1997 Yalumba Octavius Shiraz

We had just completed tasting this wine, and left it out on the bench for our customers to savour. Along side this wine, there appeared the 1999 Yalumba Merlot, which sells at around $8.99 per bottle. One very serious gentleman posed the question – Is one bottle of Octavius worth 10 bottles of Merlot? Indeed an excellent question, and one that may be asked about all fields of endeavour where artistic excellence is concerned. The Octavius delivers an extraordinary level of flavour and complexity and at the end of the day, that is what one pays for. The alcoholic kick is about the same!Opaque deep crimson mauve colour. Superb nose, perfect aromatics, with notes of cedar, spice, confectionary, plum, violets, vanilla and liquorice – a magnificent sniff! The palate delivers on the expectations of the nose, and reveals wonderful complex layers of plum, liquorice allsorts and confectionary. Velvet smooth tannins. Perfect balance. Classic Barossa Shiraz. Exceptionally long aftertaste of confectionary, vanilla and ripe plum. Cellar 4-5 years.