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2004 RockBare Barossa Babe Shiraz
With an iridescent capsule and posing beauty on the back label the wine that goes by the name Barossa Babe has no intention of being a wallflower. The wine, unlike the packaging, is not gaudy or ostentatious and is a classic example of Barossan fruit with judicious lashings of oak. The nose offers char, toast and black fruits and a touch of linseed and liquorice. In the mouth there is ripe raspberry and fleshy black cherries, which morph into more toasty notes and baking spice complexity. For a sub $40 retail wine this is well and truly "punching above its weight" as the boxing crowd says. I personally don't know what it means, but I'm using that expression to mean that it is very good indeed, other more famous labels would charge close to $100 for quality such as this. The wine has beautifully fine and long tannins, well-balanced acidity and a savoury side, like dried sage and perhaps some faint cracked pepper, which adds complexity. The only down side to this wine, is that it is showing age a little earlier than I would expect, however it is always nice to see fruit showing aged character, something that most consumers miss out on. I'm thinking char grilled red meats, or herb crusted roast lamb. Go and punch someone above their waist and see how it feels, I bet it isn't as good as this!
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