Personalised Aphelion Wait Grenache 2024 14.1% 750ml

 

TASTING NOTES

 

APPEARANCE

Deeply coloured with an intense ruby hue.

 

AROMA

Savoury aromatics of turned earth, root vegetable, and dark cherry are subtle but have great depth.

 

PALATE

The palate is firm with a very savoury and slightly saline edge. Tannin is the most prominent of the three SV wines, it comes in waves and carries the savoury edge of the wine across the palate with great length. This wine will stand up to a rich food pairing and will benefit with time in the cellar.

 

WINEMAKERS COMMENTS

Part of our premium SV Grenache range, the fruit used to make this wine is sourced from a single vineyard in the northeast corner of the Blewitt Springs area of McLaren Vale owned by the Wait family. Often the most structural and savoury wine in the range, brooding in character with earth and briary characters dominating the palate.

food matching

 

Redolent with a sausage and thyme ragu.

 

CELLARING POTENTIAL

Enjoy now and will continue to evolve through to 2034.

 

VINIFICATION

The fruit was hand-picked on the 6th March and processed as a 100% whole bunch ferment. After a slow and cool ferment, the fruit was pressed to large format neutral French oak where it remained on full lees until racking for bottling in May 2025.

 

GRAPE VARIETY

100% Grenache

Reviews:

Marcus Ellis, Halliday Wine Companion - 96 Pts

From the top block of bush vines on the Wait vineyard in Blewitt Springs, with vines back to the mid-1940s. These single-site grenache bottlings are quite different to the '23s, and that’s no surprise given the relatively warmer year, with a reflection of greater ripeness in the stems, or that’s how it seems. It’s brooding in a way, but also refined. Amaro herbs, preserved sour cherry, white pepper, a bastourma-like cured meat note, lingonberry, goji, dusky rose and a crackle of spice. This was picked on the earlier side, based on the final alcohol, giving a pleasing verve and linearity, though the fruit is impeccably ripe, and the site reflection bell clear. Excellent.

Erin Larkin, Robert Parker Wine Advocate - 96 Pts

The 2024 Wait Single Site Grenache won't be released until late 2025, and the wine is showing notes of Campari and blood orange, raspberry seed and poached rhubarb. On the palate, this wine really shines, and it shows the power and succulence of the 2024 season. This has surprisingly low alcohol, but it works really well—the fruit and tannins feel ripe, despite this. It is almost an entire degree lower in alcohol than usual. 13.2% alcohol, sealed under Diam Origine. Rob Mack, winemaker/propreitor of Aphelion in McLaren Vale is thoughtful, intelligent and quietly spoken, with an enduring respect for Grenache. This is the business that he has built with his wife Lou Mack. A graduate of the Len Evans Tutorial and a McLaren Vale local, Rob is an experienced wine show judge and a lover of Barolo and saké. Mack's wines tend to take on the delicacy and ethereal quality that both styles exhibit, and the inherent quality of McLaren Vale Grenache is well matched to his drinking proclivities. This is a small producer to watch out for.

Campbell Mattinson, The Wine Front - 95 Pts

Gorgeous wine. Plenty up its sleeve but ready to be consumed now too, should you wish. I wished. Herbs, undergrowth, boysenberry, red and black cherry, a graphite note, a gentle meatiness. This is juicy, fine, smoky and impeccably well structured all at once. Tannin is like a tickle in the dark; you’re not sure where it came from but you’re sure aware of its presence. Can’t fault this. It’s exquisite.