2021 Penfolds Grange

Other Reviews….
Wow. What a release of this famed Australian wine, made from 94% shiraz and 6% cabernet sauvignon. Aromas of blackcurrants, cured meat, cedar, iodine, blackberry compote and lilacs. The palate is full-bodied with seamlessly integrated tannins and a powerful yet silken mouthfeel that persists in a long-lasting finish. You can taste the prestige and history, tied in with the expression of the warm 2021 vintage. As always, a wine for aging but drinking well now. Drink or hold.
98 Points
JamesSuckling.com

2021 was a magnificent season in South Australia, one blessed with good yields (a change from the previous several years of low yields and drought conditions), healthy rainfall leading into the season and dry, mild conditions during ripening. Vignerons could not have hoped for better conditions. So here, the 2021 Grange is powerful, ripe, structural yet balanced, long and complex. There is a softness to the middle palate, which speaks to the mildness of the conditions, potentially positioning this as one of the best modern-era Granges. The fruit (94% Shiraz, 6% Cabernet Sauvignon) was sourced from Barossa Valley, McLaren Vale and Clare Valley. For critics of this style, my only wish to assist with clarification could be teleportation, together, into a future 30 or 40 years from now. We would drink this wine, where it would still appear fresh and yet would have settled into its finesse and grace as well. It matured for 18 months in American oak, 100% new. 14.5% alcohol, sealed under natural cork. Drink 2025-2061.
98 Points
Erin Larkin – Robert Parker’s The Wine Advocate

Always the focus of the Collection, especially so when it hails from what has become a legendary vintage. The expectations for the 2021 Grange were simply that this had to be a great Grange. Anything short of that might even be deemed a failure and this is indeed an extraordinary Grange. Quite simply, a wow wine. As always, a variety of regions contributed – the Barossa Valley, McLaren Vale and Clare Valley. As is usual, though not inevitable, there is a dollop of Cabernet Sauvignon in the blend, 6% for 2021, and the wine spent a year and a half maturing in new American hogsheads. No wonder Peter Gago’s response was a face-splitting smile and to confirm he was “very, very pleased”. Maroon/black in hue, one simply gets lost in the nose, just endlessly sniffing the most glorious cassis notes, along with black fruits, blueberries, coffee beans, aniseed, mulberries, delicatessen meats, tobacco leaves, plums and graphite. The wine is seamless, intense and immaculate with knife-edge balance. It simply dances with joy. The oak is there, undeniably, but it is so well handled that you almost have to think twice. So complex already, and yet so harmonious and decadent. Silky tannins, bright acidity, the intensity never wavers for an instant and there is incredible length – Rutherglen muscat length. This is as close to a perfect Grange as I can imagine. Fifty years, if you think you can last that long (or want very grateful grandkids). A Lord-take-me-now wine, if ever there was one. Drink 2025-2075.
100 Points
Ken Gargett – WinePilot.com

We've been waiting patiently for the Grange release from the stellar '21 vintage and it certainly lives up to the hype. An impenetrable magenta/crimson in the glass, with the telltale aromatic clout and the light V.A. lift of an embryonic Grange clearly evident as you place your nose in the glass. There's an incredible depth of fruit here. Deep blackberry, blackcurrant and plum compote with hints of graphite, coal dust, violets, wood spice, olive tapenade, oak, blackforest cake, pan juices, panforte, Dutch licorice and earth. The tannins – strong yet powdery – provide ample structure to the wine as it finishes long and deep, resonating perfectly. There is no doubt that this will be considered one of the great Grange releases. Drink by 2067.
99 Points
Dave Brookes - James Halliday’s Australian Wine Companion