Yalumba The Signature Barossa Cab/Shiraz 2001

cliffordjames

ON THE NOSE: Immediate notes of leather and dark, dark cherry. A very intense and concentrated nose right from the start. A deep raisin aroma pervades the leather and reminds us of the Yalumba Muscat desert wine that we had a few months back, it actually does smell that sweet! We had the Yalumba Muscat “Museum Reserve” before we started writing down tasting notes, which is too bad because it was quite, quite good; it is the best desert wine we have ever had. Maybe this “raisin” smell is what people mean by currants, for it seems many describe a taste of currants in these bold reds, yet I don’t recall anybody I know growing up and into the present who eats currants at all, save for maybe a few in some scones, so the whole currents/cassis thing baffles me. I’ve purchased currants and currant jam from Switzerland as well, but I still don’t “get” currants, as a flavor profile, but I’ll keep trying. Could somebody please tell me: if I smell raisins should I say “Mmm, black currants!??” Poking our noses further in the generous glasses we recently purchased we detect some pleasant mocha notes as well as mosquito repellent and shoe polish AND floor polish (yes, a different thing than shoe polish), but also vanilla and all the stuff that comes with oak barreling as well as tons and tons of very sweet very ripe fruit, highly concentrated. This is a big nose, folks, with a little something for everyone! ON THE PALATE: Some salami directly at the pop-n-pour stage, with an intriguing cold stainless-steel mouthfeel; yes, that describes the first palate well! As it opens up more it is more acidic than astringent, but with decent tannins, of course, as one would expect. A lot of beautifully sweet oak is evident and the mouthfeel is thick with several layers of tastes, many flavors that are consistent with wines like these throughout the many tasting notes I have read, including: black licorice, deep dark chocolate, cherry and raisins and raspberries and some strawberry. A berry tart emerges from the dark. There is also some kind of sod smell … undergrowth … a tree-trunk turning mulchy, as well as the taste of what moss smells like (because, we want to point out, we don’t actually know what moss tastes like, but this taste is what moss smells like). The earthiness is a nice touch, albeit a little too scarce, but it IS there on the mid-palate (if you breathe air in with your sips), an earthiness sort of like the Green Giant from those vegetable cans, only not giant, so I guess it’s more like the Green Midget. This is a bold wine, to be sure. It is beautiful. It is scrumptious. We drank it slowly over very many hours, and enjoyed it quite a bit. Thinking of wines we have recently consumed, however, this Cab/Shiraz blend was not as richly appealing, not as transcendent as the Bodegas Victoria Dominio de Longaz, at half the price. There are some similarities, like the depth of the nose, but the Longaz reaches further, is more enigmatic, mysterious, and yet more luscious. Perhaps I should avoid such a comparison, yet it is inevitable for our minds to drift back to the recent great bottles we have had, and we could not help but to think of the Longaz while drinking this, which is, perhaps, a testament to them both. WOULD WE DRINK IT AGAIN? Yes, we would not hesitate to drink this wine again, so please bring us some!!! WOULD WE BUY IT AGAIN? Well, no, we probably would indeed hesitate to buy this wine again right now. As we've noted so many other times before there are simply too many wines to try at this price point, and below this price point, to warrant buying this one again. We did, however, really, really like this Yalumba.

Tasting Tags: dark-cherry floor-polish leather moss oak raisin shoe-polish vanilla