Five Wines

Friends hosted a Syrah tasting yesterday afternoon. The event was originally scheduled for today, but weather conditions were anything but promising so the event was moved up a day. It turned out to be a good idea as the weather has turned from cold and gray to colder and white; it's snowing and the wind is beginning to pick up with the weather people saying gusts of 45 mph this afternoon. A good day to stay home.

There were five wines on the table. Usually at these events there are clear winners and losers, but that wasn't the case yesterday. There were four very good wines and one wine that was simply outclassed, though it was more than drinkable. There was plenty of food and a lot of good discussion.

In the end the wine of the day was a 2005 Syan Shiraz from the Pyrennes of western Victoria in Australia. This wine started slowly, offering very little in the nose. It was a big wine, full of fruit and extract and alcohol, 14.8%. Dark fruit taste with plums and blueberries and a little spice in the mix. There was a tiny hint of chocolate at the end. Nice wine, but nothing to get excited about. An hour later this wine began to bloom. The heaviness seemed to disappear and the nose changed dramatically. The blueberries were strong and there was a wonderful mix of oak and cedar in this wine. It was quite an appealing wine. A little research after the fact revelaed the wine to have been aged in American oak hogsheads for 18 months and bottled unfiltered. It was simply a wine that needed time out of the bottle to show its true stuff.