Wednesday, March 3, 2010

Paul Conti's Mariginiup Shiraz. Get it while you can.


In fact, get anything they make sourced from fruit grown at the Mariginiup block while you can.

Was speaking to Jason Conti at their Woodvale cellar door on the weekend, and that block's days are numbered.

Which is a shame, because the 2008 Shiraz, which I'm drinking right now, is pretty damn good. I reckon it'll be drinking better in 12 months time, but there is a lot to like right now.

In a hypothetical universe somewhere far, far away, I might leave the third of bottle that is left until tomorrow and finish it off when it has really opened up.

But screw that.

Sadly though, the block that also produces the Grenache & Shiraz blend (which is also very nice drinking), tawny and white ports and the Reserve Muscat is being engulfed by suburbia and they know it is only a matter of time before they will have to sell it for redevelopment.

My boss says that many of the new residents are so-called tree changers who you would think would like the idea of vineyards in their midst. Except of course that tree changers also tend to have hippyish tendencies and will imagine all kinds of ailments and rashes should the vines have to be sprayed for anything.

So the writing is on the wall as they say, even if, unlike King Belshazzar, the Contis can interpret the omen unaided.

Apparently there is already some doubt about whether the Reserve Muscat will be made anymore.

You know, why more people don't drink our amazing Australian fortified wines is a fucking mystery that you would need a diviner to solve. It's certainly got me beat.

The unbelievable flavours, unbelievably complex and concentrated at their best, provide world class drinking almost without equal.

Many would actually complement ripened cheeses, but who thinks of this matching these days? Idiots!

So a vinous treasure continues to whither on the vine before our very eyes (he says, while using those eyes to look longingly at his opened bottle of Talijancich Liqueur Verdelho).

Still, Contis have other vineyards on which to grow their grapes.

There's a restaurant that has a set menu lunch Wednesday to Friday and a la carte dinner Tuesday to Saturday.

Posted via email from Garth's posterous

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