Through the wine club I am involved in, I get the opportunity to try out some different wines I would not normally try. The Yarra Yerling is exactly one of those wines that I am not exposed to, and I took a while to learn their numbers. The No. 1 is cabernet sauvignon, the No. 2 is a shiraz that are both full bodied and the No. 3 a medium bodied wine.

The 2018 Dry Red No. 2 is a blend of 95% shiraz and rounded out with 3% viognier, 1% marsanne and 1% mataro, so one could argue this is pretty much a shiraz. A 20+ years cellaring potential for a shiraz is huge, normally 10+ is a pretty good guide for a premium wine. I have ordered a carton, some will be drinking now with my father and some will be cellared, I have to really organise a spreadsheet with wines and vintages along with preferred drinking times.

The Dry Red No. 2 is drawn from the original 1969 plantings of shiraz, further shiraz was planted throughout the 1990’s, with the mataro and viognier sourced from vines planted between 1984 to 1995. As a premium winemaker, this was hand-picked fruit and destemmed before fed into the fermenter with some stems added later to contribute to structure.

Frozen vionier and marsanne skins were added to the bottom of the fermenter to round out the flavour. The No. 2 was matured for 12 months in French oak barriques with 30% of the barriques being new. The aroma is plums, violets and spice with some cigar box in the aftertaste. I suggest there is a fine oak structure that is not overdone, this happened a few years back where some wines were over wooded, this imparts enough fine oak flavours.