Print this Wine         1996 Hewitson "L'Oizeau" Shiraz   MCLAREN VALE                 January Release   Shiraz       Fully mature, low yielding vines in the McLaren Vale supply the fruit for this fine wine. Dean Hewitson has spent many vintages honing his winemaking skills with some of Australia’s most highly regarded producers, Petaluma for example, and finally with this wine he gets a chance to make some thing entirely for himself. The wealth of his experience in the winery shows as this wine displays the richness of concentrated Shiraz fruit counterbalanced superbly with fair lashings of sweet new oak. The fruit flavors are raspberries and plums with a spicy overlay of cloves and nutmeg. On the palate the fruit is more obvious and more powerful than the oak. The weight of fruit is medium to full bodied and there is considerable texture as the wine slides over the palate. The finish lingers on with plenty of acid driving the back of the palate along with firm tannins. Although the wine has not yet reached its peak you can certainly enjoy it now whilst the fruit is fresh and the acidic finish tingling. Give the wine between 5 and 7 years in the cellar and the finish will be much softer and the wine will develop more rustic complex characters. The choice is yours but you will not lose either way. Try the wine with game poultry such as duck and quail. The spicy varietal component in the wine will be a superb match with the gamy flavour of the birds. The tannin and acid finish to the wine will complement either rich reduction sauces or spicy relishes that are typically served with these meats.

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