Jim Barry The Armagh Shiraz 2016 (750ML)

99 JS / 99 DE / 97 WA / 96 WS / 96 VM

Wow. This is a bold, brassy shiraz that carries a wealth of very intense aromas of ripe blackberries, dark plums, licorice and sweetly spiced earth. Still so very youthful and primary. The palate is so powerful, so mouth-filling and so, so juicy. This manages to deliver such intensity and composure. Supple, long and deep-set tannins and heroically expressive fruit. Really impressive now, but this will deliver much more over the next two decades. One of the finest releases to date. - James Suckling

This is a brilliant wine that makes you sit up and pay attention. Concentrated and mouthwatering with spicy liquorice root and black cherries. Needs a couple more years to fully open but already it packs a punch without being overpowering, and it achieves the feat of great wines where you simply know how good they are by how your palate responds to the effortless balance of tannin, juice and brambled fruit. Long ageing potential also. 3.5pH, 70% French oak, 30% American oak. From sandy gravel soils with full sun exposure meaning natural low yields of around 30hl/ha.-Jane Anson, Decanter

My pick of the recently bottled vintages, the 2016 The Armagh Shiraz shows a bit more obvious oak (simply because of its youth) but also a wonderful taut tension between ripeness and acidity. The fruit here is a bit redder in profile, leaning more toward raspberries than blackberries, while still being fully ripe. Full-bodied and supple, it finishes cedary, intense and long, adding in complex, lingering spice notes. - Joe Czerwinski, Wine Advocate

Opens with a nose of black walnut liqueur, dark chocolate, freshly roasted coffee, palo santo, salted caramel and nutmeg that swirls around a core of ripe, fleshy spiced plum, black cherry and cassis flavors. The tannins are plush and polished, lending an elegant air to this powerful wine. Tremendous finish. Drink now through 2035. From Australia. - MW, Wine Spectator HOT Wine

Deeply colored and flavored, the full-throttle 2016 Shiraz The Armagh delivers a rich and impressive core of blackberry, chocolate, blueberry, cloves, earth, eucalypt and dried spices wrapped up in a cloak of oak. Immense fruit concentration follows with a freight train of sweet oak and immaculately balanced drying tannins, building up to a massive finish. The 2016 is big and deeply expressive.-Angus Hughson, Vinous Media