Wynns a winner for wine lovers

IN the late 1950s and ’60s, Wynns in Coonawarra was a household name for wine lovers.

Wynns was upmarket in price and consistently among Australia’s most sought after and finest.

The years and decades turned over, sometimes with extraordinary vintage releases, and sometimes not.

There is no specific timing, but let’s say that in about 2010, the painstaking viticultural work of Allen Jenkins and the winemaking skills of Sue Hodders’ team (which previously included Julian Langworthy at Deep Woods and Luke Skeer of Devil’s Lair these days) all started to pay off.

Since then, Wynns has been back at its very best and released a series of both great and great value-for-money wines.

Given the work and effort put in, the team now has enough quality fruit to have also produced a series of wonderful, new and high-quality individual vineyard labels.

Wynns is best known for the famous Black Label cabernet sauvignon that has been produced in every vintage since the 1950s, but in the early days was also known for the premium and now value-for-money White Label Coonawarra shiraz.

There have been some marvellous vintages of Wynns Coonawarra shiraz in the last few years, and the 1986 (18.5 points) still remains one of Australia’s greatest ever wine values.

And now comes the outstanding 2015 shiraz release, which has to be included amongst the finest few.

It is pure and intense with soft, fragrant edges around long, restrained and elegant cool climate shiraz fruit that has a classy, finely textured mouthfeel.

Subtle and appealing, the fruit is of higher quality than you’d expect in this price range and the same applies to the winemaking.

This was tasted in a high-profile group of 20 shirazes in the up to $45 price range and it was clearly both the finest and the finest value.

As for ageing potential, the pedigree is important, just as it was with Bart Cummings and Gai Waterhouse for 15-20 years.

Do you buy this? A definite yes. $25 and 18.4 points.