Mitolo Reiver Barossa Shiraz 2004

Mitolo "Reiver" Barossa Valley South Australia Shiraz 2004

We took this BYOB to Angelis Italian, our neighborhood Italian Bistro. 

The Mitolo family arrived in Australia in the 1950s bringing with them viticulturist ancestry from the Abruzzo wine region in Italy. Frank Mitolo produces small batch and single vineyard designated wines from Barossa and McLaren Vale South Australia. It all began as a pastime making wine in the 1990’s to share with family and friends. He teamed up with well known winemaker Ben Glaetzer in 2000.

Their first wine is still perhaps their best known, G.A.M. Shiraz, a single vineyard wine, first produced in 2000, named in honour of Frank’s three children Gemma, Alex and Marco. Since then Mitolo have added another 10 wines to the brand. This 100% Shiraz wine is named after the (English/Scottish) Border Rievers.

Mitolo / Glaetzer source much of their fruit from growers, the Loprestis, also Italian immigrants and old friends of the Mitolos. The Lopresti vineyards are situated near the coastal town of Aldinga in McLaren Vale, sitting between the Gulf St Vincent and the nearby Willunga Hills. They have 200 acres of Shiraz, Cabernet and Grenache.

At twelve years, this is most likely nearing the end of its prime drinking window and will not improve any further with age. It is dark black crimson colored, full bodied and muscular with concentrated ripe, almost raisin flavored black fruits punctuated by tones of spice, black pepper and kirsch with a layer of vanilla, smoke, cured meat and graphite on a lingering fine grained tannin finish. This is a style Linda likes a lot but the obtuse fruit and non-fruit flavors are a bit overbearing for my preference.

This gets reviews as high as 94 points and a Cellartracker average of 92 but I give it a 90. 

https://www.cellartracker.com/wine.asp?iWine=80875

 http://www.mitolowines.com.au/

Heartland Stickleback South Australia Red Blend 2006

Heartland Stickleback South Australia Red Blend 2006

An Australian blend of red varietals - Cabernet Sauvignon (52%), Shiraz (33%), and Grenache (15%) - from Ben Glaetzer wines. A $10 red blend that meets expectations and tastes like a $10 red. I would not cite this as having exceptional QPR (quality-price ratio) but rather okay drinking for an every day pizza wine, which is exactly what we were trying it as, but lacking any inspiration or excitement.

The Grenache seems to predominate over the Cabernet and Shiraz fruit flavors.

Dark ruby colored, medium-full bodied, lacking balance or polish with a hard edged tight backbone and layer of spicy black fruits - raspberry, currant and dark cherry with tones of pommegranate, leather, and tones of metallic graphite on a rather hard tannin finish.

https://www.cellartracker.com/wine.asp?iWine=467199

http://heartlandwines.com.au/

Amon-Ra Barossa Shiraz 2008

Amon-Ra Barossa Shiraz 2008 Overpowers Italian Dinner

For our special getaway weekend to NY/Hoboken to visit son Alec, we picked up this special wine to take for a BYOB dinner. We chose the wine and then settled on a restaurant and despite the pairing being less than ideal, the wine and the dinner individually were wonderful. 

We dined at Cafe Michelina a short walk from son Alec's place - trendy' lively and quaint  traditional Italian featuring pasta dishes with some select seafood and chicken entree's. 


If you read this blog, you'll see continually that we, and especially Linda, love big bold Shiraz, so she selected this label for tonight's dinner. This was our first adventure tasting the classic AMON-Ra and this is indeed a BIG wine ...  not for the feint of heart!  While it overpowered our Italian fare and begs for a big steak, dark chocolate or hearty cheese,it was delicious none-the-less.

AMON-Ra is the flagship wine of the Glaetzer Family who have been producing Barossa Valley wines since 1888. We hold several Glaetzer wines going back a decade including one of our favorites, GoDolphin, which has since been discontinued, Wallace, Annaperenna and Bishop. The branding and labels for these wines all feature hieroglyphic symbols from ancient Egyptian mythology.  

Since AMON-Ra was considered to be the king of all gods, winemaker Ben Glaetzer chose that symbol for his flagship, top of the line ultra-premium label. Perhaps this is fitting since the temple of AMON-Ra was believed to be the first temple to ever plant a vineyard to produce wine for the citizens of the temple.

The eye on front of the AMON-Ra label is the all-seeing eye of Horus or wedjat ("whole one") - a powerful Egyptian symbol of protection. It is represented as a figure with six parts, corresponding to what Egyptians regarded as the six senses; touch, taste, hearing, sight, smell and thought.
Ben created AMON-Ra Shiraz to appeal to all these six senses. And it certainly does! 


Fruit for Glaetzer wines is sourced from the small sub-region of the northern Barossa Valley called Ebenezer. Some of the vines are as up to 80-120 years old. The 2008 release of AMON-Ra Shiraz is the eighth release of this label. The 2008 vintage in the Barossa was a difficult year for wine producers due to a heat spike during the vintage. As a result, Glaetzer limited the total production of AMON-Ra to maintain the quality of the wine. The strict fruit selections were rigorous and uncompromising to sacrifice quantity for quality resulting in the smallest volume released since the tiny 2003 vintage, lower than the 2007 production. This required carefully monitoring the vines and making multiple passes through the vineyards carefully selecting only grapes with the right intensity of fruit and balancing different levels of ripeness before the heat spike overstressed the fruit. 
 

This release was produced by winemaker Ben Glaetzer who was New World Winemaker of the Year in 2006. According to the producer, "the 2008 vintage shows great purity of fruit and firm but fine tannins, giving great structure and power to the wines."

This was dark inky purple colored, full bodied, dense powerful and concentrated with a firm structured core of fruit yet nicely balanced. The bright aromatic fruit scents filled the room upon opening - the flavors were of ripe sweet dark berry, cranberry, boisenberry with a layer of mild licorice and tones of spice turning to smooth silky clinging tannins on the long finish.

RM 93 points. 

https://www.cellartracker.com/wine.asp?iWine=743959

http://www.glaetzer.com/

More on our getaway weekend and dining experience to come ...