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2023 Helbig 1915 Shiraz

$420.00
TASTE A delicious whack of plums and spiced red berries. Notes of dark chocolate on the back palate, with silken long tannins to underpin the power of fruit on the finish.
COLOR Red
VINTAGE 2023
VARIETAL Shiraz
REGION Barossa Valley
In stock
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An up close of the label of the wine Helbig 1915 Shiraz
2023 Helbig 1915 Shiraz

Production notes

Description

Only 699 bottles produced

A single vineyard selection of truly remarkable Shiraz that was planted by the Helbig family in 1915. This vineyard is located on the western ridge of the famous Barossa Valley and has been a highly sought after parcel for many of the Barossa’s leading winemakers. Luckily for the Ashmead family, we were able to acquire this vineyard in 2010, forever ending the race to get this amazing fruit.

Winemaker Notes

The spring ahead of the 2023 season presented with enough rain to make us happy - we even enjoyed getting some runoff into the vineyard dams! This mild start to the season resulted in a delay in budburst and subsequent longer ripening period owing to the very mild temperatures without heat spikes, aside from a short burst of heat around late December/early January.

With such tiny volumes of Helbig Shiraz, we fermented in puncheons with heads removed. After destemming, the fruit underwent a cold soak and then gentle plunging was used for cap management during fermentation. We held the new dry wine on skins for a short time to help develop the tannin structure, to ensure the fruit and tannin balance was right.

Tasting Notes

Alcohol: 14.8

Aroma: Brooding red fruits with spicy oak overtones

Appearance: Dark purple

Taste: A delicious whack of plums and spiced red berries. Notes of dark chocolate on the back palate, with silken long tannins to underpin the power of fruit on the finish.

Mouthfeel: Pure, focused

Ageing Process: Post pressing, this wine was kept on lees in new French oak until post malolactic fermentation, and then given a further year to relax and mature before bottling.

Cellaring

15+ years from vintage, given good cellaring conditions

Reviews

96 points, Dave Brookes, Halliday Wine Companion

A gorgeous shiraz sourced from the 1915 plantings of the Helbig family vineyard in Greenock. It sings true to its western Barossa roots with a ferruginous edge, and this release seems to have a little more detail and light than the previous model. It's at the lighter end of full-bodied and sits flush with fruit tones of doris plum, black cherry and blackberry fruits, etched with hints of baking spices, cedar, roasting meats, grilled fig, dark chocolate, plum conserve, fruitcake, purple florals and turned earth. Harmonious and elegant in its travel, with ironstone-edge, powdery tannins and a fine, lacy acidity that lends a freshness and velocity to that lovely pure fruit.

95 points - Andrew Caillard MW, The Vintage Journal

Medium-deep crimson. Lifted musky plum, dark chocolate aromas with sesame, marzipan notes. Fresh dark plum, blackberry spice flavours with intense cedar/ marzipan. Mocha oak notes and sinuous chocolaty tannins. Finishes spicy/ cedary with espresso notes. Oak-dominant wine, but should settle down. Drink 2026–2036

95 points, Erin Larkin, The Wine Advocate

The 2023 Helbig 1915 Shiraz remains a statuesque and powerful wine, but it is not as big or concentrated as last year's wine. I like both. Here, the wine is savory and spicy, with notes of sandalwood and clove, forest floor and aged leather, alongside the bright fruit notes of mulberry, blackberry and raspberry. In the mouth, the tannins are pliable and profuse, but I like the way they shape the fruit. The wine was fermented in French puncheons. This is a change from the early vintages, which were fermented in 1,500-liter closed-vat fermenters that trapped the alcohol and produced very big wines. This evolution means that the wine today, while substantial, is balanced and fresh. The Helbig family planted and farmed this 1915 planting for three generations, and now the Ashmeads own it (since 2010). Don Helbig still visits the vineyard occasionally, and the family maintains a good relationship with him. 700 bottles filled. 14.8% alcohol, sealed under natural cork.
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