“95 points. Deep, dense purple/red colour, with concentrated chocolate and plum aromas and flavours, a fair degree of oak but not overdone, and a trace of reduction on the early nose. Dense, powerful, concentrated but all things in harmony. A biggie but a goodie.” Huon Hooke The Real Review
A winery with incredible depth of history, particularly the family lineage of the Osborn family, d’Arenberg was established in 1912 in the fledgling McLaren Vale wine growing region by Joseph Osborn. Chester Osborn, as current winemaker and bon-vivant front person for d’Arenberg, represents the fourth generation of family wine heritage.
Chester prefers to work with individual parcels of fruit, sourcing the unique flavour spectrums and individuality of the fruit. The process is very hands-on and seeks to create wines of great fragrance and fruit purity.
Old, extremely low-yielding McLaren Vale vines are responsible for d'Arenberg's Dead Arm Shiraz - a wine of enormous power, intensity and real complexity. One of the flagships for McLaren Vale for many years, this wine continues to shine with a balanced between tradition and Chester Osborne driven innovation.
Dead Arm is a vine disease caused by the fungus Eutypa Lata that randomly affects vineyards all over the world. Often affected vines are severely pruned or replanted. One half, or an 'arm' of the vine slowly becomes reduced to dead wood. That side may be lifeless and brittle, but the grapes on the other side, while low yielding, display amazing intensity.
2017 D’Arenberg Dead Arm McLaren Vale Shiraz 14.5% 6x75cl
There are red fruits, lifted spice notes and earthy aromas on the nose. The vintage conditions are even more evident on the palate where flavour, tannin and acid are in perfect balance. There is an impressive amount of concentration in this wine, but it is immediately drinkable upon release. The Dead Arm Shiraz 2017 shows all the hall marks of a classic McLaren Vale Shiraz that will see it age gracefully for 15 plus years.