It's a big, dark full-flavoured juicy wine with tannins that don't leap out of the glass to rip your throat out. They’re still there in spades, but in a quieter, more restrained manner than my previous experiences with the variety had led me to expect.
Rounded with a density in the flavour components that matched it up nicely with the hearty stew it accompanied.
If I lived somewhere where there's a real winter I'd be inclined to buy a dozen for those winter slow-simmered stews that would be a regular part of the week to week diet in those circumstances.
North Queensland winters don't get quite that low, and not for extended periods (a couple of nights below ten, and that's it) so it's going to be a case of a bottle or two in a mixed dozen. It'd be interesting to see how it would go with a couple of years' bottle age, though I note Mr Halliday has a drink by date of 2012.
By the time I got to the bottle, of course, the '06 was gone from the Cellar Door List, but we're about due for a Brown Brothers reorder (I want to get my hands on some of the Vermentino. Savagnin, Nero d'Avola, Graciano and Petit Verdot, so that order's going to run to two cases).
And based on the '06 there'll definitely be room for a couple of the '07 Durif in there as well.
