Thursday, July 25, 2013

Ruggabellus Archaeus

It would have been an option to review an icon wine to celebrate the 50,000 views milestone, but I decided to have a look into the future, or what many say is the future. Ruggabellus is viewed by many as the most exciting newer winery in Australia, and by some as the new face of the Barossa. It specializes in a number of different GSMs.

The 2012 Ruggabellus Archaeus is my first ever taste from this winery. This wine is a Shiraz dominated GSM. Its colour is dark purple. Blackberry flavours jump out of the glass. The fruit flavours are very intense on the palate, and this at a moderate 13.7% alcohol. This wine is different, alright. There are very strong briary flavours in this wine so that despite the strong fruit core, the wine is actually quite savoury in the end. This might be the Mataro at work. Sufficient acidity makes the wine quite balanced. This wine is very slick, yet quite profound at the same time, built on the famous Barossa Shiraz flavours. My only concern, the structure is a little compact, rather than linear.

The future of the Barossa? This takes it a bit far, but certainly a great and different addition. I highly recommend to everybody to try this wine.

Score: 94/++


1 comment:

JasonM said...

It great to see more of the savoury styled GSM's coming out of Barossa, but still with that Barossa fruity core. You know where its from.

I recently reviewed one from Schwarz Wine Co, with similar profile. Great drinking.