Wine Advisor
Standish, The Relic Shiraz-Viognier 2022
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Description
Tasting notes
Reviewed by: Erin Larkin
The 2022 The Relic Shiraz-Viognier contains 2% Viognier skins, and this addition presents in this vintage as a core of raspberry and pomegranate. It is pure fruited and powerfully aromatic, as this cuvee always is. Interestingly, I am tasting this wine from two different glasses: one opened two days ago, one opened this morning. They are quite different, telling us once again that oxygen really is a friend to this producer, especially if choosing to drink these wines young. While the bottle opened two days ago is complete, balanced and utterly refined, it speaks more of its florals and fruit than it does its savory register of spice and complexity. However, the wine opened today has nuances of bacon fat and exotic spice. It is tightly coiled and springy and nowhere near as giving as the former. So, choose your own path. This vintage is a prettier, finer but no less long or coiled version of itself, and it will prove to be one of the greats in the cellar. The tannins certainly are a highlight for me. Built for age but also, in the framework of this beautiful season, absolutely available to you right now. An effortless beauty, here. 14.9% alcohol, sealed under natural cork.
About the Producer
The Standish Wine Company is located in Lyndoch, South Australia, in the Barossa wine region. Founded in 1999, the winery is already one of the outstanding wineries in the region despite its short history. Standish Wines was founded by Dan Standish. Mr Standish is an experienced winemaker who has a BSc in Chemical Engineering and has worked as a winemaker in California's Napa Valley, Sonoma County, Spain's La Rioja and France's Rhone Valley. In 1999, he inherited from his parents a vineyard in the Barossa Valley with typical sandy and clay soils and nearly 100 year old Syrah vines. Influenced by the style of wines from the Rhone Valley in France, Mr Standish considers this vineyard a gift from nature and it is the winery's mission to produce wines that express the character of the terroir. The grapes are harvested by hand, carefully brushed and destemmed, then fermented in wild yeasts in fermenters and aged for 30 months in 15% French oak barrels. Each wine is vinified for a minimum of two years before it can be sold, is neither filtered nor clarified before bottling, and only those wines of outstanding quality are labelled Standish. The estate's Syrahs are aromatic, full-bodied and sweet, with intense earthy and spicy flavours. In the past, the wines were only available for export or online orders, but now they are also available in small quantities to the national premium wine shops.
