Personalised MMAD Vineyard Shiraz 2023 13.5% 750ml

Tasting Notes

Grape variety
Shiraz

MMAD Vineyard
MMAD Vineyard is a partnership of Martin Shaw, Michael Hill Smith MW, Adam Wadewitz, and David LeMire MW. 100% single vineyard wines from the MMAD Vineyard, perfectly located in the dress circle of Blewitt Springs. The vineyard has some of the oldest plantings in Blewitt Springs, with grenache planted in 1939, shiraz in 1941, and chenin blanc in 1964. Blewitt Springs combines sandy soil, which enhances aromatics, and cool sea breezes that maintain freshness. MMAD Vineyard also has a layer of ironstone pebbles beneath the sand, which contributes to the wines’ structure and complexity. The 2022 Chenin Blanc recently won best white wine at the 2023 McLaren Vale wine show, with MMAD Vineyard taking out best small producer.

Reviews:

Marcus Ellis, Halliday Wine Companion - 97 Pts

The third year, and a notably long and cool season. The process here, in general, is fermentation in concrete and oak with a portion of whole bunch, though mostly destemmed, then élevage in older, larger French oak. There’s a little reduction up front but that settles, revealing a moodily scented wine, saline with blackberry pastille, olive, ground cacao nibs, violet and lavender, black cherry, star anise, clove, pepper and mace. It’s a complex wine, more medium in stature, with significant Rhône echoes. Saint-Joseph comes to mind, but this is a wine of site and there’s nothing imitative about the elaboration. Another excellent release; maybe less intense than the '22, but just so detailed.

Jeni Port, Wine Pilot - 97 Pts

The accompanying wine notes tell of the latest and coolest vintage yet for this vineyard, but the upshot was a wide picking window combined with small, bunches and intense fruit flavours. The result is an absolute stunner of a wine, boasting a layer of what can only – and perhaps a little too lazily – be described as cool climate-inspired spiciness. It’s more inherent than a flat-out feature and to be fair was present in the ’22 release, one ingredient in a complex range of scents and flavours that take in black cherry, plum, cassis with lifted aromatics in rose and pressed flowers and dusty cacao, bitter chocolate and, yes, spices with anise and pepper in the lead. Fruit, oak, tannins and spice are packed tight, an intense youngster that will age a beaut. In the meantime, it’s bright, it dances, it weaves, it’s a seamless engaging young Shiraz of the highest quality.

Huon Hooke, The Real Review - 96 Pts

Very deep, dark, dense red-purple, young and bold. Mixed spices and dried herbs with sage to the fore, purple fruits too, violets and blueberry, which power through on the palate as well. Full bodied yet elegant, with fine, powdery tannins, the entirety lingering on for a long time on the finish and after-palate. Hints of graphite and broken ironstone. A splendid shiraz with great potential for improvement in the cellar.