Red fruits and lifted spice notes on the one hand to more brooding, dark, ashen, earthy aromas on the other. There is an impressive amount of concentration in this wine but at the same time, it feels somewhat more restrained compared to other more in your face, rustic Dead Arm vintages. Don’t be fooled by its approachability however, The Dead Arm Shiraz 2017 also shows all the hallmarks of a classic McLaren Vale Shiraz that will see it age gracefully for 15 plus years.

James Suckling 94 Points

Decanter 94 Points

About d’Arenberg Winery

All d’Arenberg estate owned and leased vineyards are NASAA Certified for organic and biodynamic processes. This natural and environmentally friendly philosophy encourages strong root systems that penetrate the soil, resulting in lively tannin structures, soil characters and fine minerality. These practices also ensure that yields are kept low with concentrated flavours and excellent natural acidity.

From entry level to iconic, all d’Arenberg wines have been basket pressed, reds and whites, with all red ferments foot trod during fermentation.

Walking the vineyard rows and tasting grapes, Chester Osborn classifies and determines the ideal picking time for each individual vineyard.

Small batches of grapes are gently crushed, then transferred to five tonne headed-down open fermenters, all batches remain separate until final blending. The red wines are foot trod two thirds of the way through fermentation, and then basket pressed.

d’Arenberg is one of the only wineries in Australia to basket press both white wines as well as reds, making for a labour intensive process, but the quality of the results makes this worthwhile as the action is controlled and extremely gentle.

White wines are basket pressed before fermentation to ensure no colour or tannins are extracted from the skins, and the reds are pressed afterwards. After pressing, reds are transferred to barrel to complete fermentation, and then aged on lees to slow aging and keep the wine fresh, while also reducing oak influence.

All parcels remain separate until final blending, an extensive barrel tasting process is undertaken to determine the final wine. There is no racking until final blending, and the wines do not undertake fining or filtration prior to bottling.