Anderson .................. Mahmoud.